EU Regulation 'Rome I' as a step forward in the Europeanization of conflict of laws

6 CHAPTER 1 The development of the legislative competence of the European Union on measures promoting the harmonization of conflict of laws The analysis of the Regulation Rome I 1 (hereinafter, ‗Rome I‘ or ‗the Regulation‘) needs to be put into the context of the developments occurred in the field of European private international law due to the progressive expansion of judicial cooperation between Member States. An account will be given of the history of this process and its reasons, focusing the attention on the area of PIL concerning choice-of-law rules, as opposed to those regarding jurisdiction, recognition and enforcement of judgments. 1.1 The intergovernment al phase The original EC treaty of Rome of 1957 2 did not provide any direct reference to private international law nor a specific competence of the European Community in this field 3 . Nonetheless, the founding Member States acknowledged the importance of an easier circulation of judgments for the achievement of the Community objectives and, accordingly, they agreed that Member States should enter into negotiations of legal instruments regarding “the simplification of formalities governing the reciprocal recognition and enforcement of judgments of courts or tribunals and of arbitration awards” (Article 220 fourth indent Treaty of Rome 4 ). As a result, the European Community did not have any competence on harmonization or 1 Regulation (EC) 593/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 17 June 2008 on the law applicable to contractual obligations, [2008] OJ L 177/6. 2 Treaty Establishing the European Economic Community, done at Rome on 25 March 1957, 298 UNTS 11 (EC Treaty). 3 Jürgen Basedow, ‗The Communitarization of the Conflict of Laws under the Treaty of Amsterdam‘ (2000) 37 CMLR 687. 4 Later this article was renumbered 293 by the Treaty of Amsterdam and finally repealed by the Treaty of Lisbon, see para 1.3.