Endowments in European law: Current state and perspectives

Abstract

Throughout history, endowment, although with the same content, has developed differently in European countries in terms of law. The national legal regulations of the countries in this area define the basic elements, legal status and functioning of legal entities established in the spirit of endowment differently. The idea of the European Union as a market characterized by the free flow of people and capital inevitably led to the emergence of a very complex set of rules that apply to the member states of this union. The inclusion of endowments in the single market and the growing number of those characterized by internationally useful goals often lead to insurmountable problems in the operations of endowments outside national borders due to national legislations of EU countries not being synchronized, regardless of the general aim to create a single space without any barriers to the flow of people, services and capital. This is the starting point used to examine the subject of this paper - the need to regulate and resolve situations in the functioning of endowments and foundations in Europe: by creating special rules at the EU level and equalizing or harmonizing rules relating to these non-profit organizations. The subject of the research was chosen because of the importance of the topic in the process of developing private EU law in the non-profit sector. The aim of this paper is to analyze the legal regulations related to endowments and foundations in the national legislations of the EU member states comparatively in terms of law, but also to analyze the proposals for creating uniform legal rules.