7 Anti-Suit Injunctions and Exclusive Forum Clauses

Subject(s):

Exclusive forum clauses — Injunctions to restrain proceedings in England and Wales

This chapter looks at exclusive forum clauses in anti-suit injunctions. The court's approach to anti-suit injunctions is transformed where the injunction defendant is obliged by a contractual exclusive forum clause to resolve his disputes with the injunction claimant in an agreed forum. There are two principal types of exclusive forum clause. An exclusive jurisdiction clause obliges parties to resolve disputes covered by the clause before a chosen court. An arbitration clause obliges them to resolve disputes covered by the clause before an arbitration tribunal. In both cases, the clause imposes negative as well as positive obligations, and so in general prohibits the contracting parties from litigating other than in the chosen forum. In contrast, so far, choice of law clauses have not been interpreted to include any correlative negative obligation.