This volume contains thoughts on the issue of Codification of European Private Law and on the present state of European Private Law by one of the protagonists of the debate that is unfolding in Europe. Taking a sometimes sharply critical view, Professor Mattei attempts to unveil what he considers biases, strategies, and ideologies that affect the European legal process. The work attempts to open a basic and genuine political debate between legal scholars, which he considers an unavoidable prerequisite of any major reform process in private law. Challenging the claim of technocratic neutrality shared by much of the most influential European legal academy, the author uses the tools of Comparative Law and Economics to set priorities on the table and to show some of the real stakes of the present process. The work explores fundamental areas of European private law, from the sources' to contracts' to trust law.

A European codification of private law is in the air. The European Parliament decided in favour of it, the European Commission supports it and many legal scholars are already working on it. The question is: why? This book provides an answer by looking into the history of codification. It focuses on the arguments that were used for the introduction of some modern codifications, such as the French Code civil and the Austrian ABGB. It shows that the realisation of these codifications was closely linked to the process of the formation of states. Since uniformity was thought to be of crucial importance to the formation of a modern state, it was only logical that the unification of law became an important goal, too. Codification was an excellent means to achieve this goal. After all, the most essential feature of these modern codifications was the establishment of the monopoly of the central government on the making of law within its own territory. This historical enquiry thus increases our understanding of the political nature of the endeavours to realise an European codification of private law.

Regions within European Union member states (such as Scotland in the UK and Catalonia in Spain) have their own legal systems: how will the process of 'Europeanization' affect them? This volume examines the phenomenon of 'regional' private law in the European Union, considering jurisdictions and laws below those of the member states and drawing comparisons with other such jurisdictions elsewhere in the world, such as Louisiana and Quebec. The whole is considered in relation to the development of European private law, and the use of codification in that process. This volume will be of interest to academic lawyers worldwide, advanced law students and European policy-makers.

The European codification project has rapidly gathered pace since the turn of the century. This monograph considers the codification project in light of a series of broader analytical frameworks – comparative, historical and constitutional – which make modern codification phenomena intelligible. This new reading across fields renders the European codification project (currently being promoted through the Common Frame of Reference and the Optional Sales Law Code proposal) vulnerable to constitutionally-grounded criticism, traceable to normative considerations of private law authority and legitimacy. Arguing that modern codification phenomena are more complex than positivist, socio-legal and historical approaches have suggested over the past two centuries, the book stages a pathbreaking method of analysis of the law-discourse (nomos-centred) which questions at once the reduction of private law to legislation and of law to power and, on this basis, redefines the ways in which to counter law's disintegration and crisis in the context of Europeanisation. Professor Niglia reconstructs the European codification project as a complex structure of government-in-the-making that embodies a set of contingent world views, excludes alternatives, challenges the plurality of private laws and entrenches conflicts that pertain not only to form (codification, de-codification, recodification) but also to dilemmas implicated in determining the substantive orientation of European private law. The book investigates the position of the codifiers and their discontents in the shadow of the codification strategy pursued by the European Commission – noting a new turn in the struggle over the configuration of private law which has taken place since the Savigny-Thibaut dispute of 1814 which this book critically revisits exactly two centuries later. This monograph is particularly aimed at readers interested in exploring the complexities, and interconnections, of the supposedly separate realms of comparative law, European law, private law, legal history, constitutional law, sociology of law and, last but not least, legal theory and jurisprudence.

European law, including both civil law and common law, has gone through several major phases of expansion in the world. European legal history thus also is a history of legal transplants and cultural borrowings, which national legal histories as products of nineteenth-century historicism have until recently largely left unconsidered. The Handbook of European Legal History supplies its readers with an overview of the different phases of European legal history in the light of today's state-of-the-art research, by offering cutting-edge views on research questions currently emerging in international discussions. The Handbook takes a broad approach to its subject matter both nationally and systemically. Unlike traditional European legal histories, which tend to concentrate on "heartlands" of Europe (notably Italy and Germany), the Europe of the Handbook is more versatile and nuanced, taking into consideration the legal developments in Europe's geographical "fringes" such as Scandinavia and Eastern Europe. The Handbook covers all major time periods, from the ancient Greek law to the twenty-first century. Contributors include acknowledged leaders in the field as well as rising talents, representing a wide range of legal systems, methodologies, areas of expertise and research agendas.

This detailed analysis of the content and configuration of civil codes in diverse jurisdictions also examines their relationship with some branches of private law as: family law, commercial law, consumer law and private international law. It analyzes the codification, decodification and recodification processes illuminating the dialogue between current codes – and private law legislation in general – with Constitutions and International Conventions. The commentary elucidates the changing requirements of civil law as it shifted from an early protection of patrimony to a support for commercial and contractual law. It also explains the varying trajectories of civil law, which in some jurisdictions was merged with religious legal tenets in its codification of familial relations, while in others it was fused with commercial law or, indeed, codified from scratch as a discrete legal corpus. Elsewhere, the volume provides material on differing approaches to consumer law, where relevant legislation may be scattered across numerous statutes, and also on private international law, a topic of increasing relevance in a world where business corporations have interests in multiple jurisdictions (and often play one off against another). The volume features invited contributions from leading scholars in the field of private law brought together for an in depth analysis of the current regulatory attitude in this field of the law in jurisdictions with diverse legal systems and traditions. In current times we are witnessing the adoption of diverging regulatory solutions. Through the analysis of the past and present of private law regulation, the volume unveils the underlying trends and relevance of the codification method across the world.

In this volume, the Study Group and the Acquis Group present the first academic Draft of a Common Frame of Reference (DCFR). The Draft is based in part on a revised version of the Principles of European Contract Law (PECL) and contains Principles, Definitions and Model Rules of European Private Law in an interim outline edition. It covers the books on contracts and other juridical acts, obligations and corresponding rights, certain specific contracts, and non-contractual obligations. One purpose of the text is to provide material for a possible "political" Common Frame of Reference (CFR) which was called for by the European Commission's Action Plan on a More Coherent European Contract Law of January 2003.

No aspect of legal formalism has interested comparative jurists as much as the extent of legislative codification across legal systems. This book looks at codification from a broad, international perspective, discussing general themes as well as various legal fields. The first of two volumes on this subject begins with a general theoretical and historical view of codification, followed by a series of other horizontal inquiries. It encompasses papers focusing on several significant contemporary issues in codification, including "codification of private law in post-soviet times", "criminal law codification beyond the nation state" and "soft codification of private law". In addition, this volume consists of general reports and national reports on administrative procedure and human rights, providing a comparative analysis of codification of law. This book is developed from papers presented at the 2012 Thematic Congress of the International Academy of Comparative Law.