The Confluence Of Public And Private International Law

A sharp distinction is usually drawn between public international law, concerned with the rights and obligations of states with respect to other states and individuals, and private international law, concerned with issues of jurisdiction, applicable law and the recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments in international private law disputes before national courts. Through the adoption of an international systemic perspective, Dr Alex Mills challenges this distinction by exploring the ways in which norms of public international law shape and are given effect through private international law. Based on an analysis of the history of private international law, its role in US, EU, Australian and Canadian federal constitutional law, and its relationship with international constitutional law, he rejects its conventional characterisation as purely national law. He argues instead that private international law effects an international ordering of regulatory authority in private law, structured by international principles of justice, pluralism and subsidiarity.

The public policy exception in private international law is designed to provide a national backstop in the application of foreign laws. This book provides detailed and practical comparative coverage of the use of public policy in the context of private international law across a number of important jurisdictions spanning three continents.

Is Private International Law (PIL) still fit to serve its function in today’s global environment? In light of some calls for radical changes to its very foundations, this timely book investigates the ability of PIL to handle contemporary and international problems, and inspires genuine debate on the future of the field.

Horatia Muir Watt and Diego P. Fernández-Arroyo: Introduction: The Relevance of Private International Law to the Global Governance Debate Part I: BEHIND CLOSED DOORS: THE PRIVATE MODEL AND ITS DISCONTENTS Section A. Epistemological Challenge: The Meaning of 'Private' in Private International Law 1: Geoffrey Samuel: Comparative Law as Resistance 2: Robert Wai: Private v Private: Transnational Private Law and Contestation in Global Economic Governance 3: Ralf Michaels: Post-critical Private International Law: From Politics to Technique Section B. Political Critique: Privatization as Homogenization 4: Tomaso Ferrando: Global Land Grabbing: A Tale of Three Legal Homogenizations 5: Veronica Corcodel: Governance Implications of Comparative Legal Thinking: On Henry Maine's Jurisprudence and British Imperialism Section C. Searching for Legitimacy: Questions of Design 6: Diego P. Fernández-Arroyo: Private Adjudication Without Precedent? 7: Gilles Cuniberti: The Merchant Who Would Not Be King: Unreasoned Fears about Private Lawmaking 8: Yannick Radi: Balancing the Public and the Private in International Investment Law PART II: BEYOND THE SCHISM: EMERGING MODELS AND WORLDVIEWS Section A. The Global Turn to Informality: Pragmatism and Constructivism 9: Benoit Frydman: A Pragmatic Approach To Global Law 10: Harm Schepel: Rules of Recognition: A Legal Constructivist Approach to Transnational Private Regulation 11: Michael Karayanni: The Extraterritorial Application of Access to Justice Rights: On the Availability of Israeli Courts to Palestinian Plaintiffs Section B. Re-importing Public Law Methodology: Federalism and Constitutionalism 12: Alex Mills: Variable Geometry, Peer Governance, and the Public International Perspective on Private International Law 13: Jacco Bomhoff: The Constitution of the Conflict of Laws 14: Jérémy Heymann: Importing Proportionality to the Conflict of Laws Section C. Reinventing a Global Horizon: Working towards a Global Public Good 15: Bram van der Eem: Financial Stability and Private International Law 16: Ivana Isailovic: Recognition(and Mis-recognition) in Private International Law 17: Sabine Corneloup: Can Private International Law Contribute to Global Migration Governance? Horatia Muir Watt: Paradigm Change in Private International Law: Renewal, Circularity, or Decline?

This book examines interactions and discusses intersectionality between public international law and private international law. With contributions from scholars from USA, Canada, Australia, India and EU, this book brings out truly international perspectives on the topic. The contributions are arranged in four themes—Public international law and private international law: historical and theoretical considerations of the boundary; Harmonisation of private international law by public international law instruments: evaluation of process, problems, and effectiveness; Case studies of intersectionality between public international law and private international law; Future trends in the relationship between public international law and private international law. The ultimate aim of this book is to analyse whether these two legal disciplines become convergent or they are still divergent as usual. With wide coverage spanning across these four themes, the book has takeaways for a wide readership. For scholars and researchers in the fields of public international law and private international law, this book sparks further thoughts and debates in both disciplines and highlight areas for continuing research. For practitioners, this book offers fresh insights and perspectives on contemporaneous issues of significance. This book is also be a great resource for students at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels taking subjects such as public international law or private international law or some related disciplines such as international sale of goods, international trade law or international investment law to advance their knowledge and understanding of the disciplines.

Provides an unprecedented historical, theoretical and comparative analysis and appraisal of party autonomy in private international law. These issues are of great practical importance to any lawyer dealing with cross-border legal relationships, and great theoretical importance to a wide range of scholars interested in law and globalisation.

Do private and public international law coincide in their underlying objectives when it comes to their respective contribution to the realisation of global values? How do they work together towards the consistency and efficiency of the international legal order? This edited collection sets out a vision: to serve modern society, the international legal order cannot be defined as public or private. Linkages and Boundaries focuses on the interface between private and public international law and the synergies that a joint approach brings to topical issues, such as corporate social responsibility and environmental law, as well as foundational concepts such as international jurisdiction, state sovereignty and party autonomy. The book showcases the dynamic interaction between the two disciplines, with a view to contribute to a dialogue that is still only in the early stages of delivering its full potential. The collection explores ways to deepen the dialogue between these two distinct but interrelated disciplines, with a view to further their progression towards a more integrated and holistic approach to legal problems that require an international approach. The book brings together well-known experts and new voices from both disciplines and from a wide range of jurisdictions in Europe, North America and South America.

Contemporary debates about the changing nature of law engage theories of legal pluralism, political economy, social systems, international relations (or regime theory), global constitutionalism, and public international law. Such debates reveal a variety of emerging responses to distributional issues which arise beyond the Western welfare state and new conceptions of private transnational authority. However, private international law tends to stand aloof, claiming process-based neutrality or the apolitical nature of private law technique and refusing to recognize frontiers beyond than those of the nation-state. As a result, the discipline is paradoxically ill-equipped to deal with the most significant cross-border legal difficulties - from immigration to private financial regulation - which might have been expected to fall within its remit. Contributing little to the governance of transnational non-state power, it is largely complicit in its unhampered expansion. This is all the more a paradox given that the new thinking from other fields which seek to fill the void - theories of legal pluralism, peer networks, transnational substantive rules, privatized dispute resolution, and regime collision - have long been part of the daily fare of the conflict of laws. The crucial issue now is whether private international law can, or indeed should, survive as a discipline. This volume lays the foundations for a critical approach to private international law in the global era. While the governance of global issues such as health, climate, and finance clearly implicates the law, and particularly international law, its private law dimension is generally invisible. This book develops the idea that the liberal divide between public and private international law has enabled the unregulated expansion of transnational private power in these various fields. It explores the potential of private international law to reassert a significant governance function in respect of new forms of authority beyond the state. To do so, it must shed a number of assumptions entrenched in the culture of the nation-state, but this will permit the discipline to expand its potential to confront major issues in global governance.