Contents: Introduction, Deryck Beyleveld, David Townend and Jessica Wright; Research ethics committees in Austria, Peter Rehak; Belgian ethics committees and the protection of personal data, Guy Lebeer and Geneviève De Boeck; Research ethics committees in Bulgaria, Sylvia Tomova; Research ethics committees in the Czech Republic, Lukáa Prudil and Josef Kure; Research ethics committees in Denmark, Mary Rosenzweig and Lisbeth Knudsen; Research ethics in Estonia, Toomas Veidebaum; The general legal responsibility of research ethics committees in Finland, Lasse Lehtonen and Ritva Halila; The role of ethics committees in relation to French biomedical research: protection of the person and personal data, Brigitte Feuillet-Le Mintier; Research ethics committees in Germany, Matthias Kettner; Research ethics committees in Greece, Tina Garanis-Papadatos and Dimitris Boukis; Research ethics committees in Hungary, Judit Sándor; Research ethics committees in Ireland, Deirdre Madden and Maeve McDonagh; Research ethics committees in Italy's legal system, Roberto Lattanzi; Research ethics committees in Latvia, Laima Rudze; Research ethics committees in Lithuania, Asta Cekanauskaite and Eugenijus Gefenas; Research ethics committees in Malta, Pierre Mallia; Medical research on human subjects and RECs in the Netherlands, Jessica Wright and Bert Gordijn; The Norwegian model for ethical review of medical research, Vigdis Kvalheim; Research ethics committees and personal data protection in Poland, Patrycja Bong-Polec and Pawel Luków; The constitution and operation of health ethics committees in Portugal: rights of patients to personal data protection, Helena Moniz, Sónia Fidalgo, Rafael Vale e Reis and Rosalvo Almeida; Bioethical review in Romania, Octavian Doaga; Research ethics committees in Slovakia, Jozef Glasa and Jane Miller; Research ethics committees in Slovenia, Joze Trontelj; Research ethics committees in Spain, Carlos Maria Romeo-Casabona and Pilar Nicolás; The Swedish system for ethics review of biomedical research and processing of sensitive personal data, Elisabeth Rynning; Research ethics committees and the law in the UK, Stephen Baker, Deryck Beyleveld, Susan Wallace and Jessica Wright; Index.