Doctrine of Renvoi

Imagine asking a friend in Mumbai where to meet a stranger, and she says, go where he would tell you to go. The stranger, asked the same, says, go where she would tell you. You circle forever. Conflict of laws has a version of this puzzle. The Indian court's rule sends the case to French law, but French law's own conflict rule sends it back to India, or on to a third country. Does the court stop at French internal law, or follow the reference? That question is renvoi, a French word meaning sending back.

In two minutes

Renvoi arises when the forum's conflict rule points to a foreign law and that foreign system's own conflict rule points back to the forum (remission) or on to a third system (transmission); the court must decide whether to apply only the foreign internal law or also its conflict rules.

The rest of this chapter

The full explanation, the cheat sheet, every previous-year question at every mark weight, the quiz and the answer skeletons are part of Conflict of Laws on LexBlox Semester. Sign in to unlock the subject, or read Module 1 of Legal Language and Writing free.