Litigation on Regulations Rome I and Rome II: Spain

This chapter evaluates the judicial practice on the Rome I and Rome II Regulations in Spain, on the law applicable to contractual and non-contractual obligations. It analyses eighty judgments delivered by national courts, which involve cases that decide international commercial disputes by reference to either Rome I or Rome II provisions. The study seeks to identify common threads in international commercial litigation in order to ascertain the extent to which the advent of Rome I and Rome II has contributed to transforming the practice in Spain. To this end, the chapter examines the following key aspects: the interplay between universal law and national law, the interaction between Rome I, Rome II and other international conventions, party autonomy and the determination of the applicable law in the absence of choice, the tension between the lex fori and the lex causae, and the practice on the scope of the lex contractus. Concluding remarks follow.