PROTECTION OF CONSUMER RIGHTS IN DISTANCE SELLING CONTRACTS – URGE TO REFORM GEORGIAN PRIVATE INTERNATIONAL LAW

The Association Agreement between Georgia and the European Union has initiated a significant process of legislative approximation, including the recent transposition of Directive 2011/83/EU on consumer rights into Georgian law. Despite this progress in substantive consumer regulation, the protection afforded to consumers in cross-border distance selling contracts remains structurally inadequate at the level of private international law. Presented article delivers interim conclusions from my ongoing PhD thesis on critical analyzes of current framework of the Law of Georgia on Private International Law (GPIL). The article examines the EU’s dual-layered system of consumer protection: a substantive layer, under Rome I, ensuring the application of the consumer’s habitual residence law and restricting harmful choice-of-law clauses through a semi-mandatory regime; and a procedural layer, under Brussels Ibis, granting asymmetric jurisdictional privileges, home-forum protection, and tight control over forum-selection clauses. Employing a combination of doctrinal, comparative, teleological, and normative-analytical methods study integrates elements of case-law analysis, focusing on key decisions of the Court of Justice of the European Union the article proposes a comprehensive reform of Georgian private international law and civil procedure.