Party Autonomy in Global Context

Author(s):  
Horatia Muir Watt

The aim of this chapter is to contribute to transdisciplinary dialogue on a defining paradox within the classic liberal meta-discourse that still seems to determine structures of thought right across the social sciences. Profound transformations linked to the global legal turn have meant that while state-centered liberalism continues to define contemporary paradigms in legal thinking, it does so according to a curiously abridged or truncated version, which in turn affects the shape of the social, political, or economic “reality” that it purports merely to govern. The ensuing distortion is of very specific relevance in what is known as private international law—the part of the law that provides the legal framework for late capitalism, or, in different terms, the informal normative infrastructure of the global economy.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eduardo Florio de León

Abstract On 17 November 2020, the General Law on Private International Law (Law 19.920) was approved. This Law resulted from a process of hard work that took over two decades of discussions and debates.1 With this Law, Uruguay becomes one of a group of countries that have already carried out this kind of reform, particularly in regard to international commercial law and international contracts. The new Law 19.920 allows parties to choose the applicable law (State or non-State law) to regulate their international contractual obligations. This reform has a real disruptive imprint since Uruguay leaves behind its old and anachronistic regulation of the matter. This article provides a general analysis of the regulation of international commercial law under Law 19.920 (Articles 13 and 51) and the new regime applicable to international contracts, including the parties’ right to choose the applicable law (Article 45) (State or non-State law), which increases their autonomy in comparison with the previous regime.


Author(s):  
Horatia Muir Watt

The ways in which the background rules of private law determine the balance of power within the global economy are difficult to identify to the extent that the reach of any given legal system and its combination with other potentially contradictory sets of national regulation are uncertain. The specific contention here is that private international law, which allocates the various sets of applicable rules on all these points when they involve private, usually corporate, actors, has served above all to dispense them from the regulatory constraints to which they might be subject in a domestic setting. It has thereby provided the building blocks that have allowed capital to expand beyond borders and the pursuit of profit to develop to the detriment of competing values, beyond control.


Author(s):  
Yeo Tiong Min

This chapter describes Singaporean perspectives on the Hague Principles. Party autonomy is recognized as a very important principle in the private international law of Singapore. The primacy given to the role of party autonomy is evidenced by the adoption of the New York Convention and UNCITRAL Model Law for international arbitration, the adoption of the Convention on Choice of Court Agreements for international litigation, and the palpable support of the UNCITRAL Convention on International Settlement Agreements Resulting from Mediation. Most of private international law in Singapore is sourced in judge-made law. In the absence of direct Singapore authority, Singapore courts have traditionally looked to English case law for guidance, but increasingly, the courts have looked to the laws of other jurisdictions, and indeed international instruments which do not have binding force in Singapore law. Given the level of sophistication of existing common law contract choice of law rules, it is unlikely that Singapore will engage in radical law reform. However, it is likely that the Singapore courts will continue to look to the Hague Principles for guidance in areas where the common law is unclear or where there is a gap or strong imperative for change.


Author(s):  
Gebremeskel Fekadu Petros

This chapter reflects on Ethiopian perspectives on the Hague Principles. Ethiopia does not have a codified law regulating matters of private international law, nor is there detailed case law from which one could derive key principles of the subject. While the shortage of private international law in Ethiopia is evident, the problem is most severe in the area of applicable law. In relation to party autonomy in choice of law, the Federal Supreme Court’s Cassation Division has handed down some interesting decisions, and these indeed have the force of law in Ethiopia. Nevertheless, the approach of the Ethiopian courts in respect of party autonomy is not very developed and clear, including in the field of international commercial contracts. While it would be prudent for Ethiopian courts to refer to the Hague Principles as persuasive authority, this requires awareness of the existence of the Hague Principles. In the long term, the Hague Principles will surely find their way into Ethiopian law.


Author(s):  
Gama Lauro ◽  
Tiburcio Carmen ◽  
Albuquerque Felipe

This chapter evaluates Brazilian perspectives on the Hague Principles. Despite the proposition of several bills in the 1960s, no legislative initiative to modernize the Brazilian private international law has succeeded so far. The most recent legislative proposals have focused on modifying Article 9 of the Law of Introduction to the Norms of Brazilian Law (LINDB) rather than the whole system. One of these proposals, pending before the Senate, amends the Brazilian Code of Consumer Protection and updates and expands the contents of Article 9 LINDB. This bill incorporates several provisions of the Hague Principles; it states the basic principle of party autonomy and authorizes choice of law in respect of international contracts (B2B transactions). As Brazil still waits for law reform, the Hague Principles may be relevant as persuasive authority before the Brazilian courts. In this sense, the Hague Principles may be used in the interpretation, supplementation, and development of the applicable rules and principles of Brazilian private international law.


Author(s):  
Pietro Franzina

International law scholarship has traditionally been understood in Italy as encompassing the study of both public and private international law. The two subjects are still considered jointly for recruitment purposes and are mostly taught by the same professors. Pasquale Stanislao Mancini, who regarded nationality as a foundation of both disciplines, had a major influence on the popularization of this approach in the mid-nineteenth century. The advent of positivism, a few decades later, entailed a general rejection of Mancini’s views but did not challenge the integrated approach to the different branches of international law. Rather, the positivist turns triggered a renewed reflection on the ties between the two subjects. The study of international law, some argued, should cover, alongside international rules, such municipal rules as deal with international matters. The chapter outlines the origin and evolution of the Italian integrated approach to international law and its perception by today’s scholars, in Italy and abroad.


2019 ◽  
pp. 1-42
Author(s):  
Adrian Briggs

This introductory chapter begins with a brief discussion of the effect of the unexecuted decision of the United Kingdom to leave the European Union. If the United Kingdom were to withdraw on the terms approved by Parliament, the resulting legal framework would, in principle, be that put in place by the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018. That is to say, on ‘Exit Day’, the European Communities Act 1972 will be repealed. This will, at a stroke, remove the legal basis upon which a substantial body of private international law takes effect in the legal order of the United Kingdom. The chapter then sets out the book’s focus, which is the conflict of laws, followed by discussions of the common law’s conception of private international law and legislation establishing private international law as European law.


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