Public policy as a fundamental legal conception precluding the application of foreign law in the age of globalisation

• Main Author: Abdel Wahab, Mohamed Salah Eldin
• Published: University of Manchester 2004
• Subjects: 344
• Online Access: http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.569904

Public policy is considered one of the landmarks of private international law. It has been a rich source of attraction to many scholars across the globe. While it is generally considered an expression of the prevailing major value-system norms and fundamental notions of justice in the forum, its variability has made it extremely difficult for all those who attempt to research the concept to ascribe a workable all-embracing definition and criterion for this dark tunnel of private international law. Similarly, globalisation as one of the most powerful forces shaping our modem world represents a perplexing complex notion that has intensified economic, political, legal, social, and cultural cross-border relations. Thus, it has impacted on and transformed traditional legal and cultural institutions. It is exactly in this context that the present thesis aims to analyse the concept of public policy in English, French and Egyptian legal systems, evaluate the phenomenon of globalisation and assess its impact, especially with respect to trends of cultural interaction on the evolutionary path of public policy, and provide a specific examination of the applications of public policy in relation to globalisation in family law and international commercial arbitration. The importance of this study not only stems from the analytical and comparative approaches utilised, the diversity of issues covered and their theoretical and practical aspects, but also from the fact that it represents the first study on the relation between public policy in conflict of laws and globalisation and amongst the relatively few that address the interrelation between globalisation and law.