On Jurisdiction Agreements from the Perspective of Pan-European Unification of International Procedural Law

Abstract

In several European countries there is a system of rules governing the question of the international jurisdiction of the courts in civil law matters. Such rules are laid down either as a part of the law of civil procedure (such as in the Polish Law of Civil Procedure of 1964) or are prescribed within the framework of laws on private international law; examples of the latter system are the Czechoslovak Act on Private International Law and International Procedural Law of 1965, the Hungarian Act on Private International Law of 1979, the Yugoslav Act on Private International Law of 1982 and the Swiss Act on Private International Law of 1987. In other countries, e.g. in Germany, The Netherlands, Austria and France in regard to competence ordinaire , the rules on internal jurisdiction are applied, mutatis mutandis , to establish international jurisdiction. However, conventional law on international jurisdiction takes precedence over conflicting provisions of national law.