Introduction: Online Market Places as Private Governance Systems and ‘balloon Effects’ in Private Law
CEPRI Studies on Private Governance, Issue 8/2023 – Special Issue on Platforms as Private Governance Systems
12 Pages Posted: 11 Sep 2023 Last revised: 13 Sep 2023
Date Written: September 6, 2023
Abstract
When online market places started appearing some 20 years ago, it was an explicit goal of the EU to support this type of business as an instrument to facilitate cross border trade. For this reason, rules were put in place to make the establishment of online market places attractive. A central element in this regard was the rule in the E-commerce directive (ECD) which as a general principle exempts platforms from liability for the acts and omission of the users of the platform as long as the platform is only a passive provider of the digital infrastructure. The strategy was successful. Over the past two decades, online trade has increased massively. Today, one million European businesses are selling goods and services on online platforms. Online market places provide goods of all kinds, transport, housing, investments, loans, etc. and the COVID crisis only reinforced the popularity of this way of trading.
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation