Explore the vast range of titles available.

This substantial and original book examines how the EU Private International Law (‘PIL’) framework is functioning and considers its impact on the administration of justice in cross-border cases within the EU. It grew out of a major project (ie EUPILLAR: European Union Private International Law: Legal Application in Reality) financially supported by the EU Civil Justice Programme. The research was led by the Centre for Private International Law at the University of Aberdeen and involved partners from the Universities of Freiburg, Antwerp, Wroclaw, Leeds, Milan and Madrid (Complutense). The contributors address the specific features of cross-border disputes in the EU by undertaking a comprehensive analysis of the Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU) and national case law on the Brussels I, Rome I and II, Brussels IIa and Maintenance Regulations. Part I discusses the development of the EU PIL framework. Part II contains the national reports from 26 EU Member States. Parts III (civil and commercial) and IV (family law) contain the CJEU case law analysis and several cross-cutting chapters. Part V briefly sets the agenda for an institutional reform which is necessary to improve the effectiveness of the EU PIL regime. This comprehensive research-project book will be of interest to researchers, students, legal practitioners, judges and policy-makers who work, or are interested, in the field of private international law. Volume 20 in the series Studies in Private International Law

One of the issues left untouched by the Brussels Convention of 27 September 1968 (and by the Brussels-1 Regulation replacing it) concerns the leeway left to domestic courts when applying European rules on international jurisdiction in civil and commercial matters. For instance, is the court under a duty of strict compliance with the jurisdiction rule as it is drafted? Would such a duty go so far as to require the court to abide by the jurisdiction rule, even though it is being used by one of the litigants to achieve an unfair result, for example to delay adjudication on the merits? Under what conditions may the Court decline jurisdiction on account of any unsuitable forum shopping, thus ruling out the European provision on jurisdiction? Recent litigation in the ECJ has yielded rather, even excessively, restrictive answers, ruling out any discretion by domestic courts to remedy any inconvenience arising from the strict application of the European provisions, if such discretion were provided for by the lex fori (the Gasser case, the Turner case, and the Owusu case). This series of rulings from the ECJ raises several questions. Most observers have questioned the appropriateness of prescribing a blind application of European rules on jurisdiction by domestic courts, relying on the legal traditions of EC Member States usually providing for corrective mechanisms – such as ‘forum non conveniens’ in English Law and ‘exception de fraude’ in French Law – in cases when a party abusively triggers the jurisdiction of a court in order to obtain an unjust advantage, thus practising unacceptable forum shopping. The time has now come for an analysis, under both Community and comparative law, of the ramifications of the recent Gasser/Turner/Owusu cases. Readers will find in this book a collection of studies by some of the leading English and French experts today, analysing the ins and outs of jurisdiction and forum shopping in Europe.

The reform of the European Constitution continues to dominate news headlines and has provoked a massive debate, unprecedented in the history of EU law. Against this backdrop Monica Claes’ book offers a “bottom up” view of how the Constitution might work, taking the viewpoint of the national courts as her starting point, and at the same time returning to fundamental principles in order to interrogate the myths of Community law. Adopting a broad, comparative approach, she analyses the basic doctrines of Community law from both national constitutional perspectives as well as the more usual European perspective. It is only by combining the perspectives of the EU and national constitutions, she argues, that a complete picture can be obtained, and a solid theoretical base (constitutional pluralism) developed. Her comparative analysis encompasses the law in France, Belgium, Denmark, the Netherlands, Germany, Ireland, Italy and the United Kingdom and in the course of her inquiry discusses a wide variety of prominent problems. The book is structured around three main themes, coinciding with three periods in the development of the judicial dialogue between the ECJ and the national courts. The first focuses on the ordinary non-constitutional national courts and how they have successfully adapted to the mandates developed by the ECJ in Simmenthal and Francovich. The second examines the constitutional and other review courts and discusses the gradual transformation of the ECJ into a constitutional court, and its relationship to the national constitutional courts. The contrast is marked; these courts are not specifically empowered by the case law of the ECJ and have reacted quite differently to the message from Luxembourg, leaving them apparently on collision course with the ECJ in the areas of judicial Kompetenz Kompetenz and fundamental rights. The third theme reprises the first two and places them in the context of the current debate on the Constitution for Europe and the Convention, taking the perspective of the national courts as the starting point for a wide-ranging examination of EU’s constitutional fundamentals. In so doing it argues that the new Constitution must accommodate the national perspective if it is to prove effective.

The Brussels I Regulation is by far the most prominent cornerstone of the European law of international civil procedure.Every practitioner in the international field has to work with it - and its importance is still growing.The first edition of this full scale article-by-article commentary found a very warm reception.

This book contributes to the debate about the impact of European Community Law on the national constitutional orders and cultures of the respective Member States. The author examines the doctrine of sovereignty as a mechanism within which this impact may be best assessed and in particular how it underwrites the tension between European Union rights and the rights provided by the respective legal orders of the Member States. In particular the book focuses on political,social and civil rights, drawing from T.H. Marshall’s typology. In endorsing an appropriate analytical framework, the book challenges both existing law and secondary literature in order to argue that the terminology, the concepts and the tools which are used to assess the impact of the EC law on the national constitutional orders are to be selected with great care. This is particularly apposite given the complexity of constitutional diversity, in terms of national constitutions and their reception of EC law. It is also important because of the variety of approaches involved in the constitutional adjustment of the acquis of the Union within the context of the increasing drive to constitutionalisation of the Union on the one hand and enlargement on the other.

'Wessel Geursen's work is more than \"mapping\", it is a very thorough in-depth examination of the way EU law applies to its member states' territories, and in certain circumstances to third states' territories.' Part of foreword by Jacques Ziller, Honorary professor at Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, and Università di Pavia   With increased.

A lively debate on the constitutionalisation of the international legal order has emerged in recent years. A similar debate has also taken place within the European Union. This book complements that debate, exploring the underlying realities that the moves towards constitutionalism seek to address. It does this by focusing on the substantive interconnections that the EU has developed over the years with the rest of the world, and assesses the practical impact these have both in the development of its legal order as well as in the international community. Based on papers delivered at the bi-annual EU/International Law Forum organised by the University of Bristol in March 2009, this collection of essays examines policy areas of economic governance (trade, financial services, migration, environment), political governance (human rights, criminal law, responses to financing terrorism), security governance (counter-terrorism, use of force, non-proliferation), and the issue of the emergence of European and global values. How are these areas shaped by the interaction between EU law and other legal orders and polities? In what ways does the EU impact on other transnational legal systems? And how are its own rules and principles shaped by such systems? These questions are addressed in the light of the specific legal and political context within which the EU pursues its policies by interacting with the rest of the world.

The second edition of this highly recommended work addresses the interaction between conflict of laws, dispute resolution, electronic commerce and consumer contracts. In addition it identifies specific difficulties that conflicts lawyers and consumer lawyers encounter in electronic commerce and proposes original approaches to balance the conflict of interest between consumers’ access to justice and business efficiency. The European Union has played a leading role in this area of law and its initiatives are fully explored. It pays particular attention to the most recent development in collective redress and alternative/online dispute resolution. By adopting multiple research methods, including a comparative study of the EU and US approach; historical analysis of protective conflict of laws; doctrinal analysis of legal provisions and economic analysis of law, it provides the most comprehensive examination of frameworks in cross-border consumer contracts. Volume 1 in the series Studies in Private International Law