Regulation 261/2004 on Air Passengers' Rights has been amongst the most high-profile pieces of EU secondary legislation of the past years, generating controversial judgments of the Court of Justice, from C-344/04 ex parte IATA to C-402/07 Sturgeon. The Regulation has led to equally challenging decisions across the Member States, ranging from judicial enthusiasm for passenger rights to domestic courts holding that a Regulation could not be relied upon by an individual claimant or even threatening outright to refuse to apply its provisions. The economic stakes are significant for passengers and airlines alike, and despite the European Commission's recent publication of reform proposals, controversies appear far from settled. At the same time the Regulation should, according to the Treaty, have uniform, direct and general application in all the Member States of the Union. How, then, can this diversity be explained? What implications do the diverging national interpretations have for the EU's regulatory strategy at large? This book brings together leading experts in the field to present a series of case studies from 15 different Member States as well as the extra-territorial application of Regulation 261, combined with high-level analysis from the perspectives of Aviation law and EU law.

Every ten years ICAO holds a worldwide air transport conference. The most recent such event - the 6th Worldwide Air Transport Conference (ATConf/6) - was held in Montreal from 18 to 22 March 2013. The questions posed by this book are: are the “clerical and administrative tasks” for ICAO which were decided on by ATConf/6 (and other preceding conferences) sufficient to meet the needs of the people of the world for safe, regular, economical and efficient air transport? Should ICAO not think outside of its 67-year-old box and become a beacon to air transport regulators? In other words, shouldn’t the bottom line of ICAO’s meaning and purpose in the field of air transport be to analyze trends and guide the air transport industry instead of continuing to merely act as a forum for global practitioners to gather and update information on their respective countries’ policies for air transport? Shouldn’t ICAO provide direction, as do other agencies of the United Nations? This book addresses ICAO’s inability, unlike most other specialized agencies in their missions, to make a tangible difference in air transport development, through a discussion of key issues affecting the air transport industry. It also inquires into the future of air transport regulation. ​