Market Regulation and Private Law : The Quest for Reconciliation in European Private Law

Scholars and law students across the fields of European and private law, comparative law, legal theory, and regulation and governance will find this book to be an astute and engaging read. It will also prove an indispensable guide for legislators, regulatory agencies, and courts, as well as practitioners working in the regulated sectors.

The book offers a new theoretical perspective on the relationship between market regulation and private law in the face of contemporary challenges, such as climate change, the digitalisation of the marketplace, and growing inequality in society, with significant practical implications for a wide range of areas. It focuses on European private law to explore the uneasy interplay between the instrumental public regulation of economic activity and traditional, interpersonal justice-oriented private law in the multi-level and heterarchical legal order of the European Union (EU). By drawing together different elements of what are at present often disparate discourses of market regulation and private law, the book develops an integrated analytical framework that could help us better understand the interaction between the two. The central argument advanced in the book is that market regulation and private law are two sides of the same coin that can be reconciled with each other.