ΟΡΙΟΘΕΤΗΣΗ ΤΗΣ ΔΙΕΘΝΟΥΣ ΔΙΚΑΙΟΔΟΣΙΑΣ ΣΤΙΣ ΔΙΑΦΟΡΕΣ ΑΠΟ ΣΥΜΒΑΣΗ ΚΑΙ ΑΔΙΚΟΠΡΑΞΙΑ ΒΑΣΕΙ ΤΟΥ ΚΑΝ 1215/2012

XI ΠΡΟΛΟΓΟΣ For 45 years, the European Court of Justice (CJEU) has been interpreting the “Brussels system”, first the Brussels Convention of 1968, later the Brussels Regulation of 2001, and now the Brussels Ibis Regulation of 2012. The Brussels system is the backbone of the Eu- ropean Lawof Civil Procedure providing for legal certainty andmutual trust in cross-bor- der transactions. The CJEU’s case law demonstrates sensitivity to the specificities and problems of cross-border litigationwithin the Internal Market. The efficiency of the pres- ent system is based on this case law. The hard Brexit in European international private and procedural law (unfortunately) demonstrates the achievements of the existing sys- tem. Brexit entails considerable legal uncertainty for future litigation related to the Unit- ed Kingdom after the past 40 years of successful judicial cooperation in civil and com- mercial matters. However, the present system is not free from internal weaknesses, which are evidenced by the case-law of the Court of Justice, too. Articles 7(1) and 7(2) of the Regulation pro- vide for two special heads of jurisdiction based on contract and on tort. These special heads of jurisdiction offer to the plaintiff an important alternative to bringing a lawsuit at the defendant’s domicile, which is the general rule under Article 4 of the Regulation. Although the basic concept of tortious jurisdiction has been unchanged since 1968, the case law of the Court still demonstrates conceptual uncertainties. Many judgments on Article 7(2) address recurrent doubts. They relate to the delineation of contractual and tortious liability; to the “place and the concept of damage”; to the infringement of pri- vacy rights (in the age of the Internet). Furthermore, the most recent development is a growing misuse of the Brussels system by (economically powerful) plaintiffs who try to intimidate actors in civil society (especially journalists and activists) by the filing of (of- ten) unmeritorious lawsuits brought in a multitude of fora (SLAPP). Similarly, the auton- omous concepts of contract and of the place of performance under Article 7(1) of the Regulation give rise to several uncertainties even twenty years after its introduction by the EU lawmaker. Courts of the EU Member States still recurrently submit questions on the interpretation of this head of jurisdiction to the CJEU. Against this background, a thorough investigation of Articles 7(1) and 7(2) of the Regula- tion Brussel 1bis in the light of the case lawof the Court of Justice is verymuchwelcome. The study by Chrysoula Michailidou is timely as the start of evaluation of the present in- strument is scheduled for January 2022. A Report on the application of the Regulation