Extraterritoriality and Territorial Extension in EU Law

Abstract

This paper examines the global reach of EU law in the context of current debates about the rise of the EU as a global regulatory power. Challenging recent claims to the contrary, its findings are that the enactment of extraterritorial legislation by the EU is extremely rare. Nevertheless, the EU makes frequent recourse to a legislative technique that I term territorial extension, in order to gain regulatory traction over activities that take place abroad. This technique not only leads to the EU governing transactions that are not centered upon the territory of the EU, but it also enables the EU to influence the nature and content of third country and international law. Nevertheless, it is inaccurate to say that the EU thereby seeks to export its own norms. EU legislation which engages in territorial extension is generally characterized by an international orientation revealing the EU to be engaged in action-forcing contingent unilateralism rather than the exportation of norms. The EU seeks to galvanize third country or global action to tackle transboundary problems and to pursue objectives that have been internationally agreed upon. The importance to the EU of this international orientation is clear from the criticisms that the EU has made of extraterritoriality and territorial extension in United States law.