The link between EU private law and the integration objective requires some reflection on what integration means in Europe, which will be discussed in Chapter I (paras. 3–17). Since the main thrust of the integration programme is the establishment and the functioning of a common or internal market, a closer look will be taken at the European economic constitution and its significance for private law in Chapter II (paras. 18–34). A third Chapter of this Part will deal with the idiosyncrasies of private law in the Union as compared with traditional conceptions (paras. 35–95). Alongside the integration-driven EU law, a new body of legal Acts emerged aft er the turn of the millennium; they focus on “civil matters” addressed in the fourth Chapter (paras. 96–121). A final look will be taken at the interaction between the idiosyncratic private law of the Union and the Union’slegal Acts in civil matters in Chapter V (paras. 122 –133).

EUROPEAN INTEGRATION

THE INTEGRATION PROGRAM

Integration as an objective

At the national level, private law is meant to balance rights and obligations as between private persons and/or between groups of private persons in society. In EU private law, there is an additional dimension: like other activities of the Union, it is intended to promote integration. It is true that the first generation of civil codes, such as the Code Napoléon of 1804 and the Bürgerliches Gesetzbuch (BGB) of 1900, were equally designed to unify the law in their respective countries and to contribute to national identity. But this motivation has lost significance for national legislation in private law nowadays. The second generation of civil codes, such as those of the Netherlands of 1992 or of Hungary of 2013, were enacted in well-established nation-States which already possessed a uniform private law. They pursued objectives other than integration, in particular, the adjustment of the law to technical and economic developments or to social and political change. In the EU, however, the goal of integration is clearly discernible everywhere.