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| Section 1 Europe-wide Resources |
Section 2 European Union Countries |
Section 3 New Arrivals to the EU |
Section 4 Russia |
Section 5 Miscellaneous Resources |
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| Section 1 Europe-wide Resources |
Section 2 European Union Countries |
Section 3 New Arrivals to the EU |
Section 4 Russia |
Section 5 Miscellaneous Resources |
Section 1 - Europe-wide Resources
This is a many layered site, attempting to provide information to many different types of viewer, from children, students and adult viewers with many different types of interest, through to politicians and lawyers looking for the "nitty gritty" stuff of the EU. Indeed, this is probably one of the most complex sites in the world, with so types of viewer, so many institutions and so many languages - anyone else's design problems pale into insignificance!
To get to the first real page, choose a "Welcome" phrase (Gateway to the European Union) from the 20 languages offered on the opening page - this establishes your language as English.
The first main page is oriented to general information about the EU; the best way to "get into" the legal areas of the site is to take the EU at a Glance option from the left hand side. This then offers a further set of options in the top section of the left hand side - News, Activities, Institutions, the EU at a glance, EU Documents, and Information Sources. Take the EU Documents option and then you will see a link to the European Law Portal called Eur-Lex.
Eur-Lex can also be reached directly here. The site offers a series of sections covering, respectively, the Official Journal, Treaties, International Agreements, Legislation in Force, Preparatory Acts, Case Law and Parliamentary Questions although not all of these are operational yet. The site has now been combined with CELEX which was previously only available on subscription.
The Justice and Home Affairs section provides sections on Key Sites, Documentation, Summaries and Legal Texts. Notice the sections under "Summaries" on Judicial Cooperation in Civil Matters and Judicial Cooperation in Criminal Matters (particularly relating to financial matters) which describe the EU initiatives to bring the various jurisdictions closer together. The objective is "to enable individuals and businesses to approach courts and authorities in any Member State as easily as in their own."
There are a whole series of further options offered to you (see left hand section), including Agriculture, Audiovisual, Budget, Competition and so on.
For current news and information on EU topics, the site also provides a series of sources of current information and news.
The European Parliament site (which can be reached via the "Institutions" option at the top left and then clicking on the "European Parliament" heading or directly at www.europarl.europa.eu) provides information on the history of the Parliament, the Members, the Agendas, Parliamentary Questions, Rules, References and Press Releases. See the cover of the printed version of the course for a picture. There is also a "Citizens Portal" and sections on Who's Who, the Future of Europe, Enlargement, "Freedom Justice and Security" and other topics.
The European Court of Justice (which can be reached via the "Institutions" option or directly at www.curia.eu) offers a great deal of background information. First choose your language, then let the mouse hover the case-law option. This offers a series of options:
Council of Europe, in Strasbourg, provides a wider grouping than the European Union and any European state can become a member provided it accepts the principle of the rule of law and guarantees human rights and fundamental freedoms to everyone under its jurisdiction. The European Convention on Human Rights, which came into force on 3 September 1953, is the Council of Europes main convention. All States wishing to become members of the Council of Europe are obliged to ratify the Convention. There are 45 states at present, including several of the former Eastern European states, and there is a full Parliamentary organisation with Plenary sessions, committees and so on. Disputes are carried out in the European Court of Human Rights, see below.
The European Court of Human Rights, based at Strasbourg, provides a history of the institution and also has recent judgments available and a searching facility called HuDoc
Human rights documentation (known as Hudoc) is the searchable database of the case-law of the supervisory organs of the European Convention on Human Rights.
The International Court of Justice, the principal judicial organ of the United Nations, is based at the Hague, in Holland. It began work in 1946, when it replaced the Permanent Court of International Justice which had functioned since 1922. The site offers the text of the official judgments since 1946, advisory opinions, and orders, press releases and information on the process of current cases. The decisions are published in English and French, the two official languages of the Court. As well as a "normal" list of decisions, there is also a list of contentious cases by country, so you can see which countries are the main "offenders".
Justice is an all party, law reform
and human rights organisation working to improve the legal system and the quality
of justice by
promoting human rights, improving the legal system and access to justice, improving
criminal justice, and raising standards of EU justice and home affairs.
Justice has recently set up a separate site called
The EU Charter of Fundamental Rights
which was proclaimed in December 2000 and incorporated as Part Two of the Treaty establishing a
Constitution for Europe on 18 June 2004. This is the first formal EU document to combine and declare
all the values and fundamental rights (economic and social as well as civil and political) to which
EU citizens should be entitled. The site gives the detailed text of the Charter Chapters:
1. Dignity
2. Freedoms
3. Equality
4. Solidarity
5. Citizens' Rights
6. Justice
7. General Provisions
and also provides links to key reference texts, provides a FAQ page, a history page, and a detailed
set of links to related bodies.
The European Library is a portal which offers access to the combined resources (books, magazines and journals, posters and images, music, manuscripts and many other resources, both digital and non-digital) of the 45 national libraries of Europe. There is a vast virtual collection of material from all disciplines. It offers free searching and delivers digital objects - some free, some priced. It is not specifically a legal library although there are some legal collections within it. The European Library was initially set up as an EU project but it is now owned by the Conference of European Librarians (CENL), and financially supported by the participating libraries.
The European Federation of Intellectual Property (EFIPWEB) represents over 100 non-governmental and other not-for-profit organisations interested in protecting the intellectual property of all europeans. There are over 300 programs, covering a wide spectrum of activities. The site contains information on Intellectual Property in a European context and extensive (detailed) information on latest patents (150,000 of these).
Middle Temple Library provides a description of many legal resources with a particularly good collection of links to European and Human Rights Information. The resources all have a short and succint description.
The Virtual Library of the European Documentation Centre at the University of Mannheim is a major site which is part of an extensive information network which was created on a global level by the European Communities in the early sixties. The site provides all kinds of information on the European Union including treaties and current legislation and decisions. Many of the links go straight to the Europa site but it seems to be a different way of viewing the data.
Legislationline is a free online service provided by the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE). It compiles international texts and domestic legislation in the OSCE region (55 countries located in the Caucasus, Central Asia, Europe and North America) dealing with the rule of law and the protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms. This is a particularly useful site for finding out about the legal and political structure of Eastern European countries less well known to UK lawyers. A free email newsletter is available, providing information on the latest legal developments throughout the OSCE region along with new additions to the site.
ELIXIR (European Lawyers' Information eXchange & Internet Resource) is a project based at The University of Birmingham Law School. This includes material provided by Dr Julian Lonbay on the different legal systems in all the EU countries, including training requirements, and an introduction to the EC Law on Mutual Recognition of Professional Qualifications in EU countries. Information on notaries and bailiffs is now also included.
European Commission's Intellectual Property Rights Helpdesk is a free site highlighting the importance of IPR protection and exploitation in the European context. There are a number of self-run tutorials on IPR and related subjects which can be downloaded, comprehensive news from across the EU on IP topics, FAQ's and forms. Most of the site is in 6 languges. There is a telephone help desk available although this seems to be mainly for organisations involved in "current or recently completed EU funded RTD projects and those who are potential participants in FP5 RTD Calls for Proposals". The site says that "it will also help applicants to locate professional advisers and patent attorney associations who will be able to assist them further" although I cannot see any sign of this on the site at present.
Codex Online is a site seeing itself as a legal comunity across Europe and offering legal news, articles, research tools and directories. It will publish any lawyer's articles (subject to basic checks).
Section 2 - Individual European Union Countries
Compendium site....
European Laws and
Legal Systems, with sections for each European country,
is provided by the Institute for Computer Science Law at the University of
Saarland, Saarbruecken.
Free legal advice provided by Danish lawyers.
Danish Ministry of Justice provides a database of all Danish laws (free).
Legifrance - A government site providing French Statutes and legal texts. An English version is "under construction".
Jurifrance also covers French laws and legal system.
Jrme Rabenou's site covers these topics with a more personal touch.
University College London's Institute of Global Law was created in 2001 by Professor Basil Markesinis and the website will soon be covering French law (in translation).
Legal News France is a French service for lawyers offering current news, treaties, jobs, conferences, forum and email alert. You can take a free month's subscription but after that, the annual subscription is 2400 francs. It claims to be the main French legal community.
Droit Anglais is a site about English law created by a French lawyer, Michael Haravon. The site contains information on English law, courts, institutions, publishers, legal news, precedents and many other topics. There is also a glossary of French legal terms and English definitions.
A German Law Archive is provided by Dr Gerhard Dannemann at the University of Oxford, Institute of European and Comparative Law. This contains a collection of judgements, statutes, literature and bibliographies, in English.
University College London's Institute of Global Law was created in 2001 by Professor Basil Markesinis and the website contains an ever expanding amount of translated German cases.
Legal News Germany offers current news, treaties, jobs, conferences, forum and email alert. You can take a free month's subscription but after that, there is an annual subscription.
Transblawg is a legal translation weblog, designed for legal translators particularly between English and German. The site covers legal developments in the UK and Germany, often in both languages, and is maintained by legal translator Margaret Marks.
The Dutch Parliament site.
For Ireland.....
see separate page on Legal Sites and Resources in Ireland
All websites are in English apart from the Senate and the Government site.
Italian laws can be found by full text search here, which is a site provided by the Ministry of Justice.
Please visit also the Institute for legal documentation of the Italian National Research Centre.
Obviously only Italian versions of laws are official. However, depending on the topic, it is possible to find English versions of laws and regulations provided by regulatory boards and authorities, such as the following:
For Italian company, finance and securities law please visit the site of CONSOB, the public authority responsible for regulating the Italian securities market.
For competition law, please visit the Autorit Garante della Concorrenza e del Mercato, the Italian Competition Authority.
For telecommunications law, please visit the Autorit per le Garanzie nelle Comunicazioni, the Italian Telecoms Authority.
For electricity and gas, please visit the Autorit per l'Energia Elettrica e il Gas, the Electricity and Gas regulatory body.
For insurance law, please visit the site of ISVAP, supervisory body for private insurance companies.
Information about bills in the agenda and laws passed in the current legislature can be found at the Italian Parliament, which is composed of the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate (in Italian only).
See also the site of the Italian Government (in Italian only).
Useful information about international treaties and conventions ratified by the Republic of Italy as well as other information about international issues relating to Italy can be found at the site of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
For statistics and general information about Italy, visit ISTAT, the National Statistical Institute.
Ilustre Colegio de Abogados de Madrid (The Madrid Bar Association). Since the Spanish legal profession is administratively organised locally (there is no equivalent to the Law Society) the main bodies regulating the profession are the "Colegios de Abogados" or local bar associations. The Madrid Bar Association web site is an unpretentious but comprehensive one which provides essential information about the Bar's activities and useful external links (under "otros lugares").
La Ley. This web site belongs to one of the leading legal publishers in Spain. It is updated daily and it carries an electronic version of its prestigious legal journal "Diario LA LEY". It also provides detailed information about its manuals, CD-ROMs and statutory collections.
inmoley.com provides real estate legal services in Spain and is a general resource for property-related legal matters.
Section 3 - New arrivals to the European Union
For Poland and the Czech Republic....
TGC is a multi-disciplinary professional firm
based in Warsaw, Wroclaw and Prague. The site provides useful background information
about these countries and also a set of links which include official Government
and Parliamentary links as well as Commercial links.
Trinity Corporate Services is a licensed outsourced service provider which can facilitate the market entry process and ensure on-going compliance with local rules and fiscal regulations through the provision of accounting, payroll, shelf companies and corporate secretarial services. The site also includes information on the various legal, tax and administrative aspect of doing business in Poland.
Ukraine
A law guide in Ukraine provides information on
contracts, investments, corporate, business, taxation, marine law and litigation.
The site is maintained by Ukrainian lawyers based in Kyiv & Odesa and includes a very useful
list of legal sites in the Ukraine.
For Russia...
LeBoeuf, Lamb, Greene & MacRae (major International
law firm - "24 offices on 4 continents") have set up a significant legal resource relating to
Russian Law. The site,
which is maintained by the Russian office of the firm, contains articles on
current legal topics (money laundering, currency regulations, licensing law) and also
a set of links to Russian resources generally, such as the Duma, the Central Bank,
and various international collections with Russian sources. The whole site is available in
Russian too!
Section 5 - Miscellaneous Resources
European Arbtiration is an electronic newsletter providing a source of information and comment, centred on its diary of arbitral events. There are currently eighteen issues per year. You can register for the newsletter on the site.
Europe