Commercial Law Centre
               Harris-Manchester College
               Mansfield Road
               Oxford OX1 3TD
               United Kingdom
               clc@hmc.ox.ac.uk
                                        Update - November 2015
                                 Comparative Commercial Law Project 
               This document summarises initial steps in the comparative commercial law project
               (the CCL Project), a research undertaking under the auspices of the Commercial
               Law Centre (the Centre) at Harris Manchester College, University of Oxford (HMC).
               Transnational commercial law (TCL) is taught in many jurisdictions and law schools
               worldwide.  Research developed through the CCL Project aims to fill a critical gap in
               the teaching of TCL.  That gap is the limited knowledge of the students about (i) the
               underlying transactions (except contracts, which they are likely to have studied) that
               are the subject of TCL instruments, and (ii) the basic legal principles, more so on a
               comparative basis, that govern such transactions. Such comparative commercial law
               (including the underlying transactions, CCL) is central to understanding the process
               of creating, and content of, TCL instruments, even where the latter seek to advance
               best international rules rather than set out a common denominator of legal
               approaches.
               There is a need for, if not a complete companion course for TCL, at least a set of
               basic materials that TCL teachers can provide students, on CCL. 
               This project, headed by Jeffrey Wool, condon-falknor professor of global business law
               at the University of Washington School of Law and senior research fellow at HMC,
               will develop such basic and/or course materials on CCL. This is an open project in
               the sense of inviting collaboration with interested others.  Collaboration with UW
               law school is being explored. The results of the CCL Project would be shared globally,
               including, without restriction, with teachers of TCL.
               Separate from its key linkage to TCL, CCL merits study and development as an
               academic end in itself.
               Annexed hereto are:
               --    A schematic depiction of the CCL Project (Annex I)
               --    An outline of first step in the CCL Project: the development of basic materials
               for a new course, which, alternatively, can be assigned materials in TCL, called
               ‘Comparative Commercial Law: Transactional Perspectives’ (Annex II)
               --    The initial archetype transaction and fact pattern to be used in that new
               course (described further below)(Annex III)
                                                  1
            --  The template for jurisdictional outlines and bibliographies related to that
            transaction and fact pattern (described below) and the form for compiling the
            jurisdictional replies (Annex IV-A and IV-B, respectively) 
            To make CCL Project both practical and efficient, we have secured the support of
            major international law firms with global expertise (the supporting firms) to provide
            support in terms of content. These firms, listed alphabetically, are: Abogados Sierra y
            Vazques; Clyde & Co.; Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer; Holland Knight; King &
            Wood Mallesons; and Weil, Gotshal & Manges.  The University of Paris has also
            contributed on equal footing with the supporting firms and is viewed in similar
            terms in the balance of this memo. Others may be added. 
            The supporting firms will be publicly recognised as the firms supporting the CCL
            Project,   including   on   the   HMC/Centre   website   and   in   correspondence   and
            communications.
            The supporting (each doing pieces, not jointly) have done the following (the
            supporting firms’ tasks) under Professor Wool’s supervision:
                (1)  drafted sets of transaction documents (transaction documents)
            reflecting hypothetical fact patterns covering archetype transactions and raising
            basic legal issues in such transactions (as set out below, and which correspond to
            TCL instruments, the archetype transactions), 
                (2)  prepared outlines, following a common format based on a set of
            questions, on the basic legal concepts applicable to, and sources of law that govern,
            the archetype transactions and applied the same to the fact pattern under the laws
            of each of England New York, France, Germany, Mexico, New York, United Arab
            Emirates,   and   China   (the  subject   jurisdictions),   and   helped   to   build   the
            bibliography and provided source materials relating to the foregoing for each subject
            jurisdiction (jurisdictional outlines and bibliographies). The subject jurisdictions
            were selected to cover a cross section of common law, civil law (Napoleonic and
            Roman-Germanic), Islamic-impacted law, and developing jurisdictional law.
            The initial archetype transaction and fact pattern covers  contracts, security,
            insolvency, and surety.  It is set out in Annex III.1  The initial jurisdictional outlines
            and bibliographies would follow the template attached as Annex IV-A.
            These materials – in draft form – were used in a CCL tutorial [Comparative
            Commercial Law: Transactional Perspective] taught this summer at the University of
            Washington School of Law. Student (JD and (non-US) LLM) . Feedback from the
            students was obtained. That feedback, and the observations from the tutorial set on
            in Annex V, will be considered in further development of the materials.
            A presentation on the CCL Project will be made to the next TCL teachers’ conference
            (Perth,   November),   where   others   will   be   asked   to   develop   other   archetype
            1  In due course, there would be other archetype transactions, including payment systems, transport of
             goods, and intermediated securities.
          transactions and fact patterns and more generally become involved in the CCL
          Project.
          END
          SEE ANNEXES 
                                                                    Annex I
                                                       Comparative Commercial Law Project
                                                      (Commercial Law Centre, HMC, Oxford)
          Courses             Transaction /                               Comparative                             Transnational 
                            DoingBusiness /                             Commercial Law                          Commercial Law 
                                Lawyering
          Objectives         Understanding                             Substantive and                          Extracting General 
                               Commercial                                 Comparative                              Principles of 
                              Transactions                             Commercial Law                            Commercial Law
                                                                        4