Since the golden age of the nation state, the extent to which commerce is conducted across borders has risen substantially. Economic globalization thus has led to a shift in the demand structure for institutions that support commerce. Over the past forty years the need for institutions adapted...

The individual and household sector accounts for roughly 40 percent of United States energy use and carbon dioxide emissions, yet the laws and policies directed at reductions from this sector often reflect a remarkably simplistic model of behavior. This Essay addresses one of the obstacles to...

Actions by individuals and households to reduce carbon-based energy consumption have the potential to change the picture of U.S. energy consumption and carbon dioxide emissions in the near term. To tap this potential, however, energy policies and programs need to replace outmoded assumptions...

More than forty states worldwide currently pursue explicit political strategies to expand and promote their bioeconomies. This paper assesses these strategies in the context of the global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Our theoretical framework differentiates between four pathways of...

The following case study investigates the contract enforcement institutions that enable German customers to purchase software in Asia and Eastern Europe. The case study shows that nation-states are hardly able to generate a legal "shadow" for cross-border business relations. The same holds true...

The aim of this paper is to explore the political dimensions of investment arbitration. What drives the structures and rules of this institution of private-transnational dispute settlement? To define political dimensions and develop the basis of a political explanation of investment arbitration,...

First, this article proposes that the rise of the Internet and further information and communication technologies (ICT) has facilitated the evolution of a new, virtual form of relational contracts. This hypothesis is developed inductively by drawing on the results of an explorative empirical...