Private International Law, taken here as the discipline that includes jurisdiction, applicable law, international judicial cooperation and the recognition of foreign judgments, has been undergoing a process of intense harmonisation and unification in Europe and worldwide for several decades, carried out in particular through European regulations and international conventions, such as the HCCH 2019 Judgments Convention.
Such harmonisation and unification have proved invaluable in facilitating the mobility of people across borders and the international exchange of goods and services.
The process of international harmonisation and unification of private international law has, however, faced considerable challenges, largely as a result of the different national traditions that prevail in this area and its impact on sensitive matters of private law, especially those involving the regulation of family relations and inheritance.
On the other hand, the harmonisation and unification of private international law is taking place in parallel with projects to unify substantive private law, especially in international commercial law, either through international conventions or soft law instruments, such as, respectively, the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods, to which Portugal accessed in 2020, and the UNIDROIT Principles on International Commercial Law, and the coordination of these two key ways of bringing national laws closer together is not without its difficulties.
The aim of this project is to deepen the study of these processes and in particular their impact on the Portuguese legal system, where rules of private international law from domestic and international sources coexist and are not always easy to combine.
Among other things, the aim of this project will be to survey Portuguese case law applying the international and European instruments in question and identify not only the difficulties it has faced, but also the contributions it has made to the interpretation and application of these instruments.
Principal Investigator
ResearchersProf. Doutor José Augusto Fontoura Costa
Read moreProf.ª Doutora Catarina Monteiro Pires
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- CISG Advisory Council
- European Association of Private International Law
- Instituto Hispano-Luso-Americano de Direito Internacional
- Max-Planck-Institut für Ausländisches und Internationales Privatrecht
The project will comprise the following key initiatives:
- The creation of a Lisbon Observatory for European Private International Law, which will bring together various CIDP researchers linked to the field.
- The creation of a Study Group on the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (CISG).
- The creation of an open-access electronic platform, E-DIP (PT), where the results of the survey of jurisprudence, doctrine and legislation whose source or object is European Private International Law instruments will be made available.
- The publication of a series of articles and monographs by the researchers involved in the project and on its themes, in peer-reviewed journals or collective works published internationally.
- The organisation of conferences, congresses or seminars on the project's themes, aimed at discussing the results of the research carried out within the framework of the project with national and foreign experts.
- The participation of Observatory members as rapporteurs at conferences, congresses or seminars on the project's themes.
- Research internships in other prestigious international centres.
- The creation and development, as a result of these activities, of a network of contacts with researchers from other countries who are dedicated to the same themes and the search for synergies with them that will enhance CIDP's activities.