Austria joined the European Union (EU) on 1 January 1995. This full integration into Europe has been the goal of Austrian foreign policy since 1948. The dramatic change of the political situation in 1989 with the fall of the “Iron Curtain” facilitated this process. The accession required enormous harmonization efforts in the legal, political and informational area. The approximation of the Austrian law was accelerated by previous autonomous implementation of EC law and the EEA Agreement. The integration into the decision-making process of the EU was an important reason for joining the EC. The information infrastructure concerning EU law has been much improved although some gaps remain.

Since 1990, countless scientific books and articles have been published on the topic of the unification of Germany. I did not mean to add another learned contribution to a subject where everything that could have possibly been said and written has been said and written. I rather intended to familiarize the audience with a rather complex and multidimensional process within the limited space of time of a conference. This, alas!, compelled undue simplification from me. In order not to further complicate a difficult enough subject I felt, above all, constrained to concentrate on the intra-German aspects of unification. As a result, I deliberately had to leave the many international and external problems and developments out of account. This is particularly true for the Treaty on the Final Settlement with respect to Germany (Two-plus-four Treaty) of September 12, 1990, and the Polish-German Border Treaty of November 14, 1990, as well as the termination of international treaties to which the former German Democratic Republic was a party, and Germany's membership in the European Union and NATO after the unification.

The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) pursues a concept of co-operative security which encompasses commitments by participating States in the areas of military security, political co-operation, human rights, economy, culture and the environment. Its priorities are to consolidate common values and build civil societies, prevent local conflicts, restore stability and bring peace to war-torn areas, overcome real and perceived security deficits and avoid the creation of new divisions by promoting a co-operative system of security. The OSCE is the primary instrument for early warning, conflict management and crisis management in the OSCE region, i.e. Europe, Central Asia and North America. Its basic feature is the strict equality of all 55 participating States, which is well reflected in its decision-making process. With a few exceptions, decision-making at meetings within the framework of the OSCE is only possible by consensus, which is considered to be achieved if no State has expressed an objection. States are, however, allowed to make reservations or interpretative statements.

On January 1, 1988, the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (the Convention) became effective in the United States. In general, the Convention (also referred to as the “Vienna Sales Convention,” the “Sales Convention,” the “CISG,” or the “UN Convention”) applies to contracts for the sale of goods between enterprises having their places of business in different countries, provided these countries have adopted the Convention. Freedom of contract, however, is a fundamental principle of the Convention, and the parties may opt out or modify the effects of its provisions.

Czechoslovakia was established on October 28, 1918. For a better understanding of its legal history, allow me to mention first a few historical events that influenced the creation of Czechoslovakia and, in later years its legal development.

Let me first introduce myself: I am the librarian of the Institute of East European Law and Russian Studies at the University of Leiden in the Netherlands since 1980.

Legal databases in Austria go back to two different sources. In the public sector decisions of the three major (or high) courts, the Constitutional Court, the Administrative Court and the Supreme Court, have been stored in local databases. In the private sector the major legal publisher MANZ created a limited company in 1982, RDB (Rechtsdatenbank), with the participation of representatives of the legal profession and a big bank. The legal publisher ORAC and EDP professionals joined the team. Most of the journals in RDB are available in full text starting in 1978, but the Hohenecker-Index goes back to 1947.

A prominent jurist once described the law as a “seamless web.” This description of linked knowledge actually applies to all fields of scholarship and investigation, and it is not only lawyers who experience the need to move through the library constantly, each open text citing another or suggesting another avenue of inquiry. The pile of open books on the library table, and the constant recourse to catalogue and stacks, epitomize the image and the process of textual research, both for the advanced scholar and for the school-child writing her first essay. Computers clearly have the capacity to enhance the quality of our lives, but in my opinion their contribution to library reference work lies chiefly in this: to liberate us from the “up-and-down-and-fetch” mode of research as well as the “scissors-and-paste” method of text revision. This liberation is promised today in the hypertext features of all Windows-based or icon-clicking applications in use now, particularly with the incorporation of graphics and images, be they decorative or illustrative, from Netscape creatures to art, archaeology, or architecture.