The Common Frame of Reference and the Feasibility of a Common Contract Law in Europe

摘要

The European contract law project no longer waits patiently at the sidelines of European policy-making. Nowadays it occupies centre-field with such heavyweight policies as fundamental rights and citizenship, asylum and organised crime. Its prominence owes much to the company it keeps, for it has been integrated into an agenda at the highest of political levels. The Hague Programme of the European Council has embraced contract law within its programme for strengthening justice, a programme that forms the third plank in the triptych of freedom, security and justice. Within this programme of justice, and under a rubric of "confidence building and mutual trust", specific action for improving the quality and coherence of EU legislation is timetabled. It is here that the instrumental role of European contract law for improving civil justice is articulated, for we find the Commission's project of a Common Frame of Reference given political seal.