Poul F Kjaer is Alexander von Humboldt Fellow at the Cluster of Excellence: Formation of Normative Orders, Goethe University Frankfurt am Main.Gunther Teubner is Professor of Law and Principal Investigator at the Cluster of Excellence: Formation of Normative Orders, Goethe University Frankfurt am Main and Distinguished Professor at the International University College, Torino.Alberto Febbrajo is Professor of Sociology and Anthropology of Law at the University of Macerata, Italy.

• Introduction Poul F KjaerSECTION I: The Financial Crisis in a Systemic Perspective1. A Constitutional Moment? The Logics of 'Hitting the Bottom' Gunther Teubner2. Towards a General Theory of Function System Crises Rudolf StichwehSECTION II: DynamicsSection II.1: The Breakdown of Expectations 3. The Financial Market Crisis—a Case of Network Failure? Karl-Heinz Ladeur4. Death by Complexity—the Financial Crisis and the Crisis of Law in World Society Moritz Renner5. Political Epidemiology and the Financial Crisis Urs StäheliSection II.2: Fundamental Crises of society 6. The Return of Crisis Hauke Brunkhorst7. The Culture Form of Crisis Dirk Baecker8. What is a Crisis? Jean ClamSECTION III: ReactionsSection III.1: Regulatory Reactions 9. Eroding Boundaries: On Financial Crisis and an Evolutionary Concept of Regulatory Reform Marc Amstutz10. The Failure of Regulatory Institutions—a Conceptual Framework Alberto FebbrajoSection III.2: Individual and Collective Reactions 11. Struggles for Law: Global Social Rights as an Alternative to Financial Market Capitalism Kolja Möller12. The Ethics of the Financial Crisis Aldo MascareñoSection III.3: Constitutional Transformation 13. The Future of the State Chris Thornhill14. Law and Order within and Beyond National Configurations Poul F Kjaer

...a welcome addition to this scholarship. It presents the first systems-theoretical analysis of this topic.One of the chief virtues of this book is that it avoids becoming entangled in the details of the regulatory responses in the aftermath of the global financial crisis. Instead, the authors step back and attempt to shed light on the deeper problems that led to the latest financial turmoil and the challenges ahead. Another particularly admirable quality of this edited volume is that it challenges the common orthodoxy that sees the latest crisis as a failure of risk perception and management. The book convincingly demonstrates that the financial crisis of 2008 is a symptom of deeper structural transformations.An interesting feature of this book is that it integrates a range of insights from the discipline of economics...the volume is an exemplary case of scholarly work that demonstrates the explanatory power of systems theory. In short, this edited volume contains a host of sophisticated and insightful essays which are worth reading.