This lecture series explores the evolving frontiers of private law through the lens of interfacing—as both a metaphor and a method. Private law today no longer operates in isolation as a self-contained normative system; it is continuously shaped by its encounters with adjacent domains. These include not only other legal fields but also the broader social, technological, and economic environments, where private law intersects with digital infrastructures, social movements, climate exigencies, financial architectures or circular economy imperatives. The concept of interfacing, originally drawn from textile production where an ‘interface’ denotes the inner layer used to join and give form to separate fabrics, foregrounds these seams of connection. It invites scholars to reflect on how private law is stitched into wider regulatory landscapes, and how it is restitched, destabilized, or reinforced through these points of contact. By attending to interfaces—such as between contract and code, property and sustainability, tort and platform accountability—we aim to trace the normative frictions and alignments that animate contemporary private law.

In embracing this perspective, the series positions private law as a site of active mediation, responsive to transformations in technology, politics, and society. At the same time, it reflects critically on private law’s own texture, its internal vocabularies, traditions, and genealogies: how do the pasts of private law shape its present and possible futures, which concepts remain fit for purpose, and which require retooling? Interfacing Private Law is thus both a descriptive and normative endeavor—tracing how private law is made and remade in practice, and questioning what role it ought to play in governing the rapidly shifting realities of the 21st century.

Lineup Semester 1

Katharina Pistor (Columbia Law School): Monday September 29
The Law of Capitalism and How to Transform It
A3.15 (Moot Court) 
15.30-17.00

 Rita Simon (Charles University, Prague): Monday October 27
Repair or Replace? Legal Remedies and the Decline of Repair Culture in Eastern Europe
A3.01 (Research seminar room)
15.30-17.00

Ernest Lim (NUS Law): Monday November 24
Fiduciary Duties, Climate Change, and the External Dimension: Lessons from State-Owned Enterprises
A3.01 (Research seminar room)
15.30-17.00