Research Handbook on Extraterritoriality in International Law, Edited by Austen Parrish and Cedric Ryngaert, by Austen Parrish and Cedric Ryngaert, Edward Elgar, 2023, 507 pages

This edited volume by Austen Parrish and Cedric Ryngaert, recently published in the Research Handbooks in International Law series, is a welcome contribution to an evolving literature in international law which has started paying critical attention to the under-theorised practices of jurisdiction and extraterritoriality and their prominent role in global governance (see S. Dorsett and S. McVeigh, Jurisdiction, Routledge, 1st ed., 2012 ; D. S. Margolies, Ö Umut, P. Maïa and N. Tzouvala (Eds.), The extraterritoriality of law : History, theory, politics, Routledge, 2019 ; S. Allen, D. Costelloe, M. Fitzmaurice, P. Gragl and E. Guntrip (Eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Jurisdiction in International Law, Oxford University Press, 2019).These are, of course, topics familiar to private international lawyers, and readers of this journal will undoubtedly find relevant the broad overview the book provides of key debates on extraterritorial law, drawing on doctrine and practices from different legal fields and geographies. Yet, the book’s significance goes beyond the useful technical analyses the chapters offer of legislation and case law. Its strength lies in its focus on diffuse practices of extraterritoriality and the techniques they mobilise, providing an insightful – if patchy – picture of how ‘spatial knowledge is institutionally (re-) produced in a context of competing narratives on the geographic extent of normative authority and State power’ (p. 8). After a brief presentation of the book, I will reflect on that point by considering the image different chapters draw of how extraterritoriality shapes international legal power, and I will discuss some of the questions raised by that vision…