Exclusive jurisdiction

Negotiation Anatomy™ →Go uptown Walk-away | Escalation | Algorithm | Heuristic | subject matter expert | Operationalisation | Playbook | Smart contract | Dead horse | Knife fight | 7 wastes | Cruddy legal advice Index: Click ᐅ to expand: Negotiation Negotiation hacks Contract Tell me more Sign up for our newsletter — or just get in touch: for ½ a weekly 🍺 you get to consult JC. Ask about it here.

Governing law chat. Mostly pretty tedious, but the litigation department will get excited about it. Draw what conclusions about them, therefore, as you wish. The fun questions will be such as these:

• Should the courts of (say) England and Wales have exclusive or non-exclusive jurisdiction to hear disputes. Even though the contract is governed by English law, might an Italian court — or a chamber of the Luxembourgouisie — have a stab at arbitrating it? Now I know what you are thinking. In what messed up, purblind existence would one be seriously entertaining a foreign court being asked to apply English law? Just go to an English court! It is a fair question, but you might have a Malaysian broker contracting with a Venezuelan asset manager under English law, in which case it might be a pain in the posterior for both to schlep up to the courts of chancery in Fleet Street to sort out the inevitable dispute.

See also

• Rome II, for just some of the reasons a governing law clause is so batteringly convoluted.