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I found it fascinating to read this new book on transnational commercial law which covers largely the same ground as my Transnational and Comparative Commercial and Financial Law, just now in its third edition. In covering also the basics of transnational insolvency and of international commercial arbitration, the authors showed the greater stamina. In taking the transnational perspective, both books derive their inspiration substantially from international finance, no longer, therefore, from the more traditional mercantile part of commercial law (mine even less so). It is an important shift in perception that will continue greatly to affect the coverage of books of this nature. It is also clearly shown in the work of Philip Wood. In doing so, we now look less at the old law merchant than at a new lex mercatoria operating in a much broader field of activity, especially important in finance.
As legal transnationalization goes, the idea and need for a substantive supranational law approach remains engrained in all international business dealings. It was a pre-19th century reality but was obscured in the 19th and 20th centuries when domestic law was thought also to be able to cover international transactions even if this law was never made for them. In a globalizing world, transnationalization of the substantive law has acquired renewed validity and even urgency now that the flows of persons, goods, services, money and technology are increasingly freed and have acquired a worldwide momentum, whilst private international law seems to get ever-more detailed and therefore unstable and unpredictable in itself. In these flows, the legal dynamics and needs are likely to be very different from domestic ones and commercial law is here the first called upon to respond. So at last the nationalistic cloud is lifting but it is an anguished process and it is amazing to see how conditioned we remain by 19th-century statist thinking, even in international commerce and finance. For many it is axiomatic. Also, common law, at least that of the English variety, struggles and finds it often difficult to accept non-statist sources of law; in the US, Sec 1-103 UCC remained more pragmatic and is here more realistic.
Against this background and need, there are a number of areas...