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The unification of European law: a pipedream?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 January 2006

R. C. VAN CAENEGEM
R. C. VAN CAENEGEM
Affiliation:
Faculty of Law, Universiteitstraat 4, Gent 9000, Belgium. E-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

The unification of European law – if it is ever achieved – belongs to the future, but much of this present article will be devoted to the past. This makes me look like the ancient Roman king Janus, upon whom the god Saturn bestowed the gift of seeing the future as well as the past, which led to his famous representation, in his Roman temple, as a man with two faces. As a professional historian I am, of course, concerned with past centuries, but the future of Europe and European law concerns me as a citizen of the Old World.

Type
Research Article
Information
European Review , Volume 14 , Issue 1 , February 2006 , pp. 33 - 48
Copyright
Academia Europaea 2006

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Footnotes

Extended version of a lecture given in Brussels on 14 May 2003 at the initiative of the Training Unit of the European Commission. An abridged version, entitled Considérations historiques sur l'unification du droit européen, was presented on 3 June 2005 in Toulouse at the yearly conference of the Société d'Histoire du Droit.