4 THE ITALIAN LAW JOURNAL NO. 1 (2018) General Remarks on Civil Liability in the European Context by Guido Alpa This article considers the evolution of the civil liability system in Europe from the perspective of the establishment and application of rules deriving from regulations and directives that define special types of torts. Neither the EU rules nor the principles developed by the Court of Justice always identify all the necessary components of the tortious act. There are cases in which certain elements are prescribed, and others which are left to the national courts to establish. Furthermore, there are instances in which the case configured by the EU rules is complete but where the national legislators are accorded a certain leeway to fill in the regulatory gaps. National rules are not always uniform and, thus, are not without ambiguity. For this reason, attempts have been made to standardise the governance of civil liability, and the models proposed to break the impasse are still relevant. But time moves on, and the standardisation process is lagging behind the ever-increasing pace of change in EU law. DOI 10.23815/2421-2156.ITALJ ISSN 2421-2156
