Kristin van Zwieten is the Clifford Chance Professor of Law and Finance at the Faculty of Law at the University of Oxford and the Gullifer Fellow at Harris Manchester College, Oxford. [1] [2] She was previously the John Collier Fellow in Law at Trinity Hall, Cambridge. [3]
She is currently Director of the Commercial Law Centre, Harris Manchester College (which is affiliated with UNIDROIT) and was the Associate Dean for Equality and Diversity at the Oxford Law Faculty until 2024. [1] [4] She is also a founding editor of the Oxford Business Law Blog and regularly consults for the World Bank. [1]
van Zwieten's scholarship focuses on corporate finance and corporate insolvency law. She is the editor of several texts on English and European cross-border corporate insolvency law. She has been editor of Goode on Principles of Corporate Insolvency Law since its fifth edition in 2018. Goode is regularly cited by the UK Supreme Court, Privy Council, Singapore Court of Appeal, and Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal and is regarded by lawyers as "a recommended acquisition for anyone interested in insolvency law from the practice, academic, or judicial perspective". [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] Her article "Director Liability in Insolvency and its Vicinity" in the Oxford Journal of Legal Studies has also been cited by the UK Supreme Court in Stanford International Bank Ltd v HSBC Bank Plc.
van Zwieten is currently the principal investigator on the "COVID-19, public policy and commercial law" project at the University of Oxford alongside Professors Horst Eidenmüller and Oren Sussman. [10] She is also working with Professor Jennifer Payne on publishing a book on "the changing landscape of English corporate insolvency and restructuring law" which seeks to bring together contributions from leading scholars across the UK, Europe, and the US. [11]
Sir Royston Miles "Roy" Goode is an academic commercial lawyer in the United Kingdom. He founded the Centre for Commercial Law Studies at Queen Mary, University of London. He was awarded the OBE in 1972 followed by the CBE in 1994 before being knighted for services to academic law in 2000.
The Faculty of Law, Cambridge is the law school of the University of Cambridge.
In law, set-off or netting is a legal technique applied between persons or businesses with mutual rights and liabilities, replacing gross positions with net positions. It permits the rights to be used to discharge the liabilities where cross claims exist between a plaintiff and a respondent, the result being that the gross claims of mutual debt produce a single net claim. The net claim is known as a net position. In other words, a set-off is the right of a debtor to balance mutual debts with a creditor.
United Kingdom insolvency law regulates companies in the United Kingdom which are unable to repay their debts. While UK bankruptcy law concerns the rules for natural persons, the term insolvency is generally used for companies formed under the Companies Act 2006. Insolvency means being unable to pay debts. Since the Cork Report of 1982, the modern policy of UK insolvency law has been to attempt to rescue a company that is in difficulty, to minimise losses and fairly distribute the burdens between the community, employees, creditors and other stakeholders that result from enterprise failure. If a company cannot be saved it is liquidated, meaning that the assets are sold off to repay creditors according to their priority. The main sources of law include the Insolvency Act 1986, the Insolvency Rules 1986, the Company Directors Disqualification Act 1986, the Employment Rights Act 1996 Part XII, the EU Insolvency Regulation, and case law. Numerous other Acts, statutory instruments and cases relating to labour, banking, property and conflicts of laws also shape the subject.
Paul Lyndon Davies KC (Hon), FBA is Allen & Overy Professor of Corporate Law Emeritus at the University of Oxford, Emeritus Fellow of Balliol College, Oxford, Emeritus Fellow of Jesus College, Oxford, and Emeritus Professor of Law at the London School of Economics, where he was the Cassel Professor of Commercial Law from 1998 to 2009. He is an honorary Bencher of Gray’s Inn.
Goode on Principles of Corporate Insolvency Law by Sir Roy Goode of the University of Oxford is a leading textbook on UK Corporate Insolvency Law. Since its 5th edition, it has been edited by Professor Kristin van Zwieten, the Clifford Chance Professor of Law and Finance at the University of Oxford. It is regularly cited by common law courts such as the UK Supreme Court, Privy Council, Singapore Court of Appeal and Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal.
Sandra Fredman FBA, KC (hon) is a professor of law in the Faculty of Law at the University of Oxford and a fellow of Pembroke College, Oxford.
Stone & Rolls Ltd v Moore Stephens[2009] UKHL 39 is a leading case relevant for UK company law and the law on fraud and ex turpi causa non oritur actio. The House of Lords decided by a majority of three to two that where the director and sole shareholder of a closely held private company deceived the auditors with fraud carried out on all creditors, subsequently the creditors of the insolvent company would be barred from suing the auditors for negligence from the shoes of the company. The Lords reasoned that where the company was only identifiable with one person, the fraud of that person would be attributable to the company, and the "company" could not rely on its own illegal fraud when bringing a claim for negligence against any auditors. It was the last case to be argued before the House of Lords.
The Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment is an interdisciplinary research centre of the University of Oxford that focuses on teaching research, and engagement with businesses and enterprises for long term environmental sustainability. The Oxford Smith School was established with the vision of a net-zero emissions future alongside achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, supported by a sustainable global economic and financial system. The school has a broad profile of research, teaching, enterprise engagement, and partnerships to support this vision.
Powdrill v Watson [1995] 2 AC 394 is a UK insolvency law case concerning the administration procedure when a company is unable to repay its debts.
The Price Media Law Moot Court Competition or Price Moot in short, is an annual international moot court competition. Described as a competition "for raising the profile of freedom of expression by bringing informed and effective debate and discussion on significant issues of information flows and technology to many parts of the world", the Price Moot focuses on international media law and related human rights such as freedom of expression, freedom of religion, freedom of association, and various facets of privacy. The main sources of law engaged include the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, European Convention on Human Rights, and the International Covenant of Civil and Political Rights. Recurring topics include online hate speech and the responsibility of internet intermediaries. With more than a hundred teams taking part annually, the Price Moot is the world's largest competition in its field and is considered one of the grand slam or major moots.
The University of OxfordFaculty of Law is the law school of the University of Oxford. It has a history of over 800 years in the teaching and learning of law.
Harris Manchester College (HMC) is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. It was founded in Warrington in 1757 as a college for Unitarian students and moved to Oxford in 1893. It became a full college of the university in 1996, taking its current name to commemorate its predecessor the Manchester Academy and a benefaction by Lord Harris of Peckham.
The anti-deprivation rule is a principle applied by the courts in common law jurisdictions in which, according to Mellish LJ in Re Jeavons, ex parte Mackay, "a person cannot make it a part of his contract that, in the event of bankruptcy, he is then to get some additional advantage which prevents the property being distributed under the bankruptcy laws." Wood VC had earlier observed that "the law is too clearly settled to admit of a shadow of doubt that no person possessed of property can reserve that property to himself until he shall become bankrupt, and then provide that, in the event of his becoming bankrupt, it shall pass to another and not to his creditors."
Sir Andrew John Pollard is the Ashall Professor of Infection & Immunity at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of St Cross College, Oxford. He is an Honorary Consultant Paediatrician at John Radcliffe Hospital and the Director of the Oxford Vaccine Group. He is the Chief Investigator on the University of Oxford COVID-19 Vaccine trials and has led research on vaccines for many life-threatening infectious diseases including typhoid fever, Neisseria meningitidis, Haemophilus influenzae type b, streptococcus pneumoniae, pertussis, influenza, rabies, and Ebola.
Louise Joan Gullifer is a British legal academic and barrister who is Rouse Ball Professor of English Law at the University of Cambridge. She is the first woman to hold this professorship and was formerly Professor of Commercial Law at the University of Oxford. She is known for her contributions to English law both as an academic, and for representing the United Kingdom as delegate to United Nations Commission on International Trade Law and UNIDROIT. She is a Bencher of Gray's Inn.
Sir Michael John Fordham,, styled The Hon. Mr Justice Fordham, is a judge of the High Court of England and Wales assigned to the King's Bench Division. He was appointed as a Justice of the High Court on 13 January 2020.
Richard Salter, KC is a British barrister practising from 3 Verulam Buildings and a visiting professor at the Faculty of Law at the University of Oxford where he teaches Corporate Finance Law and Legal Concepts in Financial Law to postgraduates.
Dev Gangjee is Professor of Intellectual Property Law in the Law Faculty of the University of Oxford and a Law Fellow at St Hilda's College, Oxford. He was Director of the Oxford IP Research Centre (OIPRC) until 2023 and is also on the Editorial Boards of the Modern Law Review and Queen Mary Journal of Intellectual Property. He is a visiting professor at the Munich Intellectual Property Law Centre and has held visiting fellowships at the Institute of Intellectual Property in Tokyo, the IP Research Institute of Australia at UNSW, Hong Kong University, the National University of Singapore and the University of Berne.
The Commercial Law Centre, located in Harris Manchester College, Oxford, facilitates academic and policy discussion of commerce and financial law. It aims to bring academics, practitioners and policy makers together from around the world to nurture development in commercial law scholarship. It is affiliated with the Faculty of Law at the University of Oxford and UNIDROIT.