The project inquires the consequences for the „rule of law“ deriving from the special context of limited statehood. By starting off from the increasing process of denationalization of rule-making and jurisdiction, and by refering to jurisprudence and social sciences literature on the functions, the emergence and the effectiveness of non-state legal systems, two leading questions arise: First, how do „legitimate and certain“ normative systems emerge in contexts beyond the nation state, and how can they solve the normative conflicts and collisions that expectedly follow the pluralisation of rule-making and enforcement. And second, relating to the concept of functional equivalence, the project seeks for ways to properly describe the interactions of the multiple systems of regulation, and examines as to which extent legitimate and certain non-state normative structures rely on a „shadow of the nation state law“.