Conflict of Laws Under Pressure: When Neutrality Meets EU Values
Private international law has long existed as a perfect model of legal neutrality – technical, value-sterile, almost mathematical rules that only decide “which law shall apply”. In recent years, however, the European Union has been increasingly breaking this simple rule. Conflict of law rules, rules of international jurisdiction and mechanisms for the recognition and enforcement of foreign decisions in the European context are ceasing to act as neutral arbitrators and are starting to openly serve to promote the material values of the Union: the protection of fundamental rights, equality and non-discrimination, the principles of the rule of law or the inviolability of the economic integration of the internal market. The section focuses on these turning points – on situations in which the traditionally “blind” conflict of law is turning into an instrument of the EU’s active value policy and where neutrality is definitively yielding to European priorities.