Kurt Lipstein-The Scholar and the Man

Abstract

Kurt Lipstein, an émigré legal scholar from Germany who escaped to England, occupies an eminent place in the European history of the private international law of the 20th century. The majority of what should be considered the most important writings of Lipstein are scattered among many and various journals, collections of essays, Festschriften, encyclopedias, and the like. Some of them are those out of which the discipline of private international law has been created worldwide. Although it may be a matter of subjective judgement to a certain degree, his Hague lecture might be the best study of the history and development of the general theory of private international law composed in English. Another of these pieces is his analysis of the private international law applicable in international courts as their lex fori. This chapter looks at the life of Lipstein as an émigré legal scholar, his education and emigration to England, his works on private international law as well as European law and comparative law. © Oxford University Press, 2013.