In 1982 the Faculty of Law of the National University of Singapore organized the first of what are now established as biennial conferences on international business law, with one given to the discussion of Current Problems of International Trade Financing. The papers from the conference were collected and edited with a substantial introduction, and were published the following year. Seven years on, those who gave the papers were asked to update them for the publication of a second edition. This volume represents the results of that activity.

Those familiar with the first edition of this work should perhaps be made aware that two of the original papers do not appear in the second edition, namely Mr Seah’s “Updating ‘Living Law’: Some Reflections on the Forthcoming Revision of the Uniform Customs and Practice for Documentary Credits”, and Mr Ferguson’s “Innovation in the Approach of Merchant and Trading Banks to Financing Overseas Sales”, because both authors were too busy to carry out the necessary updating. This is particularly unfortunate in the case of Mr Ferguson’s contribution, where the opportunity to reflect upon, and no doubt also be informed about, innovation in the area of his particular contribution is always welcome.

Indeed, the updating of the republished contributions is patchy. The contribution of Mr Mohan Gopal, “English Courts and Choice of Law in Irrevocable Documentary Letters of Credit”, has not been updated nor has the joint contribution of Mr H. Harfield and Mr W. Yaro, “Negotiable Instruments as a Vehicle for Financial Accommodation”, both being felt to contain themes which nevertheless make their inclusion useful to the reader. The contribution of Dr Rolf Ebert, “The Uniform Customs and Practice for Documentary Credits”, has been updated by the Consultant Editor but in the form of footnotes, some of which are lengthy, rather than a reworking of the basic text. No doubt this was done to preserve the integrity of the text out of respect for its original author, who has sadly died, but it prevents the improvement to the paper itself, which could have been accomplished and would have represented a greater tribute to him.

Inevitably, a collection of papers around a single theme produces a degree of overlap, which can be annoying. On the other hand, it allows for a diversity of views around a single topic to be presented. This volume is no exception to these general truths. Some general information is given on more than one occasion, not least the general background to the U.C.P. Professor Schmitthoff (another loss to the world of scholarship suffered since the first edition) and Mr Gopal each present evaluations of the “Conflict of Law Issues Relating to Letters of Credit under English law”, and there are no less than four contributions on the subject of fraud and forgery in international trade financing.

The important consideration, however, is the quality of the material included. Generally this is high, although I found Mr Gopal’s contribution very disappointing, an example of the weakness of a lot of academic writing being over-theoretical and of little real help in under