This book explores current developments in transnational commercial and consumer law. It features essays written by leading experts, many of who have taken part in the negotiation and formulation of the international instruments they discuss here. The contributors look at issues arising from the profound changes that globalization is having on the legal norms governing commercial and consumer transactions, both domestic and transnational. They consider how relations between private actors, state regulators, and national courts are being completely reconfigured. This, in turn, generates pressures for legal harmonization and creates opportunities for new national and transnational legal norms and procedures to develop.

The contributions address both the dynamics and the substance of these developments. Topics included are the UNCITRAL Model Law on secured transactions and on cross-border insolvency, the ICC Uniform Customs and Practices of Documentary Credits (UCP 600), and the dispute resolution mechanism and practices of the World Trade Organization.

The content was formerly presented as papers at the 18th Biennial Meeting of the International Academy of Commercial and Consumer Law (the International Academy) at Kyushu University, Japan. Overall, this book provides readers with a solid theoretical foundation and strong familiarity with the practice of law and international commerce, offering realistic and practical conclusions.

Toshiyuki Kono is a distinguished professor at Kyushu University (Fukuoka, Japan). He currently serves as vice president and titular member of the International Academy of Comparative Law, president-elect for the Academy of Commercial and Consumer Law, and the chair of the Committee for Intellectual Property and Private International Law at the International Law Association. In the field of private international law, he gave special lectures on "Efficiency in Private International Law" at the Hague Academy of International Law in 2013. He was selected as one of three lecturers who are invited to publish lectures in its Pocket Book series in 2014. He also has served as the president of the International Council of Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS), an advisory body of UNESCO, since 2017. He was a vice president of ICOMOS from 2014 through 2017. He is in charge of, among others, World Heritage issues. He has been active in UNESCO as an independent expert as well. For example, he served in 2010 as the chairperson of the 3rd General Assembly of the State Parties of the UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage and chairperson of the Legal Committee of the 34th UNESCO General Conference in 2007. His recent publications in the field of international heritage law include "Authenticity, notions and principles", Change over Time, Fall 2014, Vol. 4, No. 2, pp. 436-460.

Mary Hiscock is an emeritus professor of Bond University, Queensland, Australia. She taught at Bond University and the University of Melbourne, with visiting appointments in Europe, Asia, and North America. She is a fellow of the Australian Academy of Law. Her expertise is in international trade and investment, with an emphasis on international contracts and comparative law. She graduated from the University of Melbourne and the University of Chicago. She is a legal practitioner of the High Court of Australia and the Supreme Courts of Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland. Professor Hiscock has represented Australia at the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL) and has been an expert adviser to the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and a consultant to the Asian Development Bank. She is a member of the editorial boards of the Australian Journal of Asian Law and the Melbourne Journal of International Law. She was chair of the International Law Section of the Law Council of Australia and a president of the International Academy of Commercial and Consumer Law. She continues as a director of that academy. She has authored or edited 20 books and has published many articles in learned journals.

Arie Reich is the former dean and a current professor of the Faculty of Law of Bar Ilan University, Israel, and the Jean Monnet Chair of EU Law and Institutions. He specializes in international economic law and EU law. He has authored more than 40 academic books and articles on topics ranging from international trade law, public procurement law, and European Union law, to competition law and torts. Among them are his books International Public Procurement Law: The Evolution of International Regimes on Public Purchasing (Kluwer, 1999) and The World Trade Organization and Israel: Law, Economics and Politics (Bar Ilan University Press, 2006). He is a member of the ICSID Panel of Conciliators and Arbitrators, has served as the president of the Israeli Association for the Study of European Integration, and is a member of the Executive of the International Academy of Commercial and Consumer Law and a national correspondent for Israel to the UNCITRAL. He has served as the chairman of Israel's Anti-Dumping and Countervailing Duty Tribunal and as a member of four different World Trade Organization dispute settlement panels in trade disputes between the US, EU, and China. He has served as visiting professor at UCLA, Georgetown University, the University of Toronto, the University of Pennsylvania, Columbia University, the University of Luxembourg, and Monash University, and has been a Braudel Senior Fellow at the European University Institute.