Law of the European Union

Module 7

Private law, procedure and data in the Union: consumers, cross-border disputes, judicial cooperation and data protection

The Union has no civil code and no criminal code. Yet a lawyer who advises on a sale to a customer in another state, a dispute with a foreign supplier, a request from a person to delete their data or a warrant issued by a court in another country is working with Union law every day. It reaches private law in three ways: it harmonises national rules so that they are similar everywhere (as with consumer law and data protection), it settles which country’s law and courts apply when a dispute crosses a border (the Rome and Brussels Regulations), and it makes the decisions of one state’s authorities effective in another through mutual recognition (as with judgments and arrest warrants). This module goes through those three ways, with the instruments a practitioner meets most often, and ends with the data and technology rules that now shape almost every client matter.

General education on European Union law, using invented people and businesses and abstract member states. It states the Treaty framework and landmark decisions in simplified form, and it is not legal advice. Rules change and national implementation differs. Consult a qualified lawyer in the place that matters.

This course was written on 4 November 2026. To the best of our knowledge, it describes the law of the European Union as it stood on that date. Laws change, and we may have missed or misunderstood something. If you notice a change, or have other information, please do not hesitate to contact us: we will review it and update the course. We do not claim to be the final source of the law.