Wendy Kennett, Civil Enforcement in a Comparative Perspective: A Public Management Challenge
| DOI | 10.3366/elr.2022.0805 |
| Author | |
| Pages | 485-488 |
| Date | 01 September 2022 |
| Published date | 01 September 2022 |
Notwithstanding the increased importance of all forms of “recovery of civil and commercial law debts”, or “civil enforcement” as defined by the author (p 7), and the reforms aimed at improving the efficiency of European (national and cross-border) enforcement regimes, comparative legal scholarship has been lagging behind developments in Europe. Wendy Kennett’s book should exactly for that reason be welcomed, both as a gap-filler, and hopefully also as a trailblazer functioning as a major source of inspiration for others to follow.
Conceptually, the book consists of two main parts. The first is devoted to the overarching yet still developing concept of “public management”, and is predominantly of a theoretical nature. By contrast, the second is more practical because it is devoted to the evolution and contemporary regulation of civil enforcement in thirteen European jurisdictions.
Formally, the book is divided into four parts made of sixteen chapters (including the Introduction and Conclusions put forward also in chapter format). These, however, do not fully reflect the conceptual bipartite division as only Part One is devoted to the central concept of “public management” and surrounding theories. The rest (i.e. the chapters of Parts Two through Four) “compare European enforcement systems by reference to the institutional model adopted” (p 21). Though these are far from being only highly technical texts.
The thirteen European legal systems are covered in quite a detailed and in-depth manner. It is also praiseworthy that the list includes not only the Continent’s major systems but also those typically not given much attention. This includes, in particular, the former socialist states of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), which were pressed by various international financial organisations (e.g., World Bank, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development) to increase the efficiency of their enforcement systems from the fall of the Berlin Wall, denoting the beginning of the transitory process towards democracy and market economies. Austria and Spain may also be added as regimes typically treated as stepchildren of contemporary comparative legal scholarship, just for different reasons.
The omission of common law systems in Europe is one of the weak points of the book. Undoubtedly, a more complete picture of what Europe offers by inclusion of the jurisdictions of the United Kingdom (incorporating material on what Scotland as a mixed system could offer) and...
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