The Future of African Customary Law

Customary laws and traditional institutions in Africa constitute comprehensive legal systems that regulate the entire spectrum of activities from birth to death. Once the sole source of law, customary rules now exist in the context of pluralist legal systems with competing bodies of domestic constitutional law, statutory law, common law and international human rights treaties. The book promotes discussion and understanding of customary law and explores its continued relevance in sub-Saharan Africa. This volume considers the characteristics of customary law and efforts to ascertain and codify customary law, and how this body of law differs in content, form and status from legislation and common law. It also addresses a number of substantive areas of customary law including the role and power of traditional authorities; customary criminal law; customary land tenure, property rights and intestate succession; and the relationship between customary law, human rights and gender equality.

Jeanmarie Fenrich is the Director of Special Projects in Africa for the Leitner Center for International Law and Justice at Fordham Law School in New York: She graduated magna cum laude from Fordham Law School, where she served as editor-in-chief of the Fordham Law Review. She has conducted field research and authored publications on issues related to domestic violence, discrimination faced by women with HIV/AIDS, women's property rights, and women in customary-law marriage under domestic and international human rights law. Paolo Galizzi is Clinical Associate Professor of Law and Director of the Sustainable Development Legal1 Initiative (SDLI) at the Leitner Center for International Law and Justice at Fordham Law School. He previously held academic positions at Imperial College London and the Universities of Nottingham, Verona, and Milan. Professor Galizzi's research-interests lie in international law, environmental law, and law of sustainable development, and he has conducted fieldwork in several African countries. Tracy E. Higgins co-founded the Leitner Center for International Law and Justice at Fordham Law School where she is a co-director and a law professor. She is a farmer editor of the Harvard Law Review, a Women's Law and Public Policy Fellow, and an Adjunct Professor at Georgetown University Law Center. Higgins has published numerous academic articles focusing on feminist jurisprudence, international human rights, and constitutional law in many of the nation's leading law journals.