Book Review: The Regulation of Unfair Commercial Practices under EC Directive 2005/29. New Rules and New Techniques, the Forthcoming EC Directive on Unfair Commercial Practices. Contract, Consumer and Competition Law Implications
| Published date | 01 June 2008 |
| DOI | 10.1177/1023263X0801500207 |
| Date | 01 June 2008 |
| Subject Matter | Book Review |
Book Reviews
264 15 MJ 2 (2008)
Stephen Weatherill and U lf Bernitz (eds.), e Regulation of Unfair Commercia l
Practices under EC Directive 2005/29. New Rules and New Techniques, Hart Publish ing
2007, x + 290 pp., hardback, £45, ISBN 1-84113-699-9;
Hugh Collins (ed.), e Forthcoming EC Directive on Unfair Commercial Practices.
Contract, Consumer and Competition Law Implications, Kluwer, 20 04, 293 pp.,
hardback, €110 ($145), ISBN 9041-12224-9
By 12 December 2007, the European Union’s 27 Member States, as well a s a number of
candidate and prospec tive candidate members, were to have adapted t heir legislation to
EC Di rective 2005/29 on Unfair Commercial Prac tices. e problems associated with
the transposition are dealt with in a col lected volume edited by Steve Weatherill and
Ulf Bernitz. e book consist s of t he papers del ivered at a conference held in Oxford
on 3 Ma rch 2006. As the conference and subse quent book sought to highlight, there is
something special about this di rective, in that it requires total or full harmonisation. For
consumer matters, this is something unusual. Until now, almost a ll directives intended
to protect consumers have taken a minimum harmonisation approach, allowing Member
States a discretionary power to provide for more protection than the mini mum required
by the directi ve. Under a reg ime of total harmonisation, Member States are obl iged to
abolish consumer protection statute s that go further than the d irective.
e Weatherill/Bernit z volume consists of thir teen papers. In their introduction, the
two editors, Stephen Weatheril l and Ulf Bernitz , stress the importance of the Directive:
‘e Dire cti ve’s central policy to set a broad standard of required commercial behavi-
our in a “general clause” is of g reat signi can ce’ (1–10). It is signicant because it mean s
a depar ture from the more specic d irectives that had been issued up until this point.
is cha nge allows for g reater exibility, but also creates u ncertainty, according to the
authors. Giuseppe Abbamonte, as head of unit in the European Commission’s Health and
Consumer Depa rtment, was the chief dra sman of t he Directive a nd his observat ions
therefore have a hint of an authentic interpreta tion. us where Abbamonte arg ues
in h is contribution t hat the ‘Di rec tive relies on no particular national model and to a
large extent, us es novel concepts that have not been taken from the legal systems of a ny
particula r Member State’, this is something we may take as authoritative (11–31).1
Ulf Bernitz a nalyses the relationship of the Directive to t he doctrine of unfair
competition (33–46). He indicates his preference for the c ountry of origin principle.
Antonina Bakardjie va Engelbrekt deems the Directi ve to be revolutionary from the point
of view of Central and East Europe’s new Member St ates (47–90). Ida Otken Eriksson and
Ulf Öberg put the Directi ve in a wider perspective: what is the legal basis in t he EU Treaty,
how does the Directive’s lex generalis nature express itself, what is t he possible impact
1 Also published as ‘Citi zenship a nd Free Movement: E uropean and Amer ican Feat ures of a Jud icial
Formula for Increas ed Comity’ 12 Columbi a J. of Eur. L. (2006 ).
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