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The CJEU on Procedural Rules in Child Abduction Cases: private international law and children’s rights law
Comment on CJEU case Rzecznik Praw Dziecka e.a., C-638/22 PPU, 16 February 2023)
Written by Tine Van Hof, post-doc researcher in Private International Law and Children’s Rights Law at the University of Antwerp, previously published on EU live
The Court of Justice of the EU has been criticised after some previous cases concerning international child abduction such as Povse and Aguirre Zarraga for prioritising the effectiveness of the EU private international law framework (i.e. the Brussels IIa Regulation, since replaced by Brussels IIb, and the principle of mutual trust) and using the children’s rights law framework (i.e. Article 24 of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights and the principle of the child’s best interests) in a functional manner (see e.g. Silvia Bartolini and Ruth Lamont). In Rzecznik Praw Dziecka the Court takes both frameworks into account but does not prioritise one or the other, since the frameworks concur.
Reappreciating the Composite Approach with Anupam Mittal v Westbridge II
Written by: Aditya Singh, BA.LL.B. (Hons) student at the National Law School of India University(NLSIU), Bengaluru and line editor at the National Law School Business Law Review (NLSBLR)
I. INTRODUCTION
The debate surrounding the composite approach i.e., the approach of accommodating the application of both the law applicable to the substantive contract and the Lex Fori to the arbitration clause has recently resurfaced with Anupam Mittal v Westbridge Ventures II (“Westbridge”). In this case, the Singapore Court of Appeal paved way for application of both the law governing substantive contract and the Lex Fori to determine the arbitrability of the concerned oppression and mismanagement dispute. The same was based on principle of comity, past precedents and s 11 of the International Arbitration Act. The text of s 11 (governing arbitrability) does not specify and hence limit the law determining public policy to Lex Fori. In any event, the composite approach regardless of any provision, majorly stems from basic contractual interpretation that extends the law governing substantive contract to the arbitration clause unless the presumption is rebuttable. For instance, in the instant case, the dispute would have been rendered in-arbitrable with the application of Indian law (law governing substantive contract) and hence the Singapore law was inferred to be the implied choice.[1] Read more
Measure twice, cut once: Dutch case Presta v VLEP on choice of law in employment contracts
Presta v VLEP (23 june 2023) illustrates the application of the CEJU’s Gruber Logistics (Case C-152/20, 15 July 2021) by the Dutch Supreme Court. In order to determine the law applicable to an individual employment contract under article 8 Rome I, one must compare the level of protection that would have existed in the absence of a choice of law (in this case, Dutch law) with the level of protection offered by the law chosen by the parties in the contract (in this case, the laws of Luxembourg), thereafter, the law of the country offering the highest level of employee protection should be applied.
News
Virtual Workshop (in English) on April 1: Carlos Esplugues on “Take Domestic Law and Run? The Application of Foreign (Private? State?) Law in Times of Uncertainty”
On Tuesday, April 1, 2025, 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). Professor Carlos Esplugues (University of Valencia) will speak, in English, about the topic
“Take Domestic Law and Run? The Application of Foreign (Private? State?) Law in Times of Uncertainty”
The possible application of foreign law is one of the features of contemporary private international law, a discipline that is particularly sensitive to the social, political and economic environment in which it operates. However, the redefinition of the role of the State in modern societies, technological changes or the growing wave of intolerance and fear towards what comes from abroad in many parts of the world are creating a new environment that affects this question in a pluralistic way. Beyond the classical issue of the nature of the applicable law and its relationship to the process, questions are being raised about the viability of this possible applicability and the conditions under which it can be established.
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.
AMEDIP’s upcoming webinar: Circular Economy and Private International Law (27 March 2025 – In Spanish)
The Mexican Academy of Private International and Comparative Law (AMEDIP) is holding a webinar on Thursday 27 March 2025 at 14:30 (Mexico City time – CST), 21:30 (CET time). The topic of the webinar is ‘Circular Economy and Private International Law’ and will be presented by Prof. Verónica Ruiz Abou-Nigm (in Spanish).
New Canadian Conflicts Text
The Irwin Law “Essentials Series” is a collection of texts about Canadian law aimed at a broad audience: it includes law students and also lawyers, judges and academics. It has been quite successful over the past twenty years. In 2024 Irwin Law was acquired by University of Toronto Press. It has continued the Essentials Series and the use of the Irwin Law imprint.
It has now published the third edition of Conflict of Laws written by Professor Stephen G.A. Pitel of Western University, Canada. The second edition was published in 2016 and so this edition updates almost a decade of activity, mainly from courts across Canada. The major change is that the chapter on declining jurisdiction has been reorganized and updated in light of the Supreme Court of Canada’s decisions in Douez v Facebook, Inc (2017) and Haaretz.com v Goldhar (2018). All chapters have been updated to reflect new decisions, legislative changes and recent scholarship.
More information is available here. For those outside Canada, the book is a clear and accessible source of comparative conflict of laws analysis.