The fundamental right of data protection in the European Union: in search of an uncharted right

The entry into force of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights and the ensuing introduction of the right to data protection as a new fundamental right in the legal order of the EU has raised some challenges. This article is an attempt to bring clarity on some of these questions. We will therefore try to address the issue of the place of the right to the protection of personal data within the global architecture of the Charter, but also the relationship between this new fundamental right and the already existing instruments. In doing so, we will analyse the most pertinent case law of the Court of Luxembourg, only to find out that it creates more confusion than clarity. The lesson we draw from this overview is that the reasoning of the Court is permeated by a ‘privacy thinking’, which consists not only in overly linking the rights to privacy and data protection, but also in applying the modus operandi of the former to the latter (which are different we contend). The same flawed reasoning seems to be at work in the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights. Therefore, it is crucial that the different modi operandi be acknowledged, and that any upcoming data protection instrument is accurately framed in relation with Article 8 of the Charter.     

论欧盟条约中的辅助性原则

《欧盟基础条约》和尚未生效的《欧洲宪法条约》均规定了辅助性原则。虽然该原则不可避免的具有内在的模糊开放性,但仍不影响它作为一项宪法性原则的地位。辅助性原则最大的意义在于:为在欧盟和成员国或其他主体之间选择最为合适的权力行使主体提供了程序性的保障,因而提供了一个促进协调以取得平衡的重要概念空间。     

欧盟私法法典化与我国民法典的制订

随着欧盟一体化进程的加快,客观上要求欧盟在私法领域制定一部内部协调统一、具有宏观性、体系性的民法典,经过法学家的理论准备,欧盟官方对学术研究的响应和对私法发展方向的正确选择,最终促使《共同参考框架（草案）》（DCFR）的完成。欧盟私法法典化进程中,虽然具有浓厚的工具色彩,但融合了不同的法律文化与传统,体现出了现代私法的最新理念与精神。欧盟私法法典化在法典的制定、法典的精神以及法典的结构、内容、统一性方面,无疑对我国民法典的制定具有很大的借鉴意义。     

欧洲联盟法中的指令协调机制

今天的欧洲联盟,已经发展到了27个成员国,它的一体化运动,是以法律的趋同、一致化为条件和体现的。在共同体层面制定的法律,最终要在27个国家得到具体的实现;在这个过程中,法律的协调和一致化的引导是不可缺少的环节。就指令而言,在从欧共体到欧盟的几十年间,采用了"旧"、"新"两种不同的协调方法。通过对它们分别进行考察和结合案例的分析,可以看到协调机制是一个包括欧洲法院参与在内的动态系统。     

Opening up personal data protection: A conceptual controversy

The existence of a fundamental right to the protection of personal data in European Union (EU) law is nowadays undisputed. Established in the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights in 2000, it is increasingly permeating EU secondary law, and is expected to play a key role in the future EU personal data protection landscape. The right's reinforced visibility has rendered manifest the co-existence of two possible and contrasting interpretations as to what it come to mean. If some envision it as a primarily permissive right, enabling the processing of such data under certain conditions, others picture it as having a prohibitive nature, implying that any processing of data is a limitation of the right, be it legitimate or illegitimate. This paper investigates existing tensions between different understandings of the right to the protection of personal data, and explores the assumptions and conceptual legacies underlying both approaches. It traces their historical lineages, and, focusing on the right to personal data protection as established by the EU Charter, analyses the different arguments that can ground contrasted readings of its Article 8. It also reviews the conceptualisations of personal data protection as present in the literature, and finally contrasts all these perspectives with the construal of the right by the EU Court of Justice.     

公民身份的扩展与欧盟区域人权保护原则

在全球化的推动下,区域政府间的政治联盟和公民身份都获得巨大发展,成为区域法治的重要力量.承载着自由权利、政治权利和社会权利的公民身份,为区域法治提供了合法性基础,从而成为区域人权保护原则的主体性力量;公民身份的结构性联系和基本权利的内在勾连意味着,公民身份的理念与制度的扩展必然要求在区域人权保护中坚持一体保护原则、多重保护原则和司法保护原则.     

European Law Beyond ‘Ever Closer Union’ Repositioning the Concept,its Thrust and the ECJ's Comparative Methodology

The article investigates competing understandings of European law. It supports, against the prevailing EU‐centred understanding, an ecumenical concept that embraces EU law, supplementing international instruments, the European Convention on Human Rights and, importantly, various domestic laws enacting or responding to such transnational law, as well as European comparative law. To keep the concept in sync with European politics, it posits a new idea that binds the parts together: to provide for a European legal space rather than further European integration (the ever closer union). This idea can also serve as European law's functional equivalent to forming one legal order. European law thus conceived grasps the puzzling complex of interdependent legal orders, sets a common frame for corresponding reconstructions (European composite constructions, legal pluralism, network theories, federalism or intergovernmentalism) and allows forces with diverging outlooks to meet in one legal field, on one more neutral disciplinary platform. Within this framework, European comparative law finds a new mission as well as a sound legal basis.     

欧盟过境货物知识产权保护最新态势——兼评欧洲法院“NOKIA”案和“PHILLIPS”案

自2008年10月以来,在欧盟一些海关屡屡发生过境货物遭到扣押的事件,尤其是荷兰海关屡次扣押印度等国的过境药品,引起国际社会的极大关注.英国和比利时法院分别在审理“NOKIA”案和“PHIILIPS”案过程中对过境货物是否扣押产生疑问,并向欧洲法院提出咨询.近期欧洲法院对两案合并审理,做出一项里程碑意义的判决,厘清了过境货物、 “虚拟制造”理论等基本问题,对欧盟海关的知识产权执法和法院司法都有很好的指导作用,对于我国政府和企业也不无裨益.     

论欧盟宪法危机认知之理论方法

如何看待所谓的欧盟宪法危机,在很大程度上是一种理论分析形态选择的问题。分析欧盟这一政治体系或者政治体的各种理论,其共同之处在于解释欧盟现象因何而生又如何发展的问题。欧盟宪政的发展过程实际上就是欧盟法律人格丰富与健全的过程。分析欧盟法律人格的构成因素以及各个因素之间的逻辑联系,既能解释欧盟宪政的历史演进,又能分析目前欧盟宪法危机的症结所在。欧盟法律人格构成因素的丰富与强健,既是欧盟宪政发展的动力之一,同时也给欧盟宪政发展带来了挑战,无论是保持欧盟发展的动力还是避免欧盟宪政发展所遇到的挑战,都依赖于欧盟法律人格构成的三个因素———规制性支柱、规范性支柱与认知性支柱———之间的平衡。     

Security policies and the weakening of personal data protection in the European Union

In recent years, the reinforcement of security policies alongside the expansion of information systems for law enforcement and crime prevention entailed growing restrictions to personal data protection principles and procedural rights in the European Union. This paper seeks to elucidate this trend, while matching it with an EU institutional discourse based on balancing and proportionality. Indeed, EU institutions regularly present security measures and fundamental rights as somewhat symmetric values to be easily conciliated through balancing and proportionality. Considering the raising of the protection of personal data to the status of a fundamental right by the Charter of Fundamental Rights, its effect on a possible rebalancing of the values at stake is discussed. Yet, we conclude, for the time being, the potential for just and democratic solutions provided by the ideas of balancing and proportionality does not appear to be properly used.     

欧盟证券强制要约收购规则及其启示

以2004年5月20日生效的《欧盟要约收购指令》为基础,对欧盟及其各成员国有关强制要约收购的临界点、强制要约收购的价格以及强制要约收购的豁免制度进行重点研究,并对如何完善我国上市公司强制要约收购制度作一探讨。该指令的研究对完善我国证券法律制度具有重要的现实意义。     

The Control of Police Powers

This article points to a frequent feature in debates about the control of the police. Aside from cultural and political characteristics in the last decades, policing has changed and at present it is going through a stage of rapid change. The author defines the historical roots of police in democracies. He places the police within the framework of the sovereign state, the administration, the judiciary and the citizens. The state's control of police powers is described in its interdependency with new demands on the part of citizens regarding micro (domestic sphere/neighbourhood/community) and macro (urban sphere/state/European) levels. On a European scale, the article provides an oversight over the existing network consisting of internal, administrative, parliamentarian, judiciary, and civil (non-government/social movements) control agencies and mechanisms. In its conclusions the concept of ethical standards is introduced as a means of effective high-quality police management.     

欧盟信息安全法律框架之解读

网络与信息系统安全已经引起了全世界共同关注,美国和欧盟在这一领域走在了世界的前列。伴随中欧经济、文化交流的日益密切,欧盟信息安全法律框架也为我国立法提供了可资借鉴的蓝本。通过解读欧盟信息安全法律框架的演变轨迹及其特点,结合我国信息安全保障立法现状,分析当前我国信息安全立法的主要着力点,提出我国应加快信息安全立法进程,用法律形式明确信息安全监管机构和监管模式,构建有中国特色的信息安全法律体系。     

Introduction

Institutional design, structure, and processes in the European Union (EU) provide a fertile ground for studying a new model of intergovernmental and supranational cultural policymaking. In this article, the author provides a map and an analytical compass to assist researchers and practitioners in navigating the EU cultural policy labyrinth. She offers insight into how transnational cultural policymaking occurs in the EU by tracing the Culture Programme through the agenda-setting, policy formulation, policy decision, and policy implementation stages of the policy process. The author concludes by introducing an emerging process of institutionalized cultural policy transfer that appears to be developing through systematic and incremental policy transfer, policy learning, and policy convergence.     

Lessons from Roman law: EU law in England and Wales after Brexit

ABSTRACT

The experience of Roman law in legal education in England and Wales may serve as a cautionary tale for EU law post-Brexit. Similarly, past debates as to the position of Roman law in the curriculum may also be instructive in the EU law context. After tracing the history of the teaching of Roman law in England and Wales, this article posits first that the factors that appear to have caused the decline of Roman law could apply equally in the context of EU law. Secondly, based on both pragmatic and liberal education arguments that have historically been proffered for the study of Roman law, it advances arguments for the retention of a compulsory stand-alone EU law module in England and Wales after Brexit. To this end, the paper contends that the arguments for the retention of EU law in legal education are more robust than those asserted traditionally in favour of Roman law.     

法律趋同视角下的欧盟统一公司立法研究

欧盟统一公司立法创设了超国家层面的商事主体——欧洲公司和欧洲私人公司;资本制度更自由,公司治理更灵活,促进了各成员国公司法制度的趋同。统一公司立法也受制于各国的法律传统、利益集团和路径依赖等因素。欧盟成员国包括了大陆法系和英美法系国家,其公司立法的成果与争议,反映了两大法系公司法制度融合与竞争的发展趋势,值得在我国《公司法》修改完善中加以借鉴。     

EU Accession to the ECHR: Between Autonomy and Adaptation

After the European Union's accession to the European Convention on Human Rights the EU will become subject to legally binding judicial decisions of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) and participate in statutory bodies of the Council of Europe (Parliamentary Assembly; Committee of Ministers) when they act under the Convention. Convention rights and their interpretation by the ECtHR will be directly enforceable against the EU institutions and against Member States when acting within the scope of EU law. This will vest the ECHR with additional force in a number of Member States, including Germany and the UK. All Member States will further be subject to additional constraints when acting under the Convention system. The article considers the reasons for, and consequences of the EU's primus inter pares position under the Convention and within the Council of Europe, and the likely practical effect of the EU's accession for its Member States.     

欧洲一体化对英国国际私法的影响

随着 1973年英国步入欧洲共同体 ,英国国际私法不应再被孤立地看待 ,它与欧洲联盟统一国际私法及欧洲联盟成员国中的大陆法系国家的国际私法紧密地联系在一起。它们相互影响、相互渗透、相互作用、相互促进。作为欧洲联盟 15个成员国中仅有的两个普通法法系国家之一 ,而且是普通法发源地的英国 ,其国际私法受到了欧洲一体化空前的、巨大的影响。这种影响主要体现在 :推动了英国国际私法制定法的新发展 ;开拓了英国国际私法的新法源 ;创立了英国冲突法案件的新类型 ;提供了英国解决冲突案件的新方法     

论欧盟货币市场基金监管新规

2008年全球金融危机以来,欧盟对影子银行的发展深感担忧。货币市场基金作为影子银行的重要组成部分,仍然适用欧盟各个成员国的国内监管规则。随着欧盟内部市场的发展,欧盟货币市场基金的跨境投资与交易数量激增。因此欧盟将货币市场基金的统一监管提上议事日程。应欧洲议会的要求,欧盟分析与研究后,于2013年9月4日正式对外公布了《货币市场基金条例草案》。该条例草案是在金融危机背景下为加强影子银行监管和保护投资者利益而制定,是欧盟为建设金融市场统一监管体系所努力的一部分。《货币市场基金条例草案》在欧盟现有金融监管法律体系的基础上,对欧盟货币市场基金的营业核准、基金内部评级规则、信息披露义务、投资多样性与集中性原则设定了统一的监管标准。此外,《货币市场基金条例草案》首次在欧盟境内引入浮动净资产价值货币市场基金的概念,以及类似准备金制度的净资产价值缓冲机制,提高了传统固定净资产价值货币市场基金的准入门槛。当下的中国,其货币市场基金发展迅速,已成为社会各界的热门话题,因此中国的金融监管机构也正在研究如何完善货币市场基金监管规则。目前,有欧盟的《货币市场基金条例草案》在先,那么中国的金融监管机构可以从欧盟的实践中吸取经验教训,引导中国货币市场基金良性健康发展。     

欧洲民法典草案消费者撤回权制度研究

基于保护消费者免于遭受侵略性商业行为、去除跨境、在线交易障碍,以及保护复杂合同下处于信息弱势之消费者之目的,欧洲民法典草案明确规定了消费者撤回权制度,并对消费者撤回权概念、适用范围、行使方式、期限、告知义务及效果等作了规定。民法典中规定消费者撤回权,体现了民法理念从形式正义到实质正义,民法主体从抽象人格到具体人格、从强而智到弱而愚者的转变。欧洲民法典草案撤回权制度对我国相关制度的完善具有重大借鉴意义。