The Law of Reinsurance

The Law of Reinsurance is a clear, authoritative, and user-friendly guide to the principles governing reinsurance under English law. Written for lawyers and reinsurance professionals, it offers a specialist treatment focused exclusively on reinsurance, avoiding unnecessary duplication of general insurance law while explaining how established insurance principles operate in the distinctive reinsurance context. The book examines the definition, purpose, and types of reinsurance before analysing key contractual principles, standard terms, and the rights, obligations, and liabilities of reinsurers and reinsureds, as well as issues of governing law and jurisdiction. This fourth edition has been comprehensively updated to reflect significant legal and market developments since the previous edition. In particular, it addresses the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, including recent English court consideration of aggregation issues in reinsurance disputes. It also analyses the consequences of the United Kingdom's withdrawal from the European Union, which has brought about substantial changes to the rules governing jurisdiction and applicable law in reinsurance matters. While many disputes continue to be resolved through private and confidential arbitration, the new edition also discusses important recent English court decisions on topics including political violence reinsurance and the operation of follow settlements clauses in asbestos-related claims. The authors also draw on relevant non-reinsurance case law where this assists in illuminating reinsurance principles, while maintaining the book's longstanding focus and accessibility. Assuming a working knowledge of insurance law, the text concentrates on reinsurance concepts and avoids detailed exposition of insurance law except where essential. Succinct, practical, and rigorously analytical, The Law of Reinsurance remains an indispensable reference for practitioners and advisers working in one of the world's most significant areas of international commercial activity.