Contents: 1 The civil justice system; 2 Commencing proceedings: Jurisdiction and parties; 3 Commencing proceedings: The practicalities; 4 How courts manage cases and make procedural decisions; 5 Defining the issues; 6 Pre-trial termination of proceedings; 7 Protecting positions until trial; 8 Gathering information; 9 Court-annexed alternative dispute resolution; 10 Offers to settle and offers to compromise; 11 Costs; 12 Appeals; 13 Enforcement and execution
This book provides guidance for judicial officer in the conduct of civil proceedings, from preliminary matters to the conduct of final proceedings and the assessment of damages and costs. It contains concise statements of relevant legal principles, references to legislation, sample orders for judicial official to use where suitable and checklists applicable to various kinds of issues that arise in the course of managing and conducting civil litigation.
The ALI (American Law Institute) and UNIDROIT (the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law) are preeminent organizations working together toward the clarification and advancement of the procedural rules of law. Recognizing the need for a “universal” set of procedures that would transcend national jurisdictional rules and facilitate the resolution of disputes arising from transnational commercial transactions, Principles of Transnational Civil Procedure was launched to create a set of procedural rules and principles that would be adopted globally. This work strives to reduce uncertainty for parties that must litigate in unfamiliar surroundings and to promote fairness in judicial proceedings. As recognized standards of civil justice, Principles of Transnational Civil Procedure can be used in judicial proceedings as well as in arbitration. The result is a work that significantly contributes to the promotion of a universal rule of procedural law. The American Law Institute was organized in 1923 following a study conducted by a group of prominent American judges, lawyers, and law professors. Their recommendation that a lawyers' organization be formed to improve the law and its administration led to the creation of The American Law Institute. UNIDROIT was founded in 1926 as a specialized agency of the League of Nations. It exists as an independent intergovernmental organization on the basis of a multilateral agreement, the UNIDROIT Statute. Its purpose is to study needs and methods for modernizing, harmonizing, and coordinating private laws between states and groups of states and to prepare legislative texts for consideration by governments.
The American Law Institute and UNIDROIT (International Institute for the Unification of Private Law) are preeminent organizations working toward the clarification and advancement of the procedural rules of law. Recognizing the need for a 'universal' set of procedures that would transcend national jurisdictional rules and facilitate the resolution of disputes arising from transnational commercial transactions, Principles and Rules of Transnational Civil Procedure was launched to create a set of acceptable rules and principles that would be accepted globally. This work strives to reduce uncertainty for parties obliged to litigate in unfamiliar surroundings and promote fairness in judicial judgments. As recognized standards of civil justice, Principles and Rules of Transnational Civil Procedure can be used in pleadings, development, and presentation of evidence, legal argument, and tribunal judgments such as arbitration. The result is a work which significantly contributes to the promotion of a universal rule of law norm.
This book shows the surprising dynamism of the field of civil procedure through its examination of a cross section of recent developments within civil procedure from around the world. It explores the field through specific approaches to its study, within specific legal systems, and within discrete sub-fields of civil procedure. The book reflects the latest research and conveys the dynamism and innovations of modern civil procedure - by field, method and system. The book’s introductory chapters lay the groundwork for researchers to appreciate the flux and change within the field. The concluding chapters bring the many different identified innovations and developments together to show the field's ability to adapt to modern circumstances, while retaining its coherence even across different legal systems, traditions, fields and analytic approaches. Specifically, in this book the presence of dynamism is explored in the legal systems of the EU, France, the US, Brazil, Australia, the UK and China. So too that dynamism is explored in the contributions’ analyses and discussions of the changes or need for change of specific aspects of civil procedure including litigation costs, class actions, derivative actions, pleadings, and res judicata. Furthermore, most of the individual contributions may be considered to be comparative analyses of their respective subjects and, when considered as a whole, the book presents the dynamism of civil procedure in comparative perspective. Those discrete and aggregated comparative analyses permit us to better understand the dynamism in civil procedure – for change in the abstract can be less visible and its significance and impact less evident. While similar conclusions may have been drawn through examinations in isolation, employing comparative analytic methods provided a richer analysis and any identified need for change is correspondingly advanced through comparative analysis. Furthermore, if that analysis leads to a conclusion that change is necessary then comparative law may provide pertinent examples for such change - as well as methodologies for successfully transplanting any such changes. In other words, as this book so well reflects, comparative law may itself usefully contribute to dynamism in civil procedure. This has long been a raison d'être of comparative law and, as clear from this book’s contributions, in this particular time and field of study we find that it is very likely to achieve its lofty promise.
Concise Legal Research details the technical aspects of a huge number of legal sources and explains how to research law with confidence and in good time.This new edition focuses on the impact of online access and the need for the researcher to move seamlessly between traditional and electronic resources. All strategies that have been created to incorporate hard copy researching techniques have been updated with alternate electronic methods.Particular attention has been paid to the chapter on secondary sources, and with the maintenance of a structured approach to research, recognises that online research - with its many inherent pitfalls - must carefully fit within rules of research required by the discipline.