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I applaud and recommend this collection of papers, which re-considers the positive/negative integration paradigm in the EU and the WTO, through the lens of the laws and institutions which govern the interaction between trade liberalisation and environmental and food regulation. This is technical stuff, but its technicality belies deep questions posed of our contemporary polities: about the nature and governance of globalisation, and about our economic, welfare and environmental protection concepts. The authors are to be commended for drilling down where the technicality of the subject requires this, yet without losing sight of the broader questions.

This paper assesses the different options for the post-Brexit transition. It explores each option in detail, considering how it could be achieved in practice, what the salient legal and policy implications are, and whether it is politically feasible. The most desirable and simplest transition option, consistent with the UK and EU’s position, is extending the acquis communautaire, without membership. It would mean minimal disruption to UK-EU cooperation and trade. However, it would entail continued budgetary contributions, ECJ jurisdiction and the primacy of EU law (including free movement).

The accession of the European Union to the European Convention on Human Rights raises questions about the autonomy of EU law, and about the future relationship between the EU Court of Justice and the European Court of Human Rights. The concept of autonomy appears to confirm prevailing theories about the relationships between legal systems in Europe, ie legal and constitutional pluralism. This study challenges those theories, and proposes an alternative paradigm: the integration of laws. Its central argument is that the EU system of human rights protection is increasingly characterized by its integration with the national constitutional laws of the Member States and with the ECHR. It argues that in integrated legal systems, conflicts between supreme adjudicators can be resolved from within the law. Each of the supreme/constitutional courts needs to recognize the limits of its jurisdiction, but is also sharing jurisdiction with the others. This principle of limited and shared jurisdiction is a tool for resolving conflicts, leading away from a conception of a deep conflict of supreme judicial authority. Integrated legal systems are governed by a law of integration, which is there for all to see. The article touches upon some of the elements of that law of integration. It goes on to investigate the scope for EU law autonomy — which is in essence concerned with safeguarding the jurisdiction of the Court of Justice — in connection with accession to the ECHR. It argues that the principle of limited and shared jurisdiction should govern the relationship between the two European courts, and that it is capable of ensuring that the European Court of Human Rights does not decide matters of EU competence, or EU law generally. But the principle also means that the Court of Justice will be bound by judgments of the European Court of Human Rights.

This article considers the constitutional requirements and implications of Article 50 TEU for the EU. It argues that it is essential to read Article 50 in light of the features of the Treaty of which it forms part together with its drafting context, that of the Convention on the Future of Europe, as well as the substantive protections of EU constitutional law. The article demonstrates that important constitutional constraints are in place in EU law, which can affect the most significant debates in the withdrawal process, namely: the manner in which notification to withdraw from the Union is given; the revocability of a decision to withdraw; and the legal basis and content of the withdrawal agreement. Most importantly, a reading of Article 50 informed by key constitutional features of the EU legal order stipulates clear duties for the EU to respect the UK’s constitutional requirements and to protect, in any eventual agreement, acquired rights for EU citizens in the UK and UK citizens in the EU, by emphasizing the illegality of a non-compliant withdrawal agreement from the EU perspective.

This essay argues that, increasingly, international economic law develops through adjudication. It therefore aims to offer some reflections on the growth and functions of the WTO adjudicative branch, which is of central importance to international economic law, by reviewing a number of important developments in the case law. The essay shows that important policy questions are submitted to adjudication. It aims to identify some of those questions, and to establish some parameters for WTO adjudication. It focuses in particular on the case law concerning the GATT and GATS General Exceptions, which, notwithstanding their generality and indeterminacy, occupy a central position in the resolution of international trade disputes. The essay takes issue with the use of economic concepts such as cost-effectiveness and cost--benefit balancing to characterize the adjudicative process of applying the General Exceptions. It argues that these concepts are inappropriate for analysing questions about trade versus environment/health/morals, etc. Instead, the essay suggests that legal theory offers further guidance for developing tools aimed at limiting adjudicative discretion. The essay approves of the weighing-and-balancing test which the Appellate Body has introduced, and contends that there is now a richer toolkit for tackling these sensitive cases and questions. Oxford University Press 2010, all rights reserved, Oxford University Press.

No competence to review EC regulations implementing Security Council resolutions, according to the Court of First Instance – Worst of both worlds: critique from the perspectives of international law and Community law – Alternative approach on the basis of the firmly established European solange tradition.

In Opinion 2/13 the CJEU finds a series of flaws in the draft Accession Agreement to the ECHR, which revolve around safeguarding the autonomy of EU law as well as its own jurisdiction. This paper first develops a basic normative framework for assessing the Opinion. That framework focuses on the concept of judicial dialogue, and seeks to establish an agreeable understanding of what dialogue between the CJEU and the ECtHR, post-accession, ought to involve. The paper subsequently develops a critique of Opinion 2/13, challenging the CJEU's understanding of EU law autonomy and issues of jurisdiction.

This chapter analyses the EU’s obligation to uphold and promote its values and interests in its external polies, in particular as regards some of the values generally underpinning the EU’s internal market, and the rules and principles concerning services of general interest in particular. The first part of the chapter offers a mapping exercise of the relevant Treaty provisions—seeking to establish connections and ways of reading them so that they may “inform” each other. The second part puts them in the context of the debate about Normative Power Europe (NPE) —a much used, but not undisputed international relations concept coined to express the nature of the EU’s external policies and projection. The third inquires further into the “normative” nature and effect of the EU’s constitutional values and objectives. It will be argued that the Treaty normative basis for the EU’s external relations is meaningful and is to be taken seriously.

This essay re-examines the recent case-law of the European Court of Justice and European Court of First Instance on the effect of WTO law in the EC legal system, particularly the judgment in Portugal v Council. The author takes issue with the critiques of that judgment, and attempts to defend the Court's exclusion of full direct effect, from a number of different perspectives. The second part of the essay looks into the types of legal effect of WTO law which the European courts do recognize, such as the principles of interpretation and implementation. It is argued that particularly the latter principle offers useful avenues for judicial communication.

Two years ago, von Bogdandy addressed in this journal the evolution of the core foundations of the European Union, by raising the central question whether the Union is or should be a human rights organization.1 The article followed Alston and Weiler’s powerful clamour, in the framework of a broader project, for an EU human rights policy,2 a claim with which von Bogdandy took issue. Since then, the EU Charter of fundamental rights has been finalized, and its scholarly fall-out is enormous, both because the final fate of the Charter is not yet settled and because the Charter is the centrepiece of the current EU constitutionalization process. Political developments are moving at such a pace that the questions whether the EU is in need of a human rights policy or whether it is becoming a human rights organization are now overshadowed by the tall presence of the Charter. The Convention on the future of the European Union is currently looking at how the Charter could be incorporated in the EU’s basic constitutional document. If such incorporation takes place, fundamental rights protection will, apparently at least, be at the core of the European integration process. What will the Charter do to that process? Past experience with bills of rights in federal States shows the strong centralizing force of such documents. It is perhaps for that reason that the Charter contains a strongly-worded horizontal provision which clearly seeks to contain any centralizing effect. Article 51 Charter provides

This paper focuses on a concept, direct effect, which has been at the heart of Marc Maresceau's own intellectual journey, the subject of his own PhD, later turned into a marvellous monograph which continues to repay close study. It explores, prospectively, what the status of the Convention in EU law could, and should be, once the EU has become a Contracting Party. The paper does so, at one level, on the basis of the existing principles regarding the effects which international agreements have in the EU legal order. It analyses the scope of the ECJ's jurisdiction to interpret and apply the Convention, once it is concluded. The paper examines the potential legal effect of the Convention in EU law. It analyzes the following question: what will be the effect of judgments of the ECtHR in the EU legal order? Keywords: ECtHR; EU legal order; European Convention on human rights; Marc Maresceau

This paper examines the extent to which the EU's external action is to be based on the EU's constitutional values. It does so in the particular context of the values underpinning the single market and services of general interest. Drawing on Normative Power Europe literature, the paper examines the normative thickness of those constitutional values, and offers some case studies exemplifying that thickness.

This contribution analyses the main heads of exclusive external competences—Treaty-based and implied powers—identified and articulated in the case-law of the Court of Justice. It explores the rationales for such exclusive powers, which are closely connected to the coherence of the EU’s internal competences and policies. The contribution argues that, even in areas of exclusive competence, EU and Member State competences are closely entwined. It further argues that exclusive implied powers are no more than a rule of pre-emption. The contribution also explores the dialogue between the case-law and the Treaty revisions, in particular the latest one, through the Treaty of Lisbon. Its conclusion is that the case-law played a remarkable role in constituting the EU as an international actor.

© Oxford University Press, 2014. This article is devoted to the discussion of case law in which many aspects of the WTO legal regime have been clarified and analysed in a judicial manner. It looks at the settlement of World Trade Organization (WTO) disputes, effective systems of remedies, and remedies equally available to all WTO Members. A wide range of fundamental legal issues arise when scrutinizing WTO law on implementation and compliance. This article attempts to explore these questions from a number of different perspectives. It reveals that specific remedies that WTO law offers in cases of continued noncompliance-compensation and suspension of concessions-also require further scrutiny. It shows that the rule of law plays but a limited role in WTO dispute settlement, and that all depends on the politics of power. It attempts to prove that there is definitely scope for a greater role for the law than is often considered.