BRUSSELS I REGULATION. Eds Ulrich Magnus and Peter Mankowski Munich: Sellier (www.sellier.de), 2012. xxvii + 972 pp. ISBN 9783866538894. €250.
| Date | 01 January 2013 |
| Author | Paul Beaumont |
| Pages | 106-107 |
| DOI | 10.3366/elr.2013.0145 |
| Published date | 01 January 2013 |
This is an excellent article by article analysis of the Brussels I Regulation edited by two leading German private international law academics. The two Hamburg Professors have written a significant proportion of the text (Mankowski wrote 206 pages on Article 5 – special jurisdictions – including a particularly magisterial treatment of the contract jurisdiction in Article 5(1) – 27 pages on Articles 35 and 36, and 68 pages on Articles 61 to 76; while Magnus wrote 42 pages on the introduction and 78 pages on Article 23 – choice of court agreements). The remainder of the commentaries on the Articles are written by distinguished academics from all over Europe including Pippa Rogerson (Article 1), Paul Vlas (Articles 2–4 and 59–60), Horatia Muir Watt (Articles 6 and 7), Peter Arnt Neilsen (Articles 15–17) and Richard Fentiman (Articles 27–30).
An article by article commentary is a very German style of book. Writers from countries that have codified the law are used to this approach. It is a little alien to readers in the UK who are more used to the material being divided up on the basis of the subject matter. For readers who want to be able to see the wood for the trees it is essential to read the introduction. It skilfully sets out the main purposes of Brussels I, how the Regulation has evolved from its predecessor the Brussels Convention, the relationship with the Lugano Convention, the competence of the EU, the approach to the interpretation of the Brussels Convention and Brussels I taken by the Court of Justice of the EU and briefly sets out the reforms proposed to Brussels I in the Commission's recast proposal of December 2010. The main weakness of the introduction is the failure to explain to the reader the structure of the jurisdiction rules in the Regulation. The book gives the impression that following a chronological order to the analysis of the Articles will enable the reader to work out which courts have jurisdiction to hear a particular case. However, readers should be clearly told that the Regulation creates a hierarchical approach to jurisdiction with the exclusive jurisdictions in Article 22 at the top, submission in Article 24 next, then the protective jurisdictions in Articles 8–21, then choice of court in Article 23, and finally the general and special grounds of jurisdiction in Articles 2 and 5 to 7. Another weakness of the introduction is one that sadly pervades the whole book. It has not been proof read by a native English speaker and the...
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