The Twilight of the Law of the Fairs

Inventing International Cooperation on Bankruptcies in Early Modern Europe (Lyon, 1660–1710)

Bibliographic Data

ID12627313
AuthorsBenoît Saint-Cast (0009-0004-2021-9269, Associate Researcher at the Laboratoire de Recherche Historique Rhône-Alpes LARHRA Lyon France, corresponding author)
Year2024
Volume26
Issue2
Pages189-223
Publication date2024-07-10
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of the History of International Law / Revue d’histoire du droit international (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1388-199X • E-ISSN: 1571-8050
PublisherBrill (PUBLISHER • NL)
DOI10.1163/15718050-bja10094
OpenAlexW4401176262
LanguageEN
References cited6

Bankruptcy was a key institution in the development of markets in Europe. However, the territoriality of jurisdictions and legal systems made international insolvencies difficult to manage. In the middle of the seventeenth century, cities such as Lyon developed networks of cooperation by granting foreign merchants equal rights to local creditors on a reciprocal basis. However, courts were reluctant to give foreign authorities control over assets and creditors on their territory. The article examines how the Lyon commercial court changed its policy towards international insolvencies during the second half of the seventeenth century. Whereas equal treatment of foreign creditors was conditioned on the recognition of an extraterritorial jurisdiction in the medieval fairs system, it now depended on the reciprocity of the legal status granted to merchants abroad. This system of cooperation between equally sovereign courts prefigured in many ways the current situation of private international law in bankruptcy matters

Bankruptcy · Business · Conflict of laws · Creditor · Debt · International law · Jurisdiction · Political science · Reciprocity (cultural anthropology · Sociology · Historical Economic and Legal Thought · Law · Finance

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