The European Consumer Law Group was set up in the “high days” of consumer protection. It unites academics and practitioners and is unique in that combination of theory and practice. The reports presented here are the product of intensive work during the past two years.
In essence the work of the ECLG consists of two parts:
Firstly, a compilation of national reports which are shaped along the line of a common structure, and secondly, 19 policy reports commenting on recent developments in European Community (EC) legislation of importance to consumers.
The national reports are meant to give an overview on consumer law as it stands in early 2005. They intend to highlight the degree to which EC directives are implemented and the role they play in current practice as well as pointing to weaknesses in national and EC consumer law. The national reports are presented in the form of a compilation subject by subject, country by country. Such an overview is unique. It has never been undertaken in the young history of consumer law.
The reports on EC consumer law provide a full picture on all areas of EC consumer law where action is under way. The list of subjects is long extending from the broader analysis of the consumer viewpoint in the debate on the feasibility of a common frame of reference in European private law; the role of consumer protection in liberalising markets and in establishing an internal market for services; passenger and holidaymakers rights in the EC to the more detailed projects on unfair commercial practices, consumer sales, distant selling and time sharing, consumer credit, investment services and payments as well as access to justice, i.e. Rome I and Rome II convention, group action and mediation/ADR systems.
It remains for the reader to find out to what extent such an undertaking serves the purpose of enhancing consumer law at the national and the European level. For all those who co-operated in completing these reports, it was an exciting exercise and a true learning process in the best European sense. It would not have been possible without all the members of the group who volunteered for writing and commenting on all these papers and without the support of BEUC, its Director Jim Murray, and in particular Ursula Pachl, Emilie Barrau and Rosa Santa Barbara, who managed the secretariat so perfectly well. I would like to thank them all for their efforts and the European Commission for co-financing this project.

Hans-W. Micklitz, President of the ECLG
Professor of German and European Private and Economic Law
University of Bamberg