While continental and comparative lawyers have recently rediscovered succession law as an area of immense practical importance deserving greater academic attention, it is still a neglected field in England. This book aims to reinvigorate the English debate. It brings together contributions by leading academics and practitioners engaging with topical issues as well as questions of fundamental importance in succession law and estate planning. The book will be of interest to both academics and practitioners working in the field, and to non-English comparative lawyers.

This book presents a broad overview of succession law, encompassing aspects of family law, testamentary law and legal history. It examines society and legal practice in Europe from the Middle Ages to the present from both a legal and a sociological perspective. The contributing authors investigate various aspects of succession law that have not yet been thoroughly examined by legal historians, and in doing so they not only add to our knowledge of past succession law but also provide a valuable key to interpreting and understanding current European succession law. Readers can explore such issues as the importance of a father’s permission to marry in relation to disinheritance, as well as inheritance transactions and private, dynastic and cross-border successions. Further themes addressed by the expert contributors include women’s inheritance rights, the laws of succession for the prince in legal consulting, and succession in the Rota Romana’s jurisprudence.

While continental and comparative lawyers have recently rediscovered succession law as an area of immense practical importance deserving greater academic attention, it is still a neglected field in England. This book aims to reinvigorate the English debate. It brings together contributions by leading academics and practitioners engaging with topical issues as well as questions of fundamental importance in succession law and estate planning. The book will be of interest to both academics and practitioners working in the field, and to non-English comparative lawyers.

This book is one of the first to link company law to the law of succession by concentrating on family businesses. It shows that, to understand the legal framework underlying the daily operations of family businesses, one needs legal analysis, empirical data, psychological and sociological knowledge. The book works on the premise that, since many businesses have been founded by families, practitioners need to develop an understanding of the legal background of such businesses and build up experience to be able to create contracts, trusts, foundations and other legal mechanisms to give shape to systems and procedures for the transfer of shares and control within the family. Comparing the national legal order, techniques, and mechanisms in a range of countries, the book examines parallel developments in these fields of law across the world. Finally, it demonstrates the room for companies, shareholders and the members of a family to develop individual solutions within the legal framework for transferring businesses and shares to the next generation.

Succession, Wills and Probate is an ideal textbook for those taking an undergraduate course in this surprisingly vibrant subject, and also provides a clear and comprehensive introduction for professionals. Against an account of the main social and political themes of succession law, the book gives detailed explanations of core topics such as alternatives to wills and the making, altering and revocation of wills. It also explains personal representatives and how they should deal with a deceased person's estate and interpret and implement the will. Gifts may fail, estates may be insolvent or a person may die intestate, without a will at all. Increasingly relatives and others seek to challenge the will, for example on the grounds of the testator's capacity or under the law of family provision. This third edition is edited, updated and revised to take account of new legislation and case law across all the relevant issues, including a new final chapter dealing with the potentially contentious issues that are becoming more central to professional work in the field of succession.

Presented and written in a friendly and engaging style, Dr Brian Sloan's revised edition is perfectly pitched for today's undergraduate students. Considerable attention is given to the area's rich and evolving case-law, illustrating the relevance of the law to modern life; the central issues and academic debates surrounding inheritance are discussed fully. New to this edition are an introductory chapter covering the demographic and policy context of succession, extensive further reading lists, and diagrams of key concepts, all presented in a clear, modernized design to aid understanding and ease navigation.

This volume explores key issues in the law of succession from a variety of perspectives: national, historical and comparative.