This collection of 20 essays contains recent work by legal scholars, practitioners and judges, all internationally renowned for their expertise in the fields of maritime and commercial law.

For maritime lawyers, the book contains absorbing and important studies of the law governing maritime collisions, carriage of goods by sea (examining the meaning of 'actual carriage' in the Hamburg Rules, and the complex web of rules that governs multimodal carriage), and marine insurance (discussing the history of the doctrine of utmost good faith, and jurisdiction clauses in cargo policies).

In the area of private international law, there are chapters on the choice of law rules affecting the ownership of ships, and on recent cases where conflict of laws issues have been decided by the Privy Council.

For generalist commercial lawyers, there is a wealth of scholarship on the Sale of Goods Act 1979, its provisions and scope, and on the rules of contractual interpretation, their history, content and application in commercial settings.

In addition, there are chapters on negotiating damages for breach of contract, illegality, tracing misapplied funds, the application of private law rules to disputes about cryptocurrencies and developments in the law of directors' duties.

Taken as a whole, the essays in this collection stand out for their breadth of scholarship, analytical power, depth of understanding, and penetrating insights even into the knottiest problems of maritime and commercial law. They are essential reading for every maritime and commercial lawyer and a fitting tribute to a scholar who has led the way in both fields for many decades.

 

Table Of Contents

1. The Empress of Ireland and Mont Blanc Collisions: Then and Now

Nicholas Gaskell

2. Do Actual Carriers Require Special Treatment?

Francis Reynolds

3. Multimodal Carriage of Goods by Sea: Time for an International Convention?

Simon Baughen

4. The Three Ages of Utmost Good Faith

Howard Bennett

5. English Jurisdiction Clauses in Marine Cargo Insurance and Direct Actions against Cargo Liability Insurers

Yvonne Baatz

6. Choice of Law in Determining the Ownership of Ships

Martin Davies

7. Private International Law and the Privy Council

Adrian Briggs

8. Bulk Goods and Title Transfer

Michael Bridge

9. The Duty to Take Delivery of Goods

Andrew Tettenborn

10. The Vanishing Scope of the Sale of Goods Act 1979 in the Twenty-first Century

Louise Gullifer

11. Are there Any General Principles of Commercial Law?

Gerard McMeel

12. Mercantile Usage, Construction of Contracts and the Implication of Terms, 1750–1850

Charles Mitchell

13. 'The Obscure, the Implied and the Illegal': English and French Approaches to the Interpretation of Written Contracts, Implication of Terms and Contracts Affected by Illegality

Richard Aikens

14. The Interpretation of Written Contracts

James Edelman

15. The Boilerplate and the Bespoke: Should Differences in the Quality of Consent Influence the Construction and Application of Commercial Contracts?

David Foxton

16. Illegality: Pleading, Proof, and Presumptions

William Swadling

17. Negotiating Damages

Andrew Burrows

18. The Myth of Common Law Tracing

Sarah Worthington

19. Contextual and Conceptual Foundations of Private Law Claims Involving Cryptocurrencies

Stephen Watterson

20. Silence and Solidarity? The Duties of Individual Directors Minded to Speak Out about their Board's Decision-making and Governance

Peter Watts