Private law in the external relations of the EU

Abstract

Private Law in the External Relations of the EU is an innovative study of the interactions between EU external relations law and private law, two unrelated fields of law, inverted if private law is understood as regulatory private law - the space where regulatory law intersects with private economic activity. Here the link between the Internal Market and the global market - and thereby international law - is much more prominent. In this book, key questions about the relationship between EU external relations law and private law are answered, including: in what ways might European private law act as a tool to achieve EU external policy objectives, particularly in regulatory fields? How might the quickly developing EU external competence over the procedural dimensions of private law, including private international law, impact on substantive law, both externally and internally? And how is the legal position of private parties affected by EU external relations? In asking these questions, this edited collection opens up a field of enquiry into the so far underexplored relationship between these two fields of law. In doing so, it addresses three different aspects of the relationship: (i) the evolution of the EU competence, (ii) the ways in which EU private law extends its reach beyond the boundaries of the internal market, and (iii) the ways in which the EU contributes to the formation of private regulation at the international level.