A Study Of The Law Applicable To International Cruise Tourism Contracts

With the rapid development of China’s cruise tourism,the legal disputes between passengers and cruise lines,travel agencies have also increased significantly.As cruise tourisms are international travels or high seas travels,and most of cruise lines in China’s cruise tourism market are foreign enterprises or foreign-invested enterprises,cruise contract disputes are mostly foreign-related civil disputes.The determination of the applicable law of international cruise tourism contract is one of the main difficulties for the court to hear international cruise disputes due to the obvious complex and special relations in the cruise tourism contract.The law and judicial practice of United States,the United Kingdom and the European Union have many precedents to analyze the disputes on the application of the law of international cruise tourism contractual relations,and China’s judicial practice has also raised the same issue need to be clarified.According to the rules of choice law in Law of the People’s Republic of China on the Application of Laws to Foreign-related Civil Relations and People’s Republic of China Maritime Code,there are different views in the determination of the applicable law of international cruise tourism contract,theoretical controversy,for which the dilemma has not been clear path to solve.The dilemma in the law applicable to international cruise tourism contract relations is mainly reflected in the characterization of contract relations and the application of rules of choice law.The characterization dilemma mainly stems from the divergence of the legal relationships and the dual legal attributes under the rules of choice law.In China’s cruise tourism practices,there are different views on what kind of contract relationships exist between passengers,travel agencies and cruise lines,which directly leads to differences in the characterization.At the same time,for dual legal attribute of the international cruise tourism contract relationship,characterization has to two choices that whether it is a maritime contract under Article 269 of the Maritime Code or a consumer contract under Article 42 of the Law on the Application of Laws.The dilemma of the application of the rule of choice law are the obstacles of the application and the different views in the application of choice of law methods.As the places of performance of international cruise contracts are cross-border,contingent and variable,it is difficult or impossible to determine the law of the place in which the services are supplied under Article 42 of the Law on the Application of Laws,which in turn leads to the actual failure of the consumer’s contract freedom.Article 269 of the Maritime Code applicable to all maritime contracts emphasize contract freedom and efficiency,which cannot meet the special needs of protecting the interests of the weak in the international cruise tourism contracts.To solve the dilemma of the law applicable to the international cruise tourism contract relationship,it is necessary to clarify the types,nature and particularity of contract relationship existing in the cruise tourism practice,and the causes and solutions of the dilemma by empirical methods.It can be realized after the classification of the legal relationship,that the international cruise tourism contract relationships include the international cruise carriage of passenger contract relationships between passengers and cruise lines,the international cruise tourism service contract relationships between passengers and travel agencies,and the tourism service consumption contract between passengers and independent contractors.According to the special needs of international cruise tourism contractual relationship and the practices of foreign laws,the international cruise carriage of passenger contract relationship should be classified as a maritime contract under Article 269 of Maritime Code,and the international cruise tourism service contract relationship and other consumer contract should be classify as consumer contract.As for the obstacles and inadaptability of the current rules of choice law in the international cruise tourism contracts,the special rules or standards for the determination of the applicable law in international cruise tourism contracts need to be clarified by means of judicial interpretation or judicial guidance regard to the special needs of the protection of the interests of the weak and the particularity of carriage by sea.