Comparison Of International Multimodal Transport Liability Rules

Traditionally, transport law has been regarded as international law. The modern multimodal transport has changed this.The conventions on ocean transport and air transport have been widely adopted throughout the world. This reflects the fact that vessels and airplanes are used as means of transport all over the world and between the different regions of the world. In contrast, the rules on inland carriage (road and rail) vary from one region to another. Multimodal transports are not regulated by any international conventions. In commercial practice, one liability model is preferred in Europe whereas another is preferred in the United States. In this sense, modern transport law has become regionalized. The regionalization creates difficulties when goods are transported between the two regions. Basically, the different liability rules make it difficult for the contracting parties to foresee their legal positions. Most likely, the differences between the regions as to how the multimodal problem is dealt with will also create transaction costs in relation to the negotiation of contracts. The differences must also be assumed to increase dispute solving costs, as it will often be unclear to the parties what rules should apply and whether the rules are the same or different in the two legal systems.One of the central questions in relation to multimodal transport is how to facilitate recourse actions in the chain of contracts. Obviously, the simple way to achieve this goal is to create uniformity or harmonization in the chain of contracts so that the contracting carrier and the performing carrier are subject to the same liability rules. The network liability model has the ability to create harmonization in the chain of contracts, depending on the exact choice of network liability version. However, harmonization under this model seems to come at a high price. In general, the model is too complicated, and liability under the model is too unpredictable for the parties. More importantly, however, the network liability model does not achieve real globalization. Thus, even if the network liability system were adopted in all jurisdictions, it would still not eliminate the need for the parties to be acquainted with foreign law. On the contrary, the network liability system upholds and reinforces the basic idea that different types of transports are to be governed by different sets of liability rules, which may in turn vary from one jurisdiction to another. The uniform liability system has the advantage of being simple and of creating predictability on questions of liability. It also has the potential to become a global solution in that it is not based on the incorporation of existing national legislation. However, in Europe, the uniform liability model clearly lacks the ability to create harmonization within the chain of contracts, because the liability of the subcontracting inland carrier vs. the contracting carrier is mandatorily regulated under the existing European conventions governing inland transport. Consequently, neither the network liability model nor the uniform liability model can achieve the ideal solution of creating both real globalization and harmonization in the chain of contracts.The UNCITRAL Convention for Carriage of Goods, Wholly or Partly by Sea (Rotterdam Rules) will solve this problem.