Standardisation in services – European ambitions and sectoral realities

Publishers Abstract
Standard-setting has come to the forefront in the aftermath of the new EU Standardisation Regulation and recent cases relating to firm behaviour within standard-setting organisations (SSOs).

Being for a long time a 'no passing zone' for everyone but engineers and technical experts, SSOs have produced a growing solid body of standards that improved our everyday life, from wireless communications to household appliances. If standardisation in goods is vague, standard-setting in services is uncharted territory owing to the tailor-made, typically non-technical nature of rules on services supply.

However, interest in this area is growing and the EU has paved the way for a revolution in service standard-setting as encouraged by the controversial EU Services Directive , and, more recently, by the Single Market Act. Based on these developments, the present article maps this new and promising area of rule-making in services, clarifies the substantive scope of the relevant legal instruments and identifies the prospects for pan-European service standards with a view to promoting trade in services.

Sweet and Maxwell: European Law Review http://www.sweetandmaxwell.co.uk/catalogue/productdetails.aspx?recordid=427&productid=6968

ESO: Background information: Commission takes steps to modernise EU's standardisation policy http://www.europeansources.info/record/press-release-commission-takes-steps-to-modernise-eus-standardisation-policy/

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