Search

(Series Information) European Papers - A Journal on Law and Integration, 2024 9(1), 423-442 | Article | (Table of Contents) I. Introduction. – II. The legal principles governing EU coordination in international law-making fora: a weakness or a strength of Member States' external sovereignty? – III. The case of the Maritime Labour Convention: the journey of human rights from the EU to China via international law. – III.1. The Conven-tion and the EU's role in its elaboration. – III.2. The EU's rationale for uploading human rights standards into international law: a rights-oriented approach. – III.3. The impact of the Maritime Labour Conven-tion in China. – IV. Conclusion. | (Abstract) This Article presents two arguments and explores the relationship between them. First, the principles governing coordination between the EU and its Member States in multilateral fora (mainly, sincere co-operation and unity in the EU's representation) serve to increase the Member States' influence in inter-national law-making. Thus, there is a trade-off between the autonomy of Member States to determine their own positions in multilateral fora, and their capacity to influence such fora: the lesser the former, the greater the latter. Second, such an influence can be used by the EU and its Member States to pro-mote human rights laws abroad, “uploading” high standards into multilateral treaties, which are subse-quently “downloaded” by third states through ratification and implementation. Therefore, there is a link between the mentioned EU external relations law principles (which are a “condition” for a success-ful promotion) and the obligation to promote values set in arts 3(5) and 21 TEU (which provides the “direction” of the promotion). Consequently, when Member States complain about excessive EU intru-sion into their autonomy through common positions in multilateral fora, they should bear in mind that they are not only bound by the above-mentioned legal principles, but that their obligation to promote certain values abroad is also at stake. The case of the EU's influence on the Maritime Labour Conven-tion and its impact on Chinese law and policy is used to illustrate the arguments.

(Series Information) European Papers - A Journal on Law and Integration, 2024 9(1), 145-152 | European Forum Insight of 25 June 2024 | (Table of Contents) I. Introduction. - II. The signature of international agreements into EU law and the emergence of a practice. - III. Breaking a taboo. - IV. Conclusion. | (Abstract) The European Union has always concluded international agreements with third countries and international organisations as an integral component of its external action. In contrast to its predecessors, the Treaty of Lisbon introduced a uniform procedural framework for the negotiation and conclusion of international agreements in art. 218 TFEU with the aim of simplification and coherence between all EU external policies, including the CFSP. However, the act of signing international agreements has remained a grey area, shared between the Commission and the Council as a result of a well-established practice within EU institutional governance. On 9 April 2024, the European Court of Justice brought the Council back to a literal interpretation of the EU Treaties, removing any doubt about the role of the Commission in representing the EU externally and crystallising the legal authority of the sole Commission to sign agreements on behalf of the EU.

Copyright of Revista de Administración Pública is the property of Centro de Estudios Politicos y Constitucionales and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

(Series Information) European Papers - A Journal on Law and Integration, 2023 8(3), 1077-1103 | European Forum Insight of 8 January 2024 | (Series Information) European Papers (News of dd month yyyy) | (Table of Contents) I. Introduction - II. From German Competition Decision to EU Judgement - II.1. Bundeskartellamt Decision B6-22/16 of 6 February 2019 - II.2. Judgment of the Court (Grand Chamber) of 4 July 2023 - III. Comment - III.1. Something new: relations between competition law and data protection - III.2. Something borrowed: Meta v Bundeskartellamt and the European Commission - III.3. Something old: arts 6 and 9 GDPR - IV. Concluding remark. | (Abstract) Meta v Bundeskartellamt is the culmination of an issue years in the making: the relation between data protection and competition. In contention is the Bka’s finding that Meta’s practice of combining personal data across its many services, in addition to data collected through the integration of its services into third-party websites and apps, constitutes a violation of competition law. In this case, the ECJ holds that a competition authority is at liberty to consider GDPR violations as a “vital clue” to a finding of abuse of dominance, provided it first requested the cooperation of the competent data protection authorities. Furthermore, it finds that, apart from consent, no legal bases from the GDPR justify Facebook’s data processing. Through the principle of sincere cooperation, the Court opens the door to further integration of data protection and competition, acknowledging that data collection is at the core of digital market companies’ business models. Although the case is based on German national law, there is reason to believe that the same line of reasoning could also apply to the European Commission, thus expanding its options in digital market oversight. In contrast, the Court’s analysis of the GDPR is not quite as innovative, but still helpfully lists and reaffirms existing law.

(Series Information) European Papers - A Journal on Law and Integration, 2021 6(1), 567-577 | Article | (Table of Contents) I. Introduction. - II. A constitutional moment: admissibility subordinated to competence. - III. The tension be-tween the institutional and the organic visions of Europe: the nature of the contested act. - IV. ERTA and us: contested equilibria between the two visions of Europe? - V. Concluding remarks. | (Abstract) The ERTA case marks the constitutional inception of EU external relations. It laid the foundations for the legal framework governing the exercise of the EU's external competences and is often associated with the development of the doctrine of implied powers. The main tenets of the Court's pronouncement continue to define the fabric of the EU's external action. As the first Commission v Council litigation, ERTA encapsulates a still perceivable tension between two visions of Europe. One emphasises the autonomy of the EU institutional framework, the other regards the EU institutions as common organs in the hands of the Member States. ERTA's dossier de procédure constitutes a unique laboratory to assess the development of the EU as a legal order and an international actor. Its precious documents offer new sources to appreciate the abovementioned tension and unravel the shifting constitutional equilibria emerging from the interplay between EU and Member States treaty-making powers. Building on the archival research, this Article reflects on the inner working of the Court's judicial strategy. It seeks to shed novel light on the genealogy of the fascinating debate on the constitutional underpinnings of EU external relations.

(Series Information) European Papers - A Journal on Law and Integration, 2021 6(1), 81-99 | European Forum Insight of 22 April 2021 | (Table of Contents) I. La Carta, le sue origini. - II. Un "catalogo" di diritti fondamentali: le ragioni di una sua necessità. - III. La tutela di tali diritti, la giurisprudenza della Corte di giustizia e l'ambito di applicabilità. - IV. La distinzione fra diritti (da rispettare) e principi (da osservare): profili critici. - V. L'applicabilità della Carta nei rapporti orizzontali: la diretta applicabilità. - VI. I rapporti fra le Corti e il ruolo del giudice comune. - VII. La Carta, il rinvio alla Corte costituzionale e la questione pregiudiziale: la non applicazione della norma nazionale contrastante con la Carta. - VIII. Le recenti questioni pregiudiziali poste dalla Corte Costituzionale e dalle Sezioni Unite della Corte di Cassazione: la necessità di una costruttiva e leale cooperazione. | (Abstract) The year 2020 marked the 20th anniversary of the proclamation of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union. It was drawn up at the end of a long process, to which the Court of Justice has contributed substantially, affirming since the seventies the obligation to protect fundamental rights in the Community. The drafting of a catalogue of fundamental rights was then driven by the European Council, which under-lined the need for fundamental rights to be collected in a Charter and thus made more explicit. Over time, the Court of Justice has provided elements for a better understanding of certain essential aspects, such as the scope, the distinction between rights and principles, direct applicability, and the relationship with the Euro-pean Convention on Human Rights. The dialectic established more recently with the Constitutional Court has re-proposed the theme of the relationship between national law and EU law, between national Courts (Constitutional Court and "common" Court) and European Union Court.

This article explores the importance of geographical indications within the new trade policy of the European Union, using the example of the CETA and the dispute over Cypriot halloumi cheese. The authors point out that geographical indications occupy an important place within the European Commission’s negotiating strategy primarily because of their significance for the EU economy. In negotiations with third countries, such as Canada, a crucial problem is the different approaches to the protection of typical regional products. Therefore, the Union is trying to transfer its internal solutions to the international level. Th e detail of regulations, combined with the mixed nature of new trade agreements, makes trade policy vulnerable to blackmail by individual EU Member States. According to the authors, a reasonable solution to this problem – which was highlighted by Cyprus’s veto of the CETA – is to rely on the treaty provisions and the judgements of the Court of Justice of the EU. These indicate the exclusive competence of the EU in this area and impose an obligation on EU Member States to cooperate sincerely. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cooperation with third countries on readmission has occupied an increasingly prominent place in the EU's migration management strategy. The EU and its Member States have progressively concluded an extensive set of bilateral and multilateral, binding and non-binding, cooperation instruments on readmission. This proliferation questions the field's coherence with the principle of sincere cooperation, governing the interplay between the Union's and Member States' action. By taking this principle as a benchmark, the article highlights the ineffective nature of the current 'unprincipled' pursuit of readmission goals. It also demonstrates that sincere cooperation—if read together with subsidiarity—does not necessarily favour the Union's international action, to the detriment of the Member States'. Rather, it requires a good faith effort to identify, and stand by, the most effective level of action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This Article argues that the cooperation obligations of the Member States under EU law are best understood as forming part of an overall duty of EU loyalty and elaborates on the consequences of framing it in this way. EU loyalty legally requires Member States to make the common EU interest their own. The Article further demonstrates that EU loyalty is more relevant and more stringently applied in EU external relations than within the EU legal order. Loyalty obligations of the Member States reach into the future, extend to hypothetical situations, and are at a comparatively high level of abstraction aimed to protect the Union's ability to act effectively on the international plane. This limits Member States' margin of manoeuvre, including when they take unilateral external action within the realm of their retained national competences. The Article explains that this may be functionally justified by the high stakes of non-concerted external action. However, and in particular with the EU's increased external powers and the ever-growing relevance of international cooperation, the stringent application of cooperation requirements should be (better) explicated and justified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article focuses on the principle of sincere cooperation in the antitrust enforcement field by analysing its two dimensions: the first one between public and private enforcement, the second one between the different actors of public enforcement. In particular, the article will consider, on the one hand, the cooperation between public enforcement by competition authorities (Commission and NCAs) and private enforcement by national courts envisaged by Regulation 1/2003 and by the Damages Directive and, on the other hand, the cooperation amongst competition authorities provided by Regulation 1/2003 and by the ECN+ Directive, with the aim of demonstrating how both dimensions of the principle of sincere cooperation play an essential role in order to ensure the efficiency and effectiveness of antitrust enforcement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article addresses some theoretical and practical problems concerning coordination between the EPPO and national prosecuting authorities, seen from the Croatian perspective. Since investigations of the EPPO will be conducted according to national law, their efficiency will depend on the efficiency of national legal systems, but also on the efficiency of the EPPO's coordination with national authorities. There are two basic principles that regulate coordination between the EPPO and competent national prosecuting authorities: the principle of shared competence and the principle of sincere cooperation, meaning that the EPPO and national prosecuting authorities should work together and with the same goals, which implies mutual trust, loyalty and intense communication. Still, the EPPO exercises priority competence, which is reflected in its right of evocation. The analysis of some challenges to the system of shared competence and sincere cooperation, considered from the perspective of current Croatian criminal procedure legislation, shows that the complementarity principle may be a useful tool in regulating coordination between the EPPO and Croatian prosecuting authorities in specific situations where the EPPO must decide whether to use the right of evocation, although existing language barriers may reduce its practical utility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Croatian Annual of Criminal Sciences & Practice / Hrvatski Ljetopis za Kaznene Znanosti i Praksu is the property of Hrvatsko Udruzenje za Kaznene Znanosti i Praksu and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

(Series Information) European Papers - A Journal on Law and Integration, 2017 2(1), 223-229 | European Forum Insight of 26 March 2017 | (Table of Contents) I. Introduction. - II. The Danish Supreme Court's reasoning. - III. The 'selective' supremacy of EU law according to the Danish Supreme Court: is it time to reaffirm Costa v. ENEL?. - IV. The horizontality of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights. - V. Conclusion. | (Abstract) The present Insight focuses on the reception by the Danish Supreme Court (judgment of 6 December 2016, no. 15/2014, DI acting for Ajos A/S v. The estate left by A.) of the Court of Justice decision in the Dansk Industri case (judgment of 19 April 2016, case C-441/14 [GC]). Instead of disapplying a national provision which was found by the Court of Justice to be inconsistent with the general principle of non-discrimination of grounds of age, the Danish Supreme Court stresses that the Law of Accession of the Kingdom of Denmark to the European Union does not cover general principles of EU law and the national provision cannot be disapplied. The selective approach of the Danish Supreme Court raises a number of concerns which this Insight highlights: first, a clear misunderstanding regarding the functioning of general principles of EU law; second, a violation of the duty of sincere cooperation and the relate doctrine of supremacy of EU law; third, an arguable assessment of the effects of the Charter of Fundamental Rights.

Having in mind that this is the first time that a Member State decided to withdraw from the EU pursuant to Article 50 TEU there are many aspects of this process that attract the attention of scholars studying EU related issues. Regardless of the outcome of the ongoing political debate and the course of action that will be taken eventually, after the CJEU decision in Wightman, we deem the need to further explore the extent of Article 50 and its implications on a number of stakeholders self- evident. In this paper we will deal with the capacity of non-EU countries to negotiate and conclude bilateral agreements with the UK i.e. a country withdrawing from the EU. The analysis is based on the proposed framework under the Draft Agreement on the withdrawal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland from the EU and the Euratom and the possible interpretation and understanding of terms "the principle of sincere cooperation" and "the Union's interest" in this context, the principles of international law including the provisions of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties and the general principles of Union law. The primary focus is on the legal uncertainty the lack of a more thorough approach creates to non- EU countries, especially to third countries aspiring to join the EU. Considering that they do not participate in the withdrawal negotiations, it is a challenge for them to take part in prospect bilateral negotiations with the UK, while, at the same time, making sure they stay on their EU path. We argue in favor of the deal, as a universally accepted approach in case of future withdrawals, not only for the purpose of establishing a reference for any future application of Article 50, but also for providing legal certainty to those parties that are not prima facie affected by the withdrawal, but that do have to act in accordance with all deals made without the right to be heard. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

(Series Information) European Papers - A Journal on Law and Integration, 2016 1(2), 751-758 | European Forum Insight of 4 May 2016 | (Table of Contents) I. Introduction. - II. The judgment of the Court and the opinion of the Advocate General. - II.1. Arguments of the parties. - II.2. The judgment of the Court: international tribunals as regular courts? - II.3. The opinion of Advocate General Sharpston. - III. Concluding remarks. | (Abstract) The judgment in case C-73/14, Council v. Commission, forms part of the saga of inter-institutional disputes arising after the entry into force of the Treaty of Lisbon in the context of EU external representation. The Court in this case, in line with Advocate General Sharpston, excludes the applicability of Art. 218, para. 9, TFEU to the submission of statements by the EU before judicial bodies established by international agreements. In this case, the Court established the applicability of Art. 335 TFEU as a sufficient legal basis for the Commission to represent the EU in international judicial proceedings. Insofar as there were no policy-making choices in the submission of the statements for ITLOS advisory opinion in Case No 21, Art. 16, para. 1, TEU had been fully respected. This was also the case for Art. 13, para. 2, TEU and the duty of loyalty, insofar as the Commission had duly consulted the Council and taken the observations from the FISH and COMAR groups into account.

The effective judicial protection is nowadays an essential element of national legal orders, as well as of European Law, in so far as it allows individuals to enforce their rights and obtain redress. Conferring of an increasing number and content of rights that the European Union guarantees to individuals, it is necessary to create a complex system of EU legal remedies, which will ensure an effectiveness of enforcement of EU rights. The aim of the article is to introduce a legal basic and summarise essence of the fundamental right to an effective judicial protection enshrined in Art. 47 of the Charter. The author is focusing on individual's options of application of its fundamental right to an effective judicial protection before courts of the EU. Before the Court of Justice of EU is the author focusing on preliminary rulings and proceedings based on Art. 263 (4) TFEU, and at the national level is the attention focused on the principle of national procedural autonomy, as one of key principles governing the enforcement of individuals rights guaranteed by Union law before national courts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The need to ensure a uniform interpretation and effective application of the large corpus of EU environmental regulation in the jurisdictions of the Member States remains a task of pivotal importance for the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU). A quick look at the CURIA database reveals that many judgments are handed down every year to clarify the meaning of EU environmental provisions. It is therefore important to study the proper functioning of the tandem composed of the CJEU and the national courts in this field of EU law. In that sense, this article responds to Bogojević's call 'to draw a grander map of judicial dialogues initiated across various Member States'. More specifically, the topic investigated by this article is how the United Kingdom (UK) courts have followed up on responses received from the CJEU to their preliminary reference requests in the field of EU environmental law, from the UK's accession in 1972 until January 2017. All the cases we have retrieved from the UK show various degrees of willingness to cooperate with the CJEU. This article highlights the existence of three trends: full cooperation, fragmented cooperation and presumed cooperation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper tackles the enforcement of judgments of the Court of Justice as the most emblematic aspect of the constitutional dimension of the European Union, in line with the principle of loyalty or sincere cooperation in the fulfillment of European obligations. From this point of view, the State's international responsibility in implementing the judgments of the Court of Justice is also analyzed through the principle of responsibility of all public authorities. In this sense, the essay analyzes the virtues and complexities of the Spanish constitutional practice regarding the enforcement of judgments of the Luxembourg Court carried out not only by the national courts but also by other public authorities (executive and legislative ones) at both state and regional levels. In conclusion, beyond the media impact of some European judgments, the emphasis is placed on their actual enforcement as a factor to optimize the domestic legal order and, above all, as an essential element to improve the degree of Europeanism of citizenship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Public Law / Zeitschrift für Öffentliches Recht is the property of Verlag Oesterreich GmbH and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)