Professor Richard Fentiman

Richard Fentiman is Professor Emeritus of Private International Law at the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of Queens' College. Between 2015 and 2018 he was Chair (Dean) of the Faculty of Law. He is a King's Counsel honoris causa.

He is the author of International Commercial Litigation (2nd edition, 2015), and Foreign Law in English Courts (1998), both published by Oxford University Press, and of numerous articles on private international law and international commercial litigation. A second edition of Foreign Law in English Courts is currently in preparation.

He was elected to the American Law Institute in 2007, and to the International Academy of Comparative Law in 1996. He has been awarded honorary doctorates by the University of Athens (2018), and the University of Cyprus (2022). He is a member of the Lord Chancellor's Advisory Committee on Private International Law.

He taught the Faculty's postgraduate course on International Commercial Litigation from its introduction in 1993 until 2023. In 2014 he was awarded the University's Pilkington Prize for Excellence in Teaching.

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Lectures and presentations. Richard Fentiman has lectured extensively in the United Kingdom and elsewhere. He held the Walter Ganshof van der Meersch Chair at the Université Libre de Bruxelles in 2003-2004, and has been a visiting professor at Cornell Law School and at the Institute of Comparative Law, Tokyo. He delivered the 2009 Snyder Lecture at the University of Indiana ('Trading Debts Across Borders'), and in 2022 delivered the Queens' Distinguished Lecture in Law at Queens' College, Cambridge ('Citadels of the Law: Law Schools and the Defence of Doctrine'). In 2002 he delivered a course at the Hague Academy of International Law (‘The Appropriate Forum in International Litigation’), and in 2014 lectured in the Academy's General Course ('Arbitration and the Brussels 1 Regulation'). He delivered an address on 'Realism in Private International Law' on the occasion of receiving an honorary doctorate from the University of Athens in 2018, and on 'Principle and Pragmatism in Private International Law' on the occasion of receiving an honorary doctorate at the University of Cyprus (2022). He delivered the Queens' Distinguished Lecture in Law 2023 on 'Citadels of the Law: Law Schools and the Defence of Doctrine'.

Amongst recent invited lectures and presentations, in 2026 Richard Fentiman was a panellist at the concluding discussion of the Edinburgh Private International Law Festival on 'The Breakdown of the Rules-Based International Order – What Role for Private International Law?', and spoke on 'Contactless Injunctions: New Approaches to Jurisdiction in English Law' in the Current Research in Private International Law series arranged by the Max Planck Institute, Hamburg. He led a Masterclass on International Commercial Litigation at the University of Cyprus in December 2024, and spoke on 'Forum Shopping in English Law' at the conference on the Social and Economic Impact of Mass Litigation (FIBE, Lisbon, 2024).

Law reform. Richard Fentiman has been extensively involved in law reform, nationally and internationally, in the areas of private international law and international civil procedure. He has given evidence to UK Parliamentary committees, and has advised the UK Government, the American Law Institute, the Financial Markets Law Committee, and the European Commission. In 2016 he gave evidence to the House of Lords EU Justice Committee on the implications of Brexit for civil litigation, which was extensively cited in the Committee's Final Report, and in 2018 gave evidence to the JURI Committee of the European Parliament on the proposal for an instrurment on the 'Expedited Settlement of International Commercial Disputes'.

Impact and engagement. Richard Fentiman's work is frequently cited in cases before English and foreign courts. His International Commercial Litigation has been quoted with approval by the Commercial Court in Spec 1 Ltd v The Export-Import Bank of China (2026) and Harrington & Charles Ltd v Mehta (2023), by the Singapore High Court in BC Andaman Co Ltd v Xie (2017), the Jersey Royal Court in Al Tamimi v Al Chamaa (2017) and the Hong Kong Court of Appeal in Ghossoub v Team Y & R Holdings Ltd (2017) and China Shansui Ltd v Tianrui Holding Co Ltd (2020). His Foreign Law in English Courts was recently approved in Bitar v Banque Libano-Francaise SAL (2023), by the Court of Appeal in AIG Financial Products Corp v Gruber (2020), and the Commercial Court in Kazakhstan Kagazy Plc v Baglan Abdullayevich Zhunus (2018), by Arnold LJ in his dissent in FS Cairo (Nile Plaza) LLC v Brownlie (2020), and in the Supreme Court of Victoria in Thomas v The a2 Milk Company Ltd [No 2] [2022] VSC 725 (28 November 2022). His work has been cited in the European Court of Justice, as recently in Feniks v Azteca (A-G, 2018), and Wikingerhof v Booking.com (A-G, 2020).His writing on asymmetric jurisdiction agreements is frequently cited with approval, as recently in England in Spec 1 Ltd v The Export-Import Bank of China (2026) Gulf International Bank BSC v Aldwood (2019) and Etihad Airways v Flother (2019), and in Spain by the Court of First Instance (Alcobendas) in Codere SA v Perella Weinberg (2016).

He has been involved in recent leading cases before the UK Supreme Court concerning issues in private international law: Brownlie v FS Cairo (Nile Plaza) LLC (2020); Lungowe v Vedanta Resources PLC (2019); The Bodo Community v The Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Ltd (2018); Ministry of Defence v Iraqi Civilians (2016). He frequently acts as an expert witness on English law in foreign courts.

He is a member of the editorial board of the Journal of Private International Law.

Richard Fentiman is a Door Tenant at 2 Temple Gardens, London.