International Comparative Legal Guide - Construction & Engineering Law 2021

Welcome to the eighth edition of ICLG - Construction & Engineering Law. As contributing editors, Herbert Smith Freehills LLP are delighted to introduce the latest edition of this comprehensive global guide to construction and engineering law and regulation.
Clearly, it has been another challenging year for the construction sector. Many projects continue to suffer delay and disruption due to the COVID-19 pandemic as well as other factors such as the global materials shortage, and, at the time of writing, it remains unclear when a full sense of normality will return.
As always, the legal profession needs to ensure that it is in a position to respond to continued and new challenges that the global construction industry will face in the months and years ahead, both in terms of resolving the issues faced by live projects and ensuring an appropriate allocation of risk in future contracts. There will be no 'one size fits all' approach - each project, and each jurisdiction, will have its own obstacles to overcome.
As with the previous editions, this guide provides valuable insights into how different legal systems approach the questions that are commonly encountered on construction and engineering projects. It covers 20 jurisdictions, adopting the form of a Q&A.
The guide also includes an Expert Analysis chapter on the subject of fire and building safety, which takes a look at English case trends as well as the impact of this issue on the UK construction industry's approach to contracting. The chapter further explores the different types of insurance in this context as well as the French/civil law perspective on fire safety and builders' liability, in relation to which we would like to thank our colleagues Sarah McNally and Anne Petitjean for their insightful contribution.
Finally, we are honoured to join a group of distinguished specialists to provide this authoritative guide, and are grateful to all contributors for sharing their knowledge and experience. We hope that you find this guide to be useful, practical and thought-provoking.