 It is variously construed as part of a court's inherent jurisdiction to restrain breaches of its process.The jurisdiction arises in part from the Judicature Act 1873, which provided that "A mandamus or an injunction may be granted or a receiver appointed by an interlocutory Order of the Court in all cases in which it shall appear to the Court to be just or convenient..." Relying on this, Jessel MR in 1878 declared, "I have unlimited power to grant an injunction in any case where it would be right or just to do so..."

The legal order itself is in the form of an injunction, which in Commonwealth jurisdictions is also known as a freezing order, Mareva injunction, Mareva order or Mareva regime, after the case "Mareva Compania Naviera SA v International Bulkcarriers SA", although the first recorded instance of such an order in English jurisprudence was "Nippon Yusen Kaisha v Karageorgis", decided one month before "Mareva".The "Civil Procedure Rules 1998" now define a Mareva injunction as a "freezing order".