European proposals on PIL and its impact on interregional law

The most recent EU Proposals on Private International Law (on the one hand, the Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on jurisdiction, applicable law, recognition and enforcement of decisions and authentic instruments in matters of succession and the creation of a European Certificate of Succession, COM(2009) 154 final, and on the other hand, the Proposal for a Council Regulation (EU) implementing enhanced cooperation in the area of the law applicable to divorce and legal separation, COM(2010) 105 final) have raised some concerns regarding their possible effects in States with more than one legal system of private law, such as Spain and the United Kingdom. To analyse from a Spanish perspective some of the issues that may be triggered by these Proposals, a Workshop organised by the Department of Justice of the Generalitat de Catalunya (the Catalan regional Government) took place in Barcelona on June 8th (see the Program here)

The Workshop started with a brief presentation of the Proposal on successions (by Albert Font, from the Universitat Pompeu Fabra) and the Proposal on divorce and legal separation (by Rafael Arenas, from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona), paying special attention to those aspects which are likely to have an impact in Spain, as a consequence of the several private law legal systems which coexist in this country.

The second part of the Workshop was devoted to the presentation of the Working Materials prepared by the Group on Interregional Law of the Observatory on Private Law of Catalonia. These Working Materials are the result of an initial project of elaborating the draft of an Act on Interregional Law, dealing with the determination of the applicable law in intra-Spanish conflicts of private law (a matter currently dealt with by the Preliminary Title of the Spanish Civil Code). Although the draft has so far not been officially presented for its consideration by the Spanish Parliament, these Working Materials can be useful for further discussion on the subject.

For an account of the Workshop and a link to the Working Materials, please click here.

Many thanks to Cristian Oró Martínez, Postdoctoral
Researcher at the Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona