engleski

Creating a Pan-European Legal Language

The greatest resistance to the harmonization of European law has been in core areas of private law, where the link between language, law and cultural identity is traditionally the strongest. As regards the harmonization of contract law, the European Commission acknowledged that the co-existence of different national contract laws, including incongruent legal terminology, hinders the internal market's ability to function. This sparked a lively debate among lawyers on the need for a pan-European legal language, thus leading to a critical revaluation of the role of language in the harmonization process. This article analyzes the relationship between EU terminology and the national terminology of the 27 Member States in the present EU acquis and the new approach to language taken in the Draft Common Frame of Reference for a European Contract Law, prepared by European legal scholars and published in 2008. It remains to be seen whether and to what extent politicians are ready to sacrifice part of their national cultural identity and implement the new concepts, definitions and uniform principles of the Draft Common Frame of Reference in future EU legislation. Although the DCFR is drafted in English, the new pan-European legal language is not intended as a process of Anglification but rather as a meta-language to be translated into all the EU official languages.

harmonization of legal concepts, European contract law, Common Frame of Reference

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