Views
Austrian Supreme Court Rules on the Validity of a Jurisdiction Clause Based on a General Reference to Terms of Purchase on a Website
By Biset Sena Günes, Senior Research Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Comparative and International Private Law, Hamburg
Recently, on 25 October 2023, the Austrian Supreme Court (‘OGH’) [2 Ob 179/23x, BeckRS 2023, 33709] ruled on whether a jurisdiction clause included in the terms of purchase (‘ToP’) was valid when a written contract made reference to the website containing the ToP but did not provide the corresponding internet link. The Court held that such a clause does not meet the formal requirements laid down under Article 25 of the Brussels I (recast) Regulation and, hence, is invalid. The judgment is undoubtedly of practical relevance for the conclusion of international commercial contracts that make reference to digitally available general terms and conditions (‘GTCs’), and it is an important follow-up to the decisions by the Court of Justice of the European Union (‘CJEU’) in the cases of El Majdoub (C-322/14, available here) and Tilman (C-358/21, available here).
Who can bite the Apple? The CJEU can shape the future of online damages and collective actions
Written by Eduardo Silva de Freitas (Erasmus University Rotterdam), member of the Vici project Affordable Access to Justice, financed by the Dutch Research Council (NWO), www.euciviljustice.eu.
Introduction
In the final weeks leading up to Christmas in 2023, the District Court of Amsterdam referred a set of questions to the CJEU (DC Amsterdam, 20 December 2023, ECLI:NL:RBAMS:2023:8330; in Dutch). These questions, if comprehensively addressed, have the potential to bring clarity to longstanding debates regarding jurisdictional conflicts in collective actions. Despite being rooted in competition law with its unique intricacies, the issues surrounding the determination of online damage locations hold the promise of illuminating pertinent questions. Moreover, the forthcoming judgment is expected to provide insights into the centralization of jurisdiction in collective actions within a specific Member State, an aspect currently unclear. Recalling our previous discussion on the Dutch class action under the WAMCA in this blog, it is crucial to emphasize that, under the WAMCA, only one representative action can be allowed to proceed for the same event. In instances where multiple representative foundations seek to bring proceedings for the same event without reaching a settlement up to a certain point during the proceedings, the court will appoint an exclusive representative. This procedural detail adds an additional layer of complexity to the dynamics of collective actions under the WAMCA.
One, Two, Three… Fault? CJEU Rules on Civil Liability Requirements under the GDPR
Marco Buzzoni, Doctoral Researcher at the Luxembourg Centre for European Law (LCEL) and PhD candidate at the Sorbonne Law School, offers a critical analysis of some recent rulings by the Court of Justice of the European Union in matters of data protection.
In a series of three preliminary rulings issued on 14th December and 21st December 2023, the Court of Justice of the European Union (‘CJEU’) was called upon again to rule on the interpretation of Article 82 of the General Data Protection Regulation (‘GDPR’). While these rulings provide some welcome clarifications regarding the civil liability of data controllers, their slightly inconsistent reasoning will most likely raise difficulties in future cases, especially those involving cross-border processing of personal data.
News
Out Now: The Latest Issue of the Japanese Yearbook of International Law (Vol. 67, 2024)
The Japanese Yearbook of International Law (JYIL) is a leading reference publication that provides in-depth analysis and commentary on developments in international law from a Japanese perspective.
Published by the International Law Association of Japan since 1957 (originally as the Annual Yearbook of Private International Law until 2007), the JYIL covers a broad spectrum of topics, from public and private international law to comparative law, bringing together insights from top scholars and legal experts in Japan and beyond.
Each issue dives into key legal cases, legislative updates, and emerging trends, making it a must-read for researchers, academics, and professionals looking to stay in the loop on Japan’s legal landscape.
On that note, the latest volume of the JYIL (Vol. 67, 2024) has recently been released. Readers of this blog may find particular interested in selected articles, case notes, books review and English translations of court decisions related to private international law.
New Titles on Conflict of Laws in the Latest Issue of the Osaka University Law Review
The OSAKA UNIVERSITY LAW REVIEW (OULR) is a prestigious international academic journal on law and politics with a rich history. Published annually by the Graduate School of Law and Politics at Osaka University since 1952, the OULR offers a valuable platform for discussing and sharing information on Japanese law and politics, all presented in English and other foreign languages including French and German from a comparative law perspective.
The OULR’s ultimate goal is to foster debate and facilitate the exchange of ideas between Japanese and international scholars, while promoting and disseminating original research in the fields of Japanese law and politics and other related areas.
That said, the latest volume (No. 72) features some papers that might be of interest to the readers of this blog, as well as researchers and practitioners of private international law. These papers highlight important legal developments in China, particularly in the areas of international civil procedure and sovereign immunity.
3 new books on Portuguese (and European) PIL
For those able to read Portuguese, 3 new books of great interest have been published in the last months.
In January 2025, Professor Luís de Lima Pinheiro published a new, 4th edition of Volume I of the treatise on Private International Law. In more than 600 pages, the book gives an introduction to Conflict of Laws and deals with the General Part of this field. Along with the in-depth analysis of all those subjects, a comprehensive list of legal literature can be found at the beginning of each Chapter.
In November 2024, Professor Dário Moura Vicente published the 5th volume of his PIL “Essays” collection. It gathers 22 scholarly contributions of the author divided into five categories, namely general issues of Private International Law, jurisdiction and recognition of foreign judgments in the EU, international unification of Private Law, the information society and its international regulation, and international arbitration.
And in October 2024, Professor Elsa Dias Oliveira published a book on Conflict of Laws in the EU. It deals with the «general part» issues that for decades have been puzzling many European private international lawyers, due to the fact that for some of them, such as renvoi or ordre public, we may find explicit rules in many PIL regulations, while for others, such as characterization or the application of foreign law, that is not the case.