Global data flows and conflict of laws : a proposal for a new methodology

Abstract

This study examines how jurisdiction rules adapt to global data flows. To achieve this objective, a new methodological tool called the General Model of Conflicts Adjudication (GMCA) is formulated and used to analyze developments in American rules of personal jurisdiction and jurisdiction to prescribe which happened in parallel to technological and economic change. Chapter 1 examines how global data flows create economic and social dynamics that complicate the problems that conflict of laws rules must solve and explains the theoretical basis of the GMCA. Chapter 2 tests the explanatory power of the GMCA by using it to analyze the development of American personal jurisdiction rules starting with the landmark U.S. Supreme Court case of International Shoe (1945). The Chapter traces the adaptation of American conflict rules to technological developments, from the advent of the automobile to the proliferation of multinational corporations and the Internet. Commentary is made on recent important cases, such as Daimler (2014), BNSF Railway (2017), Bristol-Myers Squibb (2017), and Plixer v. Scrutinizer (2018). Apparent patterns in the development of the law and their normative implications are discussed using the GMCA. Chapter 3 focuses on the Microsoft. v. U.S. litigation (2016-2018) that concerned the extraterritorial reach of U.S. court orders in collecting electronic evidence stored in datacenters located abroad. The extensive documentation produced by the various governments, law enforcement agencies, service providers, and user groups that wanted to be involved in the dispute is examined and perceived interests of these stakeholders are determined. Commentary is made on the scholarly suggestions made for the solution of the problem. The CLOUD Act (2018), passed by the U.S. Congress to solve the issue, is examined and the comity-based solution of the Act is assessed within the GMCA. The work concludes with a summary of findings and a suggestion to use the GMCA in studying the ‘Europeanization’ of private international law.