ELI Principles for the COVID-19 Crisis

On 27 April 2020 the ELI Council adopted the ELI Principles for the COVID-19 Crisis, which address some of the most important legal issues arising in relation to the COVID-19 crisis and offer guidance to European States, EU institutions and other bodies.

The 15 Principles were prepared by the ELI Executive Committee in consultation with ELI’s Senate and Council and with input from its Members from an independent non-governmental perspective with due consideration of what has been published by other bodies.

They address the following issues: (1) fundamental values, principles and freedoms; (2) non-discrimination; (3) democracy; (4) lawmaking; (5) justice system; (6) privacy and data protection; (7) borders and freedom of movement; (8) free movement of goods and services; (9) employment and the economy; (10) continuity of relationships at a distance; (11) education; (12) moratorium on regular payments; (13) force majeure and hardship; (14) exemption from liability for simple negligence and (15) return to normality.

The full Principles are available for download here.

The Principles are also available in French (Revue de Droit Suisse (RDS) 2020 I, p 281, © Helbing Lichtenhahn, Bâle 2020), Italian (Rivista di Diritto Civile 2020 p 890, © Wolters Kluwer, Milano), Polish (Transformacje Prawa Prywatnego 3/2020) and Russian (Pravovedenie, Vol 64, No 3, 2020).