Publication date: 25.09.2024
Civil process is an essential component of the EU legal system. One of the European Union's goals is to " "create a European area of justice based on mutual acceptance of court decisions and mutual trust among judicial authorities in diverse EU countries." The European judicial area enables citizens to exercise their rights across the Union. Civil procedure laws play an important role in the EU, as evidenced by the Treaties. The article examines the evolution of European procedural law and provides a quick overview of the rules' nature and content.
The Brussels Convention
The Member States undertook, as early as the 1957 Founding agreements, to negotiate among themselves the simplification of formalities for the mutual recognition and enforcement of judgments and arbitral awards. To implement Article 293 of the EC Treaty (Treaty establishing the European Community), the Member States signed an agreement in Brussels in 1968. The Convention on Jurisdiction and the Recognition and Enforcement of Judgments in Civil and Commercial Matters entered into force in 1973. In order to promote uniform application, the Member States also agreed that the interpretation of the Brussels Convention would be a matter for the Court of Justice. The Protocol to this effect entered into force on 1 September 1975.
The Lugano Agreement
As the Brussels Convention was, by its legal nature, only open to the Member States of the European Economic Community, an agreement with substantially the same content as the Brussels Convention was signed in 1988 in Lugano, Switzerland, by the members of the European Community and the European Free Trade Association. It entered into force at different times between 1992 and 1997. The significance of the Lugano Convention was that it extended the acquis of the Brussels Convention, such as the unified European jurisdiction system and the simplified and accelerated recognition and enforcement procedure, to an enlarged European area. Some 370 million inhabitants of eighteen European states were able to benefit from the two conventions.
Community Law
The entry into force of the Treaty of Amsterdam in 1997 brought about a decisive change in the development of the European Union's rules of international civil procedure. Since 1 May 1999, the Council has been given legislative powers to deal with judicial cooperation in civil matters having cross-border implications, opening the way to the transposition into Community law of the content of the 1968 Brussels Convention. In 2000, the Council adopted Regulation No. 44/2001 "on jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters".The regulation was named in the legal literature "Brussels I" because of its close link with the Brussels Convention. Following the entry into force of the Amsterdam Treaty, the pace of Community legislation in the field of judicial cooperation has accelerated. The Tampere Programme (1999-2004) and its successor, the Hague Programme (2004-2009) and the Stockholm Programme (2010), have led to a series of regulations to facilitate the resolution of cross-border civil disputes to "strengthening the area of freedom, security, and justice." The Lisbon Treaty established civil justice as a distinct sector of EU competence, advancing the process of strengthening and emancipating this area. The body of legislation that has developed is increasingly referred to in the legal literature as European Union civil procedural law or European civil procedural law.
The Origins of the Concept of European Civil Procedural Law
European civil procedural law is the set of international rules of civil procedure applied uniformly or harmonized in the Member States of the European Union. The term was made famous by Kropholler. The term "European civil procedural law" has become widespread, mainly in German. Krophollermar anticipated the adjective "European" when the scope of the Brussels Convention, which unified jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments, was limited to six countries. The authors also agree that preliminary rulings and proceedings before the Court of Justice of the European Communities and the Court of First Instance are not considered part of European civil procedural law. However, the use of the term cannot be regarded as general; it is used mainly in Central Europe.
Content of the Regulation
The European Union's rules of civil procedure do not currently form a coherent system and do not create a uniform supranational civil procedural law. The growing body of legislation aims to promote cross-border dispute resolution as part of judicial cooperation between Member States. Private international law and civil procedural law have their roots in conflict-of-law rules. Still, there are already areas where community rules have replaced certain provisions of national civil procedural law. In contrast, elsewhere, community rules are available to claimants as an alternative to national law.
The Nature of the Regulation
The Brussels Convention of 1968 has been classified by the legal literature as international law, given the content of the agreements, within the scope of international civil procedure. The decisive change occurred after the entry into force of the 1997 Treaty of Amsterdam when the creation of a Community body of law on judicial cooperation in civil matters having cross-border implications became one of the objectives of the European Community. Article 65(c) of the EC Treaty, as amended in 1997, made it an obligation for Member States to 'abolish obstacles to the good functioning of civil proceedings, if necessary, by promoting the harmonization of the rules of the Member States in the area of civil procedure'. The international civil procedural character of the rules has been maintained, but the standard-setting has been transferred to the community level.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the history and development of European civil procedure law are intricately linked to pivotal instruments such as the Brussels Convention, the Lugano Agreement, the Amsterdam Treaty, the Brussels I Regulation, etc. As the legal environment continues to evolve, these foundational instruments will remain essential in shaping the future of civil procedure law in Europe. Regarding the content of the regulations, the European Union's rules of civil procedure do not currently form a coherent system and do not create a uniform supranational civil procedural law. Still, there are already areas where community rules have replaced certain provisions of national civil procedural law.
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