The European Union and e-commerce

The European Union has a long history of investment in, encouragement for, and development of, electronic commerce and for more than 25 years has established a strong, and mostly coherent, regulatory framework for the e-commerce sector. In such a complex and fast moving arena asking any one lawyer to remain informed of the entire legal-regulatory framework seems unreasonable. Following on from this introductory chapter, the most important EU initiatives relevant to e-commerce are discussed. As with all Internet law related topics global regulations are ideal, but difficult to realize. This may change over time as more digital natives take positions in lawmaking and regulatory enforcement bodies. This though is still some way off and therefore for the moment we keep our focus on the European Union, but maybe one day the classic approach to state sovereignty and jurisdiction in relation to e-commerce will be replaced by a globally oriented approach.