Agreements on Jurisdiction and Choice of Law

Adrian Briggs is a Fellow at St Edmund Hall and Professor of Private International Law at the University of Oxford. He is also an actively practising barrister at Blackstone Chambers specialising in commercial law, in particular jurisdiction and enforcement of foreign judgments. He has written widely in the field of private international law.

1. Introduction and Scheme ; Introduction ; Advance conclusions ; Terms and elements ; A snapshot from 2007 ; Scheme ; 2. Consent in private international law ; The general principle ; The role of consent in commercial law ; Consent or agreement, and the absence of consent or agreement ; Consent in the application of foreign law ; Consent in choice of law ; Consent in the recognition of foreign judgments ; Consent and the personal jurisdiction of the court ; Consent and the subject-matter jurisdiction of the court ; European jurisdiction ; 3. Dispute resolution and severability ; Contractual terms ; The nature of agreements for the resolution of disputes ; Contractual agreements on jurisdiction ; Separate natures, or severable agreements ; The path to the principle of severability ; Validity and severability: jurisdiction agreements ; The obverse of severability ; The agreement on choice of law as part of the severable agreement ; The strength and weakness of agreement as an organising principle ; i Divergence on the existence of a contract ; ii Divergence on the content of the bargain ; Assumptions and conclusions ; 4. Clauses, principles, and interpretation ; The range and varieties of jurisdiction clause ; Jurisdiction clauses: rights conferred and duties assumed ; Jurisdiction agreements as exemption clauses ; The scope of the duty; the ambit of the clause ; Service of suit clauses ; Combined arbitration and jurisdiction agreements ; Choice of law clauses ; One contract but several agreements ; The role of European law ; 5. Drafting agreements ; Drafting by specimen ; Contractual variation of the Brussels Regulation ; A specimen clause: elaborate version ; Explanation of contents: elaborate version ; A specimen clause: simple version ; Drafting by incorporation from other documents ; The meaning of words and the use of authority ; i Subject matter: 'this contract', 'this agreement' ; ii Prepositions, connections, and the terminology of relationship ; 6. Jurisdiction agreements: primary obligations ; Jurisdiction-blind enforcement ; Development of the anti-suit injunction ; Objections to enforcement by order of the English court ; Equitable maxims as restriction on remedy ; The position of strangers to the contract ; Stays of English proceedings brought in breach of contract ; 7. Jurisdiction agreements: Brussels Regulation ; The context in which Article 23 is to operate ; The structure of Article 23 ; The conclusiveness or inconclusiveness of writing ; What is an agreement for the purposes of Article 23 ? ; Unilateral or bilateral agreement ; Article 23: what writing ? whose writing ? ; The parties to the 'particular legal relationship' ; Formal alternatives to writing which satisfy Article 23 ; Article 23 and those who depart from the agreement ; Injunctions to enforce agreements about jurisdiction and litigation ; Turner v Grovit ; How persuasive ? The burden of proof ; The 'particular legal relationship' ; Clarifying the wording: the United Kingdom ; Jurisdiction agreements for the courts of non-Member States ; Conclusions ; 8. Jurisdiction agreements: secondary obligations ; The starting points of the common law ; Union Discount v Zoller and five cases which are less straightforward ; Other issues arising within the common law analysis ; i The cause of action ; ii The assessment of damages ; iii Where the nominated court is not in England ; Judgments from the courts of a Member State ; 9. Foreign Judgments ; Common law recognition ; Judgments from the court designated by a dispute resolution agreement ; Foreign judgments obtained in breach of jurisdiction agreement ; Overcoming foreign judgments obtained in breach of contract ; Recognition and enforcement under the Regulation ; The decision in De Wolf v Cox ; Recognition and enforcement at the margin of the Regulation ; International obligations binding courts; personal obligations binding parties ; 10. Agreements on choice of law ; Contracts: where the existence of the contract is not in dispute ; Contracts: where the existence of the contract is in dispute ; Contracts: the law which governs the consequences of contractual invalidity ; Contracts: conclusions about the nature of choice of law for contracts ; Agreements of choice of law and claims in tort ; Choice of law and property rights ; 11. Giving effect to agreements on choice of law ; Introduction ; The common law and the proper law of a contract ; Choice of proper law: common intention or mutual agreement? ; Governing the contract and governing contractual litigation ; The consequence if the law identified for application is not applied ; i Breach of a choice of law ; ii Non-monetary responses ; iii Monetary remedies ; iv Subverting the contract as a tortious wrong ; v The Rome Convention ; Impermissible choices of law: secondary consequences ; The alternative: careful drafting ; i Promising to pay ; ii Adapting the undertaking in damages ; 12. Agreements to resolve disputes by arbitration ; Preliminary questions and practical answers ; Who will adjudicate ? Who decides who will adjudicate ? ; Another view ; To what do the parties agree when they agree to arbitration ? ; The jurisdiction of the courts of the seat ; Foreign judgments in breach of arbitration agreement: Brussels Regulation ; i Non-recognition of judgments ; ii Reversal of judgments ; iii Private rights and public duties ; Foreign proceedings in breach of agreement to arbitrate: Brussels Regulation ; The New York Convention ; Damages for breach of the contract to proceed by way of arbitration ; The problem of excessive supervision ; 13. Conclusions ; The relative effect of agreements on the resolution of disputes ; The Hague Convention on Exclusive Choice of Court Agreements ; Reprise: private international law and party autonomy