1. 1 Conflict of Laws Snježana Husinec

2. 2 Conflict of Laws or Private International Law or International Private Law

3. 3 A) in common law system - a branch of international law and interstate law that regulates all lawsuits involving a "foreign" law element B) in civil law system - a law branch of internal legal system dealing with 1) the determination of which state law is applicable to situations crossing out the borders of one particular state and involving a "foreign" element (collisions of law, conflict of laws) 2) the international civil procedure and international commercial arbitration (collisions of jurisdiction, conflict of jurisdictions).

4. 4 Two major streams of legal thought on the nature of Conflict of Laws A) "universalism" – a stream of researchers who regard Conflict of Laws as a part of International Law, claiming that its norms are uniform, universal and obligatory for all states B) "particularism” – a theory which maintains the view that each State creates its own unique norms of Conflict of Laws pursuing its own policy

5. 5 Two major areas: I "sensu stricto" - -comprising conflict of laws rules which determine the law of which country (state) is applicable to specific relations. II "sensu largo" - comprises private international law "sensu stricto" (conflict of laws rules) and material legal norms which have direct extraterritorial character and are imperatively applied (material norms of law crossing the borders of State) - usually regulations on real property, consumer law, currency control regulations, insurance and banking regulations

6. 6 Conflict of Laws (in common law legal systems) is concerned with: - determining whether the proposed forum has jurisdiction to adjudicate and whether it is the appropriate venue for dealing with the dispute - determining which of the competing state's laws are to be applied to resolve the dispute - the enforcement of foreign judgments

7. 7 Choice of law rules Courts faced with a choice of law issue have a two-stage process: 1. the court will apply the law of the forum (lex fori) to all procedural matters 2. it counts the factors that connect or link the legal issues to the laws of potentially relevant states and applies the laws that have the greatest connection

8. 8 e.g. -the law of nationality (lex patriae) or domicile (lex domicilii) will define legal status and capacity, -the law of the state in which land is situated (lex situs) will be applied to determine all questions of title, -the law of the place where a transaction physically takes place or of the occurrence that gave rise to the litigation (lex loci actus) will often be the controlling law selected when the matter is substantive, ( but the proper law has become a more common choice )

9. 9 A who has a French nationality and residence in Germany B who has American nationality, domicile in Arizona, and residence in Austria C a Swiss national, owns property in Switzerland a) A corresponds with B over the internet. They agree the joint purchase of land in Switzerland, currently owned but C, but they never physically meet. b) They execute initial contract documents by using fax machines, followed by a postal exchange of hard copies. c) A pays his share of the deposit but, before the transaction is completed, B admits that although he has capacity to buy land under his lex domicilii and the law of his residence, he is too young to own land under Swiss law.