Views
Recognition of Italian Extrajudicial Divorces in Tunisia — Between Methodological Uncertainty and the Need to Preserve Continuity of Personal Status Across Borders
I. Introduction
Recent years have witnessed a movement towards the dejudicialization of consensual divorce and the proliferation of extrajudicial divorce mechanisms notably in Europe. While this mode of “private divorce” is not, as such, a new phenomenon and extrajudicial divorce has been practised in different forms across various parts of the world (see e.g., Béligh Elbalti, “Le divorce au Japon et son accueil en Tunisie” (2026) 73 Osaka University Law Review 6), it has attracted increasing attention in recent years, given the growing number of European jurisdictions that have introduced mechanisms allowing spouses to dissolve their marriage outside the courts, as well as the complex questions that such divorces raise in terms of their recognition and circulation across borders (for a comparative view in Europe, see e.g., CJEU, Directorate for Research and Documentation, “Extrajudicial Divorce: Rules, Procedures and Cross-Border Recognition in Member States” (Research Note, February 2022) 3; Pablo Quinzá Redondo, “The Recognition of Non-Judicial Divorces in Europe” in Konrad Duden and Denise Wiedemann (eds), Changing Families, Changing Family Law in Europe (Intersentia, 2024) 23). This is particularly true of the Italian form of extrajudicial divorce, introduced by Decree-Law No. 132/2014, converted into Law No. 162/2014, which allows spouses meeting specified conditions to obtain a divorce through an agreement before the civil registrar, rather than through a court.
Private International Law and European Society
from Marlene Tiede, a Research Fellow and PhD Candidate at the Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law.
Can one speak of a European society without speaking about private relations? Recent scholarship on European society has largely approached the concept through the lens of public law. Yet societies are constituted at least as much by the horizontal relations between individuals and groups as by public institutions. In the absence of a comprehensive European private law, this blogpost turns to EU private international law (PIL), the principal framework for coordinating interactions between the diverse private laws of the Member States and structuring cross-border private life within the Union. I will argue that EU PIL brings into view the importance of coordination frameworks for organising a mode of integration based not on unification, but on interdependence.
The New Zealand Supreme Court’s judgment in Kea Investments Ltd v Wikeley on anti-enforcement relief
In Kea Investments Ltd v Wikeley [2026] NZSC 97, the New Zealand Supreme Court recently delivered its reasons for reinstating world-wide anti-enforcement orders in relation to a fraudulently obtained default judgment from Kentucky. The judgment, given by Kós J, contains a useful analysis of the principles on anti-suit and anti-enforcement injunctions and offers guidance on the interrelationship between fraud and comity.
The background to the case is set out in previous posts (here, here and here). In summary, Kea Investments Ltd (Kea), a British Virgin Islands company, alleged that the default judgment obtained by Wikeley Family Trustee Ltd (WFTL), a New Zealand company, was based on fabricated claims intended to defraud Kea. The New Zealand High Court found that the defendants had perpetrated a tortious conspiracy. The Court of Appeal upheld the findings of fraud but allowed an appeal against the grant of the injunction, concluding that an injunction could only be granted as a step of last resort, which required Kea to pursue its right of appeal against the Kentucky judgment.
It was not in issue before the Supreme Court that the claim in the Kentucky court formed part of a conspiracy to defraud Kea (at [102]). It was also not in issue that New Zealand was the proper jurisdiction to deal with the claim of fraud (at [102]). In these circumstances, the Court found that comity did not stand in the way of anti-enforcement relief.
News
Second Seminar of the Global Network on Private International Law, Employment, and Labour Relations (GNPILE) (22 Oct 2026)
Ulla Liukkunen (University of Helsinki) has kindly shared the attached programme for the Second Seminar of the Global Network on Private International Law, Employment, and Labour Relations (GNPILE).
The event is open to all, but registration is required.
Virtual Workshop (in English) on October 6, 2026: Sandrine Brachotte and María Julia Ochoa Jiménez on “Conflicts of Worldviews and Private International Law”
On Tuesday, October 6 2026, the Hamburg Max Planck Institute will host its monthly virtual workshop Current Research in Private International Law at 11:00 a.m. – 12:30 p.m. (CEST).
Sandrine Brachotte (University of Antwerp) and María Julia Ochoa Jiménez (Comillas Pontifical University) will speak, in English, about the book
“Conflicts of Worldviews and Private International Law” (Hart Publishing, 2026).
This book brings together European private international law and decolonial thinking. It examines how European courts deal with conflicts between legal frameworks and postcolonised worldviews. Through three case studies—religious arbitration, Indigenous sacred land, and sexual minorities in the Global South—it shows that these conflicts are often overlooked. This results in the inadequate protection of the claims and identities of formerly colonised peoples. The book therefore proposes a more pluralist approach to jurisdiction, choice of court, and foreign law, giving greater weight to postcolonised worldviews. Prof. Ochoa Jiménez will comment on it, while focusing on private international law.
The presentation will be followed by open discussion. All are welcome. More information and sign-up here.
If you want to be invited to these events in the future, please write to veranstaltungen@mpipriv.de.
Out now: Brachotte on ‘Conflicts of Worldviews and Private International Law’
The publisher’s blurb is as follows. Readers of the blog may use the discount code indicated below to get 20% off.
Conflicts of Worldviews and Private International Law
Sandrine Brachotte
This book develops a decolonial theory of European private international law. To do so, it begins with Western court cases involving what the author terms a ‘conflict of worldviews’: a clash between the legal frameworks governing the dispute and the worldviews of the formerly colonised parties involved, referred to here as ‘postcolonised worldviews’.