*** FRANK S. BENYON (Editor): Services and the EU Citizen. Hart Publishing Ltd (16c Worcester Place, Oxford, OX1 2JW, UK. Tel: (44-1865) 517530 - fax: 510710 - Email: mail@hartpub.co.uk -
Internet: http://www.hartpub.co.uk ). "Modern Studies in European Law" series, No. 38. 2013, 192 pp. £75. ISBN 978-1-84946-426-0.
Are European countries guilty of having neglected the industrial sector completely or at least too much? Have they been focusing on services too readily? Some commentators both believe and regret that this is indeed the case. Without throwing ourselves headlong into this debate, there is no doubt that the services sector has acquired an increasing significance in Western economies, particularly in the European Union. The European institutions found themselves suddenly responsible for monitoring and providing a framework for the development of the services and their free movement in the extensive borderless internal market. This book seeks to verify the way in which these services accomplished this mission over a period of time. It stems from a number of seminars organised by the European University Institute's legal faculty in Florence. These seminars brought together legal practitioners, academics and lawyers who have an impeccable knowledge of the European Court of Justice.
At a practical level, the different rules that need implementing to accompany the steady liberalisation of services at a European level are scrutinised, sector-by-sector. In this way, the authors also analyse the different possible barriers to free trade that member states use in the name of consumer protection, as well as the provisions that have had to be patiently drawn up as a means to prevent these stumbling blocks to free movement being circumvented. Two contributions therefore explore the very slow processes that have led those active in the transport sector (aviation, road and maritime etc.) to gradually operate at European level for the good of consumers. This is the case with civil aviation, for example, which the European Court of Justice has improved by way of its Sturgeon ruling. The legislator is subsequently demanding transport carriers to compensate passengers when flights are delayed and consumer protection is effectively the leitmotif of this decision. Neither is there any doubt that consumers are benefiting from the positive repercussions in terms of prices resulting from greater competition between airlines thanks to the freedom given to set up where they want to in the Union. Some of the other writers adopt a similar approach in their examination of the liberalisation process that has taken place and which is continuing in the telecommunications area (particularly in light of the resistance to regulation on roaming and the television without borders director). Cross-border health care is also a very sensitive and complex area, similarly to pension rights in different member states.
The main concern running through the heart of these incisive legal analyses deals with the question of why these European provisions to protect consumers have had such little impact on citizens in the context of their adherence to the European Union. The authors also returned to the theme contained in the 2010 Monti Report, which called on the institutions to put consumers at the heart of the European project like never before.
Pierre Bouvier
*** EVELINE RAMAEKERS: European Union Property Law. From Fragments to a System. Intersentia (31 Groenstraat, B-2640 Mortsel. Tel: (32-3- 6801550 - fax: 6587121 - Email: mail@intersentia.be - Internet: http://www.intersentia.com "Ius Commune Europaeum" series, No. 117. 2013, 337 pp. €75, £71, $105. ISBN 978-1-78068-171-9.
This book is based on a Ph.D. thesis defended at the University of Maastricht's faculty of Law, just a few months ago or so. Eveline Ramaekers provides a scientific analysis of the Community acquis in the area of property law and puts forward a number of proposals as to how this area could be further developed. In this field, she identifies the impact of four areas relating to the freedom of movement on national property law and looks at whether the Union really could actively create this kind of law and to what extent it has already been engaged in this exercise. The author therefore sheds light on an area of law that is still extremely fragmented. The proposals put forward seek to create greater consistency for both the form and substance of this field of law.
(PBo)
*** DOROTA LECZYKIEWICZ, STEPHEN WEATHERILL (Editors): The Involvement of EU Law in Private Law Relationships. Hart Publishing (see address attached). "Studies of the Oxford Institute of European and Comparative Law" series, No. 16. 2013, 433 pp, £75. ISBN 978-1-84946-330-0.
This publication is the extension of a conference held in Oxford, which brought together top academics. This excellent book includes contributions from incisive legal experts who examined the nature and purpose of the involvement of European Union law in private law. All the different contributions seek to identify political objectives that can help to endorse Community intervention in this area. To this end, the contributions seek to tackle questions pertaining to consumer law, labour law, competition law, and equal treatment or under law of remedies. At the same time, the sixteen different writers also investigate more general concepts of EU laws such as the Internal Market freedoms and general principles of law, as well as different modes of ensuring the effective application of EU secondary law.
(MT)
*** ALMUTH EBKE: “The party is Over?” Britische Wirtschaftspolitik und das Narrativ des « Decline », 1970-1976. Peter Lang (1 Moosstrasse, Postfach 350, CH-2542 Pieterlen. Tel: (41-32) 3761717 - fax: 3761727 - Email: info@peterlang.com - Internet: http://www.peterlang.com ). “Moderne Geschichte und Politik” series, No. 24. 2012, 123 pp. €22.95. ISBN 978-3-631-63484-4.
This book examines British economic policy in the 1970s and constitutes the final study undertaken by Almuth Ebke, who is currently engaged in scientific research at the University of Cassel. Her study is structured into three different periods: 1971/72, 1973/74 and 1976. First of all, she presents the policy reform launched by the Heath government and then moves on to the 1971/72 crisis and the industrial policy pursued at the time. The author then looks at the 1973 oil crisis and the union problems that affected the United Kingdom at the same time. She examines the reaction of the Heath government (energy-saving measures), then the response by his successor, Harold Wilson (social contract) and the change of direction adopted by the Labour Party in economic policy. In her final chapter, Almuth Ebke, looks at the crisis of Stirling in 1976, followed by an analysis of neoliberalism and monetarism.
(SH)
*** CARL BRAUDENBACHER, JULIANE KOKOTT (editors): Aktuelle Entwicklungen des Europäischen und Internationalen Wirtschaftsrechts. Helbing Lichtenhahn Verlag (8 Elisabethenstrasse, CH-4051 Basle. Tel: (41-61) 2289070 - fax: 2289071 - e-mail: info@helbing.ch - Internet: http://www.helbing.ch ). 2012, No. 14, 526 pp. CHF152. ISBN 978-3-7190-3293-7.
This book includes a number of final studies that examine European and international economic law in their different perspectives. The different authors all examine the issue of the law on participating on the stock market for public companies, the resolution of disputes in the reassurance area, the possibility of a European directive on shares and damages and interest paid following a breach of European economic law, the obligation of recall and appeal under German law in an international context (from the car industry's point of view), and multinational management in China (for Western CEOs), European corporative companies and this legal form's limited scale, best practices in corporate governance, European bans on obstructing public tenders and, finally, the neutralisation principle.
(SH)
*** LUCIA MARTA: Europe: spread (not lost) in space. Institut d'études de sécurité de l'Union européenne (100 av. de Suffren, F-75015 Paris. Tel: (33-1) 56891930 - fax: 56891931 - Email: info@iss.europa.eu - Internet: http://www.iss.europa.eu ). "Brief Issue" series, No. 22. June 2013, 4 pp.
Lucia Marta is a researcher at the French Foundation for Strategic Research. In this Brief, she analyses the position of the European Union on space. She argues that its presence in this area is bound to increase given that the Lisbon Treaty provides it with the necessary political and legal basis for it to be able to go beyond simply civil flagship programmes. She also uses her expertise to analyse the decisive financial aspects of this European presence in space, which is preceded by a presentation of the cartography of the different major European agents involved in this field.
(MT)