ABSTRACT
This is the first of four chapters that explore in detail the specific practices or technologies of Private International Law that have been crucial to the mobilization of private power, private authority, and private purposes in contemporary global capitalism. The focus here is on the technologies of contractual engineering through party autonomy which has become the central principle of modern Private International Law. I draw on legal realist and socio-legal scholarship to explore how these technologies and practices work and intersect with power, and use the case of the private contractual regulation of global derivates markets to emphasize their significance. The chapter ends with a note on the intersection between party autonomy and the projects of legal harmonization.
