Facilitating Sustainable Consumption through Private Law

Dear Colleagues,

What is sustainable consumption and could we contribute to it through private law measures? Such questions were at the forefront of discussions taking place at the EU Consumer Summit organised by the European Commission in January 2020. In this Special Issue, we would like to focus on the discussion of rules that would accommodate sustainable consumption, leading to a structural change in consumer lifestyles and allowing the fulfilment of global commitments. We refer here to the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, including specifically UN Sustainable Development Goal 12 (SDG-12), relating to sustainable production and consumption, as well as the European Commission’s New Consumer Agenda prioritising the green transition.

Contributions to this Special Issue may discuss various areas of private law that could either help empower consumers to reach for ‘the green transition’ or motivate producers and traders to use new materials or products or to engage in new business practices. We leave it to our contributors to decide and discuss whether and how this could be achieved, e.g., by:

• reframing the current rules on:
  • consumer information,
  • non-conformity,
  • remedies, or
• designing new rules around the concepts of:
  • product safety,
  • product liability, or
• banning or preventing planned obsolescence,
• encouraging updates and upgrades of goods and digital content,
• relating consumer rights to corporate social responsibility claims and policies.

Any areas of private law that could help with the promotion of more sustainable consumption could be discussed in contributions to this Special Issue, whether it be sales or service contracts, online or offline contracts, contract or tort law, substantive or procedural rules, etc.

With this Special Issue, we plan to further contribute to the growing body of academic work in this area, continuing the discussion on various regulatory and self-regulatory solutions. We especially welcome contributions with an interdisciplinary angle, e.g., testing suggested solutions for boosting sustainable consumption empirically.

Dr. Joasia Luzak
Prof. Dr. Marco Loos
Guest Editors

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