Personal Jurisdiction and Corporate Groups: Daimlerchrysler AG v Bauman

This article proposes a framework for understanding what is at stake in the US Supreme Court's upcoming decision in DaimlerChrysler AG v Bauman. Argentine plaintiffs sued a German corporation in US courts, alleging violations of the Alien Tort Statutes. The outcome and consequences of the Supreme Court's decision depend on how the Court analyses three aspects of personal jurisdiction. The first is the extent to which a subsidiary's contacts with a forum state can be attributed to the corporate parent. The second is whether the contacts are so extensive that the court may exercise jurisdiction over a defendant for any cause of action, even one unrelated to the contacts. The third is whether jurisdiction is 'reasonable'. The opinion promises to provide either much-needed guidance about jurisdictional attribution within corporate groups, or an example of the discretionary, policy-driven analysis of when jurisdiction is reasonable in the context of multinational businesses. Reprinted by permission of Hart Publishing