Laying a firm foundation:

Exploring collaboration between legal theory and practice in the construction industry

Why?

Commercial contract law is often criticized for not adequately accommodating commercial practices.

This significantly weakens ‘practical legal scholarship’, which is rooted in a constructive dialogue between academia and industry. Both sides lose out on each other’s expertise.

This gap is perhaps most evident within the construction industry where the complexities of a long-term, multi-party transaction towards a common goal strain both contract theory and doctrine.

Our Aim

The aim of this project is to remedy this gap by interactions between contract doctrine and modern construction practice. To that end we wish to form an international network where practitioners, lawyers and academics work together. Through this collaboration, we hope to nurture a successful framework which combines academic study and practice-focussed legal development. Some topics that we have identified for exploration are:

The potential of smart contracts and other technological innovations.

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The idea of a ‘network’ of contracts, of which the construction project with its multiple parties and contracts is a paradigmatic example.

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The debates surrounding contract interpretation, including good faith and relational contracts.

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Legal communication: simplification of the legalese and managing expectation of contract behaviour.

We seek your participation in this project in light of your expertise and insight into the industry. Contact us at {insert email} if you are interested. Looking forward to hearing from you.

The above is merely an illustrative list and we invite further topics for engagement. From there, we hope to create a robust forum for the exchange of ideas and experiences, initially through a series of webinars.