Views
Judgments Convention – No Thanks?
On September 1st, 2023, the 2019 Hague Judgments Convention will enter into force for the Member States of the EU and Ukraine. According to the HCCH, the Convention is “a true gamechanger in international dispute resolution”, which will “reduce transactional and litigation costs, facilitate rule-based multilateral trade and investment, increase certainty and predictability” and “promote effective justice for all”. The international conference taking place in Bonn later this week will likely strike an equally celebratory tone.
This sentiment is not shared universally, though. In a scathing article just published in Zeitschrift für Europäisches Privatrecht (ZEuP) entitled ‘Judgments Convention: No Thanks!‘, Haimo Schack (University of Kiel) labels the Convention as “evidently worthless”.
Schack comes to this damning conclusion in three steps. First, he argues that the 2005 Choice of Court Convention, the first outcome of the decades-long HCCH Jurisdiction Project, has been of minimal use for the EU and only benefited Singapore and London. Read more
Towards an EU Regulation on the International Protection of Adults
On 31 May 2023, the European Commission presented a proposal for a Regulation on jurisdiction, applicable law, recognition and enforcement of measures and cooperation in matters relating to the protection of adults (in the following: EU Adult Protection Regulation – EUAPR). This proposal is a response to significant demographic and social changes in the EU: Many Member States face enormous challenges posed by an increasingly aging population. Due to considerable improvements in medical care in recent decades, people grow much older than they used to, and this lengthening of the average lifespan in turn leads to an increase in age-related illnesses such as Alzheimer’s disease. This demographic change creates problems for private international law, because the mobility of natural persons has increased within the EU where borders may, in principle, be crossed without restrictions. Many people who have left their state of origin in search for work elsewhere in their youth or middle age do not return to their home state after retirement, but rather spend the last part of their lives where they have established a new habitual residence. Besides, more and more people decide to leave their home state once they have reached the age of retirement. Such processes of migration at a late stage in life may have different reasons: Some old-age movers may want to avoid a heavy taxation of their estates that would put a burden on their heirs, some may wish to circumvent other restrictions of domestic inheritance laws (e.g. the right to a compulsory portion), others may simply wish to spend the remaining parts of their lives in milder climates, e.g. the Mediterranean, or look for a place to stay where the cost of living is lower, e.g. in some parts of Eastern Europe. When these persons begin to suffer from an impairment or an insufficiency of their personal faculties which no longer allows them to protect their interests themselves, however, intricate conflict of laws problems may arise: The authorities or courts of which state shall have jurisdiction to take protective measures concerning vulnerable adults or their property? Which law is to be applied to such measures? Under which conditions may protective measures taken in one state be recognised and enforced in other states?
The EUAPR is meant to solve these problems. Read more
Dubai Courts on the Recognition of Foreign Judgments: “Recognition” or “Enforcement”? – that’s the Problem!
“Recognition” and “enforcement” are fundamental concepts when dealing with the international circulation of foreign judgments. Although they are often used interchangeably, it is generally agreed that these two notions have different purposes and, ultimately, different procedures (depending on whether the principle of de plano recognition is accepted or not. See Béligh Elbalti, “Spontaneous Harmonization and the Liberalization of the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Judgments, Japanese Yearbook of Private International Law, Vol. 16, 2014, p. 269).
However, in legal systems where this fundamental distinction is not well established, the amalgamation of the two notions may give rise to unnecessary complications that are likely to jeopardize the legitimate rights of the parties. The following case, very recently decided by the Dubai Supreme Court, is nothing but one of many examples which show how misconceptions and confusion regarding the notion of “recognition” would lead to unpredictable results (cf. e.g., Béligh Elbalti, “Perspective of Arab Countries”, in M. Weller et al. (eds.), The 2019 HCCH Judgments Convention – Cornerstones, Prospects, Outlook (Hart, 2023) pp. 1983-184ff).
News
Call for Papers: The Role of Judicial Actors in Shaping Private International Law. A Comparative Perspective
On the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the Swiss Federal Tribunal, the Swiss Institute of Comparative Law (SICD) is pleased to announce its 35th Conference on Private International Law, to be held on 19–20 November 2025 in Lausanne.
The conference addresses how courts, lawyers, and litigants have shaped—and how they continue to shape—private international law. Special emphasis will be placed on how legal practice drives the development of private international law at both the national and supranational levels. Judges, through landmark rulings, have clarified conflicts of laws rules, set precedents on the recognition of foreign judgments, and adapted legal frameworks to globalization and digital commerce. Lawyers, by crafting novel arguments, have influenced judicial reasoning and contributed to evolving legal doctrines. Finally, strategic litigation, led by litigants and advocacy groups, has driven major jurisprudential shifts, particularly in fundamental rights, corporate liability, and cross-border regulation. The conference will analyse these actors’ distinct but interconnected roles in shaping contemporary private international law.
We invite scholars (both established and early-career researchers), legal practitioners, and policymakers to submit papers addressing these issues.
Possible topics include:
- The role of national and supranational courts in shaping private international law
- The impact of key judicial decisions on cross-border legal relationships
- The influence of legal practitioners in driving jurisprudential change
- Strategic litigation as a tool for legal evolution in private international law
- Comparative approaches to judicial reasoning in international private law cases
- Judicial responses to global challenges such as migration, digital commerce, corporate responsibility, and human rights protection
Paper Submission
Please submit an abstract (up to 500 words) of your proposed paper by 11 May 2025 to Ms. Marie-Laure Lauria (marie-laure.lauria@isdc-dfjp.unil.ch), with the subject line “ISDC 35th PIL Conference Submission“. Abstracts may be submitted in English, German, or French.
All submissions will undergo a double-blind peer review and decisions will be communicated by 3 June 2025. Accepted papers will be considered for publication in an edited volume or a special journal issue.
Organization
The conference will be hosted by the Swiss Institute of Comparative Law.
Funding
The Swiss Institute of Comparative Law will provide funding for the travel costs and accommodation of all presenters.
Crossroads in Private International Law Seminar Series, University of Aberdeen
In April, the Aberdeen Centre for Private International Law and Transnational Governance will be relaunching its Crossroads in Private International Law research seminar series. 
It will feature both online and hybrid events.
Out Now: Dominelli, Regolamento Bruxelles I bis e US jurisdiction in personam
Stefano Dominelli (Università di Genova) has just published a book titled Regolamento Bruxelles I bis e US jurisdiction in personam: riflessioni e proposte su condivisioni valoriali, influenze e osmosi di metodi with Editoriale Scientifica. The book is written in Italian but also features conclusions in English.
The author has kindly shared the following summary with us:
The book analyses the basic principles of the EU’ and US international civil procedure in contract and tort law. The investigation shows how both systems are partly inconsistent with their respective premises – of legal certainty, on the one hand, and fairness and justice, on the other. The juxtaposition of the dogmatic approaches and their contextualisation in the light of the law in action makes it possible to reconstruct a common and shared principle which shapes solutions in both systems – that of the necessary existence of a minimum connection between the jurisdiction and the case. This conclusion opens up, to a limited extent, to a conceptual rapprochement between legal systems and to reflections on possible legal transplants that respect the characteristics of the local legal culture.
The whole book is available open access under this link.