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Both the ideals of the European Union (EU) and the EU's recent political difficulties have attracted comparison with the Habsburg empire. In recent years, some of those making comparison have turned to the Austrian Jewish novelists, Stefan Zweig and Joseph Roth, who were crucial to the imaginative emergence of the Habsburg Myth. This paper analyses their writings and those of Robert Musil and Gregor von Rezzori in relation to the Habsburg Myth as a story about European unity, about Austria-Hungary as a supranational polity and about Austria-Hungary's self-proclaimed providential purpose in European affairs. It explores the dissonance between the Habsburg Myth and the EU's territorial composition and argues that the Habsburg Myth is, nonetheless, revealing about the EU's internal hierarchies and its geopolitical difficulties in relation to Russia.

Officially, of course, the world is now post-imperial. The Q’ing and Ottoman empires fell on the eve of World War I, and the last Leviathans of Europe's imperial past, the Austro-Hungarian and Tsarist empires, lumbered into the grave soon after. Tocsins of liberation were sounded on all sides, in the name of democracy (Wilson) and socialism (Lenin). Later attempts to remake and proclaim empires – above all, Hitler's annunciation of a “Third Reich” – now seem surreal, aberrant, and dystopian. The Soviet Union, the heir to the Tsarist empire, found it prudent to call itself a “federation of socialist republics.” Mao's China followed suit. Now, only a truly perverse, contrarian regime would fail to deploy the rhetoric of democracy.

Politics has three contingent aspects, viz. a role‐play, a Majestic Art and a human social science. We may talk of the first aspect as just politicking. The second aspect was delineated by Aristotle as an art of doing vis‐a‐vis the art of making: He meant by the former a behavioural art and by the latter a productive art; and the third aspect represents a comprehensive analytical study of human social behaviour.

Shortly after I arrived in Baton Rouge to begin studies toward a Ph.D. in history in the early 1970s, I was assigned the dubious task of giving lectures and grading examinations in History 1001, the first half of “Western Civilizations.” After attempting to grade the first semester's exams, which always included a section of identifications, I began to look seriously for a standard reference book of people, places, and dates, since the students were much given to inventive imagination. Several fellow graduate students advised me to obtain a copy of “Langer,” which they referred to as the “Historian's Bible.” It was to be one of my wisest purchases, and the book has continued to serve me well over the years. The book to which they referred me was William Langer's An Encyclopedia of World History, which a prominent historian has called the “Diary of Humankind.”

The purpose of this study is to critically review the book Islamic Law and International Law by Emilila Powell.

The book review is undertaken from a comparative legal and political science perspective, including arguments and insights from international relations, international law, Islamic law, Islamic culture, religious studies, legal history and European as well as international political history.

While the empirical part of Powell’s work (chapters 5, 6 and 7) shows a methodologically veryc well done approach and at the same time highly interesting insights, both foundation and context show several critical points, in particular, a lack of differentiation with respect to the Western politico-legal tradition, its concepts and the resulting implications.

The book represents an excellent starting point that should inspire new, more intensive as well as exhaustive research on this topic.

The book generates valuable insights for practitioners such as judges at international courts dealing with issues involving so-called Islamic law states, as well as politicians or public service officials in the context of international law and international politics.

As the paper is a comprehensive review of the book based upon comparatively based insights from international relations, international law, Islamic law, Islamic culture, religious studies, legal history and European as well as international political history, the arguments of Powell are analyzed and commented upon in a comprehensive, well-founded and fair way. This should give potential readers a good understanding of Powell’s arguments, inspire a critical lecture of the book and contribute to the important discourse on the connex between international law and Islamic law.

The purpose of this paper is to study how several brands like Poulain, Liebig and Guérin have helped to disseminate the French roman national through their chromolithographs at the beginning of the 20th century. By doing so, the paper highlights the participation of brands in the co-construction of the French roman national, a historical narrative that articulates state-supported collective memories.

A total of 1,106 historical trade cards have been collected and analyzed. Historical studies of the roman national have been used as secondary sources to aid in the interpretation of the motifs conveyed in those chromolithographs.

Chromolithographic images produced by various brands at the beginning of the 20th century contributed to the roman national. They provide an ethnocentric, patriotic and linear view of history but are also crossed by political fault lines, opposing secular and Catholic visions of history.

The chromolithographs produced and disseminated by companies have so far only been analyzed as promotional tools, aimed at popularizing brands and stores. By studying roman national motifs, this paper helps us understand what role businesses have played in building other narratives and forging a national spirit.

To the Most Rev. M.A. Corrigan, Archbishop of New York: