Europe's Constitutional Mosaic

Europe's Constitutional Mosaic

Author: Neil Walker

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Published: 2011-06-14

Total Pages: 404

ISBN-13: 1847317863

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This book emerged from an extended seminar series held in Edinburgh Law School which sought to explore the complex constitutional arrangements of the European legal space as an inter-connected mosaic. There has been much recent debate concerning the constitutional future of Europe, focusing almost exclusively upon the EU in the context of the (failed) Constitutional Treaty of 2003-5 and the subsequent Treatyof Lisbon. The premise of the book is that this focus, while indispensable, offers only a partial vision of the complex constitutional terrain of contemporary Europe. In addition, it is essential to explore other threads of normative authority within and across states, embracing internal challenges to state-level constitutional regimes; the growing jurisprudential assertiveness of the Council of Europe regime through the ECHR and various democracy-building measures; as well as Europe's ever thicker relations, both with its border regions and with broader international institutions, especially those of the United Nations. Together these developments create increasingly dense networks of constitutional authority within the European space. This fluid and multi-dimensional dynamic is difficult to classify, and indeed may seem in many ways impenetrable, but that makes the explanatory challenge all the more important and pressing. Without this fuller picture it becomes impossible to understand the legal context of Europe today or the prospects of ongoing changes. The book brings together a range of experts in law, legal theory and political science from across Europe in order to address these complex issues and to supply illustrative case-studies in the topical areas of the constitutionalisation of European labour law and European criminal law.


Foreign Policy Objectives in European Constitutional Law

Foreign Policy Objectives in European Constitutional Law

Author: Joris Larik

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2016-03-24

Total Pages: 397

ISBN-13: 0191055980

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Presenting the first comprehensive account of foreign policy objectives as a growing part of European constitutional law, Joris Larik confronts the trend of enshrining international ambitions in the highest laws of states and the European Union. Closely examining the provisions of foreign policy objectives, Larik differentiates their legal force and functions, situating them into the overall legal order of the state, the EU, and the composite 'European constitutional space'. He argues that the codification of foreign policy objectives suggests a progression in the evolution of the role of the constitution: from limiting public authority to guiding it towards certain goals, both at home and in the wider world. Advancing a comparative constitutional perspective for the study of EU external relations, this volume contributes a constitutional dimension to the 'normative power' debate in the study of EU foreign policy. Drawing on established national doctrines on constitutional objectives from Germany, France, and India, the book provides a common vocabulary for coming to terms with foreign policy objectives as legal norms across different jurisdictions. In the pluralist context and closely intertwined legal orders of the EU and its Member States, it shows how objectives help to channel the individual ambitions of the Member States through the Union framework towards a more coherent external action. Furthermore, the book connects its legal findings with the debate on the EU as an actor in international relations, exploring the role of these norms in inter-institutional struggles and processes of identity-shaping, legitimation, and socialization.


The Rise and Fall of the European Constitution

The Rise and Fall of the European Constitution

Author: NW Barber

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Published: 2019-01-10

Total Pages: 383

ISBN-13: 1509910999

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The Draft European Constitution was arguably both an attempt to constitutionalise the Union, re-framing that project in the language of the state, and an attempt to stretch the boundaries of constitutionalism itself, re-imagining that concept to accommodate the sui generis European Union. The (partial) failure of this project is the subject of this collection of essays. The collection brings together leading EU constitutional scholars to consider, with the benefit of hindsight, the purportedly constitutional character of the proposed Constitutional Treaty, the reasons for its rejection by voters in France and the Netherlands, the ongoing implications of this episode for the European project, and the lessons it teaches us about what constitutionalism really means.


National Sovereignty in the European Union

National Sovereignty in the European Union

Author: Ondrej Hamuľák

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2016-09-08

Total Pages: 95

ISBN-13: 3319453513

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This volume assesses the implications of membership in the European Union for countries’ understanding of the concept of sovereignty, based on the perspective of the Czech Republic. The starting point of this work is acceptance of the Czech Republic’s membership in the European Union as a basic fact. The goal of the analysis presented here is to offer a theoretical approach to reconciling state sovereignty with the participation of the Czech Republic in the European integration project. To do so, the book pursues an in-depth analysis of the reactions of the Constitutional Court of the Czech Republic to the challenges associated with membership in the EU. Above all, it addresses the following two basic research questions:1. Is membership of the state in the European Union associated with a loss of sovereignty, a sharing of sovereignty, or does it have no real consequences for the scope or understanding of the concept of state sovereignty, such that the phenomenon remains a classical, static and defining element of the state?2. How does the Czech Constitutional Court deal with the specific characteristics of European Union law and what is its stance on the nature of the relationship between supranational and national law?


Europe's Second Constitution

Europe's Second Constitution

Author: Markus W. Gehring

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2020-09-24

Total Pages: 439

ISBN-13: 1108487963

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European constitutionalisation has met with scepticism - this book analyses the steps necessary to move to EU's 'Second Constitution'.


Pluralism and European Private Law

Pluralism and European Private Law

Author: Leone Niglia

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Published: 2013-01-29

Total Pages: 294

ISBN-13: 1782250638

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European private law has hitherto tended to be conceptualised firmly around ideas of unity and harmony. Yet the discourse within other areas of European law, notably constitutional law scholarship, visibly adopts pluralist perspectives. This book seeks to bridge the gap between 'public' and 'private' law by looking at European private law from various pluralist positions and by investigating old and new ways in which to understand legal pluralism in general. It fills a gap in the wide literature on legal pluralism, as the first book entirely dedicated to offering an insight into legal pluralism from the vantage point of the private law domain. The book addresses critically issues such as what pluralism really means in private law and what conceptions of pluralism it embodies, including discussion about the outer boundaries of any of the pluralist understandings. Contributions address comparative, critical, historical, theoretical and normative aspects. The book provides an opportunity to engage innovatively with problematic conceptual issues which inform the work of European private law scholars, including the debate on the Common Frame of Reference Poject of the European Commision.


Great Debates on the European Convention on Human Rights

Great Debates on the European Convention on Human Rights

Author: Fiona de Londras

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Published: 2018-03-16

Total Pages: 214

ISBN-13: 1137607335

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This engaging textbook provides a critical analysis of the legitimacy and effectiveness of the European Convention on Human Rights and its practical operation. In a succinct way, the book investigates questions around the legitimacy of how the European Court of Human Rights develops its law, the obligations of states to comply with its judgments, the adequacy of the Convention in securing basic goods, and the effectiveness of the system in protecting rights 'in the real world'. It assesses some under-explored areas of the Convention that are often overlooked. Presenting a number of debates about the legitimacy and effectiveness of the system in a provocative and critical style, this book encourages debate, discussion, and self-reflection on how, when and why the Convention protects human rights in Europe. An ideal text for Law students at English and Welsh universities and higher education institutions taking a module in The European Convention on Human Rights (LLB or LLM level), and for GDL/CPE students and those taking the postgraduate LPC training course.


New Constitutional Horizons

New Constitutional Horizons

Author: Cormac Mac Amhlaigh

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2022

Total Pages: 257

ISBN-13: 0198852339

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This book examines the conceptual puzzles that multilevel pluralism poses for our constitutional theories. It offers fresh perspectives by addressing the pluralism of norms and authorities from the viewpoint of legality and legitimacy, proposing novel solutions for pluralizing constitutional theory in the light of multilevel governance.


European Integration and Postcolonial Sovereignty Games

European Integration and Postcolonial Sovereignty Games

Author: Rebecca Adler-Nissen

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2013-05-02

Total Pages: 274

ISBN-13: 1135127786

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This book examines how sovereignty works in the context of European integration and postcolonialism. Focusing on a group of micro-polities associated with the European Union, it offers a new understanding of international relations in the context of modern sovereignty. This book offers a systematic and comparative analysis of the Overseas Countries and Territories (OCTs), the EU and the four affected Member States: UK, France, the Netherlands and Denmark. Contributors explore how states and state-like entities play ‘sovereignty games’ to understand how a group of postcolonial entities may strategically use their ambiguous status in relation to sovereignty. The book examines why former colonies are seeking greater room to manoeuvre on their own, whilst simultaneously developing a close relationship to the supranational EU. Methodologically sophisticated, this interdisciplinary volume combines interviews, participant observation, textual, legal and institutional analysis for a new theoretical approach to understanding the strategic possibilities and subjectivity of non-sovereign entities in international politics. Bringing together research on European integration and postcolonial theory, European Integration and Postcolonial Sovereignty Games will be of interest to students and scholars of International Relations, EU studies, Postcolonial studies, International Law and Political Theory.


The EU and Constitutional Time

The EU and Constitutional Time

Author: Massimo Fichera

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

Published: 2023-07-01

Total Pages: 181

ISBN-13: 1789909007

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This insightful book examines the inherent fragility of modern liberal constitutionalism and shows how it is in the nature of every constitutional community, including the European Union, to try to protract its own duration as much as possible. The book considers the strengths, weaknesses, tensions and contradictions of European constitutionalism using the lens of constitutional time.