So many thoughts about Tesseract: a private international law perspective

On 7 August 2024, the High Court of Australia handed down its decision in Tesseract International Pty Ltd v Pascale Construction Pty Ltd. In doing so, it held (contrary to existing practitioner consensus) that certain Australian proportionate liability laws apply in Australian domestic commercial arbitration. Existing analyses assess this case from an arbitration perspective. As this article shows, however, the case is really about private international law. This being so, this article critiques the High Court’s reasoning and also Tesseract’s existing commentaries from a private international law perspective. As arbitration is a dispute resolution process grounded in law, these critiques are offered in the service of helping Australian arbitration better secure its trade facilitation purposes.