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Through further technological development and increased globalization, conducting busines abroad has become easier, especially for Small and Medium Enterprises (SME). However, the legal issues associated with international commerce have not lessened in complexity, including the role of non-state rules.
The book provides a comprehensive analysis of non-state rules in international commercial contracts. Non-state rules have legal authority in the national and international sphere, but the key question is how this legal authority can be understood and established. To answer this question this book examines first what non-state rules are and how their legal authority can be measured, it then analyses how non-state rules are applied in different scenarios, including as the applicable law, as a source of law, or to interpret either the law or the contract. Throughout this analysis three other important questions are also answered: when can non-state rules be applied? when are they applied? and how are they applied? The book concludes with a framework and classification that leads to a deeper understanding of the legal authority of non-state rules.
Providing a transnational perspective on this important topic, this book will appeal to anyone researching international commercial law. It will also be a valuable resource for arbitrators and anyone working in international commercial litigation.
List of contents
1. Introduction: Non-State Rules in International Commercial Contracts. Part 1 - The Nature of Non-State Rules and How to Measure their Legal Authority. 2. Defining Non-State Rules. 3. The Place of Non-State Rules in International Commercial Law. 4. The Roles of Non-State Rules in the Contractual Relationship. Part 2 - Application of Non-State Rules as the Governing Law of the Contract. 5. Party Autonomy in International Commercial Contracts. 6. Non-State Rules and Private International Law. 7. Non-State Rules and Arbitration. Part 3 - How Courts Apply Non-State Rules. 8. Applying Non-State Rules as a Source of Domestic Law. 9. The Application of Non-State Rules to Interpret the Law. 10. The Application of Codified Non-State Rules as Lex Mercatoria. 11. Ascertaining the Legal Authority of Non-State Rules.
About the author
Johanna Hoekstra is a lecturer in Law at the University of Essex, UK.
Summary
The book provides a comprehensive analysis of non-state rules in international commercial law. Having established what they are and how their legal authority can be measured, it looks at their application in courts and establishes benchmarks against which the legal authority of non-state rules can be measured.
