Abstract

As regards the emergence of a European private law in our time, this article shows that lessons can be learnt from the history of unification of regionally defined private law in the German Confederation (1815–1866). An important lesson is that the Europeanization of private law will be anything but a spontaneous process. Moreover, like the members of the German Confederation almost 200 years ago, the members of the current European Union will not have an equal say in the debate about unification of private law. Now, as then, economic interdependencies between the respective members will come into play. That is to say, the members the economies of which are relatively less dependent upon the economies of other members than vice versa are poised to have a larger say in the debate