UNIFORM TERMINOLOGY · Uniform terminology for european private law

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Project objective

This project aims to overcome a serious impediment to the development and harmonization of EU law. Private law has rightly been considered by Community institutions as an important tool for structuring economic relationships within the European market. Despite this, one foundational matter has been neglected, namely the need to strengthen the bonds between the different systems of private law through common terminology and, with the terminology, a shared system of concepts and taxonomies". "Taxonomy" is used here as a generic word for the classifications used in any jurisdiction to represent the systematization of legal rules and facts that are relevant for the daily functioning of private law at any socio-economic level. Taxonomic neglect has had a negative impact on the effectiveness of EU law. It strengthens local inertia and resistance to harmonization. It also means that weaknesses on the technical side of the private law language contained, for instance, in Directives can lead to distortions at the implementation level. In the face of this problem, the approach taken by EU institutions has in general been to shut their eyes to it. In short they have, perhaps for want of the necessary intellectual resources, simply refused to enter on the problem of technical classification. Taxonomies are important in law no less than in the natural sciences. Legislators and judges cannot do without them in the course of their activities. Students have to learn them; scholars, practitioners and policy-makers use them to teach and to think about law and legal solutions. However, contrary to what happens in the natural sciences, the ways in which lawyers classify facts and legal rules differ widely across Europe. Choices made in the past have driven different jurisdictions in different directions. These divergences can be bridged. The need is obvious. Yet little work has been done in this field. The vast amount of time and energy spent in legal "

Original text from CORDIS.

Participants

• UNIVERSITY OF TORINO · TORINO (TURIN)CoordinatorItaly
• STICHTING KATHOLIEKE UNIVERSITEIT · NIJMEGENNetherlands
• THE CHANCELLOR, MASTERS AND SCHOLARS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD · OXFORDUnited Kingdom
• UNIVERSITAT DE BARCELONA · BARCELONASpain
• UNIVERSITÉ JEAN MOULIN LYON III · LYONFrance
• WARSAW UNIVERSITY · WARSZAWAPoland
• WESTFAELISCHE WILHELMS - UNIVERSITAET MUENSTER · MUENSTERGermany

Links

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