A Search for Sovereignty introduced the term “legal posturing” to describe attempts by imperial agents, including pirates, to show that they were serving the interests of sovereign sponsors.

The book also traced the influence of legal conflicts in European empires on definitions of sovereignty and other elements of early international law.

[10] Rage for Order: The British Empire and the History of International Law, 1800-1850, coauthored with Lisa Ford, uncovers a vast project of global legal reform in the early nineteenth century.

[5] Benton also co-edited a volume with Alejandro Portes and Manuel Castells on the informal sector in comparative economic development.

She coined the term "interpolity law" to refer to global patterns of legal interactions in eras before the rise and proliferation of nation-states.