Foreign Elements in Family Disputes

Abstract

The pragmatic, utilitarian thrust of English private international law in the 19th century meant an absence of commitment either to territory or to person as the presumptive organizing idea of the whole field. Comity embodied notions of mutual respect between legal systems. This at least suggested a certain preference for applying the same law to the solution of a legal issue, and for recognizing the decisions of foreign courts, particularly where they were following a parallel course to that on which an English court would take jurisdiction over a dispute with a foreign element and were applying the law that an English court would also apply. Nonetheless the combinations of foreign and local elements could weave patterns too various to provide ready-made solutions. Nowhere was that more evident than in respect of family matters. In this sphere one can observe some growing readiness to accord some place to foreign laws and the decisions of foreign courts. This chapter on foreign elements in family disputes covers the issues of domicil, marriage and divorce, and family governance.