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Abstract: This article uses the example of one of the best-known global payment systems provided by an online platform, PayPal, to analyse the role of private legal orders in creating new markets beyond jurisdictional borders. It shows that a relatively uniform legal order reduces risks involved in cross-border transactions and in this way enables transnational markets. While transnational law is more easily created by private entities rather than states, it remains embedded in state laws. The continuous role of state law in shaping transnational private legal orders is guaranteed because the latter operate with the endorsement and support of states. In this way states facilitate globalization. At the same time, the impact of state laws is fragmentary and disintegrates the applicable global private legal framework. Finally, the scattered influence of state laws undermines the protection offered to consumers. This is particularly important, because mutual rights and obligations between transnational private rule-makers, like the online platform PayPal, and their 'users' tend to be strongly biased in favour of the former. Résumé: Cet article se sert de l'exemple de l'un des systèmes mondiaux de paiement les plus connus fourni par une plateforme en ligne, PayPal, pour analyser le rôle de systèmes juridiques privés dans la création de nouveaux marchés au-delà des frontières juridictionnelles. Il montre qu'un système légal relativement uniforme réduit les risques impliqués dans des transactions transfrontalières et favorise de cette manière des marchés transnationaux. Alors qu'une règle transnationale est plus facilement créée par des entités privées que par des états, elle reste incorporée dans les lois étatiques. Le rôle constant du droit étatique dans la formation de systèmes juridiques privés transnationaux est assuré parce que ces derniers opèrent avec l'approbation et le support d'états. De cette manière, les états facilitent la globalisation. En même temps, la portée de lois étatiques est fragmentaire et désintègre le cadre juridique privé mondial applicable. Finalement, l'influence éparse de lois étatiques fragilise la protection offerte aux consommateurs. Ceci est particulièrement important dans la mesure où les droits et obligations réciproques entre les décideurs privés transnationaux tels que la plateforme en ligne PayPal, et leurs 'utilisateurs' tendent à être fortement déséquilibrés en faveur des premiers.

This contribution illustrates the evolution of the Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) as a form of European hybrid governance. The hybridity of SEPA is conceived in terms of interaction between traditional hard law, soft law and privately produced rules. The public and private systems of rules – public in the form of European directives and regulations and private in the form of multilateral agreements among payment service providers – coexist and mutually shape the structure of the European payments system. These two systems of rules have formally been produced in independent rule-making processes and by discrete rule-makers – public and private respectively. However, public actors have exercised a considerable amount of influence over the private rules. They have done so through informal, yet systematized interactions with private actors and through a series of soft laws. And vice versa, private rule-makers and privately-produced rules substantially have affected the content of public rules. The question to be asked is whether this public-private hybrid governance structure is good governance.

An increased focus on consumer collective redress marks the shift from substance- to enforcement-oriented perspective in the EU consumer policy. The EU action in this regard is currently at the stage of feasibility study but it seems to be moving towards a mechanism protecting collective rather than individual interests of consumers. In spite of these developments, a comprehensive strategy towards the concept of collective interest of consumers is missing at the EU level. We argue that a relative disregard of the procedural functions which the concept performs, as exemplified also by the already existing EU instruments for consumer redress, may lead to under-enforcement of consumer rights. As a possible remedy we put forward a proposal how to make the concept of consumer collective interest a workable tool. From an evolutionary perspective, we also examine how the concept of public interest was construed by the Polish judiciary during the socialist regime to prove that the way the public interest was conceptualised in the past affects the present understanding of the consumers' collective interest. As Poland represents a New Member State and has experienced economic and political transformation, our case study demonstrates how political and economic conditions shape the concept of collective interest. The overall goal of the paper is to show that clear understanding of the idea of collective interest of consumers, which currently varies from one MS to another, is essential for the creation of the internal market in collective redress