Aukje A.H. Van Hoek (University of Amsterdam Institute for Private Law) has posted The Declaratory Judgment - Between Remedy and Procedural Technique (Pre-edit version of a contribution to M. Pfeiffer, Liber Amicorum Monika Pauknerová, Wolters Kluwer CR 2021, p. 505-514) on SSRN. Here is the abstract:
This contributions discussed a very technical issue of private international law that turned out to be crucial in several class actions held in the Netherland regarding torts committed in common law countries: Should the question whether courts in the Netherlands can issue a purely declaratory judgment on the tortiousness of certain behaviour or the liability of the defendant be considered to fall under the lex causae (the declaration being considered as a type of remedy), or rather be governed by lex fori (as being a procedural issue)? The author prefers a classification as procedural, but acknowledges that the case law on this issue doesn’t fully support this outcome. The question lost some of its relevance under the new law on class actions, but is still pertinent.
