Understanding Conflicts of Sovereignty in the EU
Understanding Conflicts of Sovereignty in the EU

Author: Nathalie Brack

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2021-05-10

Total Pages: 140

ISBN-13: 1000385124

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This book investigates the multifaceted conflicts of sovereignty in the recent crises in the European Union. Although the notion of sovereignty has been central in the contentious debates triggered by the recent crises in the European Union, it remains strikingly under-researched in political science. This book bridges this gap by providing both theoretical reflections and empirical analyses of today’s conflicts of sovereignty in the EU. More particularly, it investigates conflicts between four types of sovereignty. First, national sovereignty referring to the autonomy of the Westphalian Nation-State to rule on a territory delimited by borders; second, the supranational sovereignty acquired by the EU in a fragmentary fashion in a number of scattered internal and external policy fields; third, parliamentary sovereignty understood as the autonomy of parliaments (at the regional, national and European levels) to take part in the decision making process and control the executive in the name of the principles of election and representation; fourth, popular sovereignty whereby the body politic confers legitimacy to decision makers in a democratic system. Through an analysis of the various crises (rule of law, Brexit, migration, Eurozone crisis), the chapters look at how sovereignty is framed and contested by different types of actors, and how the strengthening or the weakening of certain types of sovereignty contribute to shape preferences regarding policies and governance structures in the multi-level EU. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of the Journal of European Integration.

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.

European Sovereignty, Legitimacy, and Power
European Sovereignty, Legitimacy, and Power

Author: Bart M.J. Szewczyk

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2020-12-23

Total Pages: 249

ISBN-13: 1000293084

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This book shows how the EU’s dual sovereignty–legitimacy problem can be resolved through the political concept of European citizenship, which can serve both to define the scope of European sovereignty and to justify EU power beyond national democracy. It reconceptualizes the EU’s legitimacy problem and demonstrates how sources of legitimacy can be identified and give rise to European sovereignty. It argues that sovereignty should be based on the will of citizens acting through various political bodies within the EU—city halls, regional entities, national governments, and EU institutions—and develops a general theory, arguably applicable to any political order. The EU is an unprecedented political project that is in tension with traditional forms of state legitimation based on national democracy, as nationalists and populists throughout Europe often make clear. Against this backdrop, the book fully articulates the notion of European sovereignty and argues that the EU’s sources of legitimacy are based on European citizenship and national democracy. This book will be of key interest to scholars and students of EU politics, European integration, international institutions, and international relations.

Limitations of National Sovereignty through European Integration
Limitations of National Sovereignty through European Integration

Author: Rainer Arnold

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2016-02-25

Total Pages: 199

ISBN-13: 9401774714

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The book considers the changes which national sovereignty has undergone through the supranational European integration. In various contributions by renowned academics and high judges demonstrate the serious impacts of supranationality on the EU member states and even on third countries which are connected with the EU by international treaties. It becomes clear that primacy of EU law, the most significant expression of supra-nationality, collides with national sovereignty as anchored in the national constitutions. The studies clearly show that most member states do not fully deny EU law primacy but are aware of the need to find an adequate balance between the supranational and the national orders. The result from the analyses of the authors from various European countries is that the upcoming constitutional paradigm is “constitutional identity”, a concept established by jurisprudence in Germany, France, Czech Republic (without being named so) and debated also in Poland which, herself, denies supranational impact on the national Constitution entirely. Studies on selected EU member states clarify the specific national approaches towards the limitations of their sovereignty as developed by the constitutional jurisprudence (Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania, Italy, Germany with comparative references to United Kingdom and France). It is illuminated that traditionally strong sovereignty concepts (UK, France) are considerably relativized and functionally opened towards the integration challenges. Basic issues are furthermore reflected, such as the supranational impact on the State’s power to reform its Constitution, the relation of national and constitutional identity and the national and supranational perspectives of identity. The book also includes Europe beyond the EU by research on the supranational character of association treaties (from a Ukrainian perspective) and on the Europeanization of a third country preparing EU membership (Albania).

A Republican Europe of States
A Republican Europe of States

Author: Richard Bellamy

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2019-01-31

Total Pages: 265

ISBN-13: 1107022282

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Examines the democratic legitimacy of international organisations from a republican perspective, diagnoses the EU as suffering from a democratic disconnect and offers 'demoicracy' as the cure.

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?

Sovereignty and European Integration
Sovereignty and European Integration

Author: M. Wind

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2001-10-25

Total Pages: 256

ISBN-13: 140390104X

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From the point of departure of international relations theory it is not an easy task to come to grips with the European integration process. We are faced with a situation where some of the world's oldest and traditionally most sovereignty-loving nations have surrendered essential parts of their power to a supranational institution. In order to make sense of this the book employs a constructivist framework. Empirically it focuses on the way in which the Community has transformed from a traditional international regime, based on classical international law, to a semi-federal polity where Community law and regulations trump national law and constitutions.

Opting Out of the European Union
Opting Out of the European Union

Author: Rebecca Adler-Nissen

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2014-08-14

Total Pages: 267

ISBN-13: 1107043212

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This book provides the first in-depth account of how European Union opt-outs and differentiated integration work in practice.

Constituting Federal Sovereignty
Constituting Federal Sovereignty

Author: Leslie Friedman Goldstein

Publisher: JHU Press

Published: 2001-08-21

Total Pages: 268

ISBN-13: 9780801866630

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Starting from the premise that the system of independent, sovereign, territorial states, which was the subject of political science and international relations studies in the twentieth century, has entered a transition toward something new, noted political scientist Leslie F. Goldstein examines the development of the European Union by blending comparative and historical institutionalist approaches. She argues that the most useful framework for understanding the kinds of "supra-state" formations that are increasingly apparent in the beginning of the third millennium is comparative analysis of the formative epochs of federations of the past that formed voluntarily from previously independent states. In Constituting Federal Sovereignty: The European Union in Comparative Context Goldstein identifies three significant predecessors to today's European Union: the Dutch Union of the 17th century, the United States of America from the 1787 Constitution to the Civil War, and the first half-century of the modern Swiss federation, beginning in 1848. She examines the processes by which federalization took place, what made for its success, and what contributed to its problems. She explains why resistance to federal authority, although similar in kind, varied significantly in degree in the cases examined. And she explores the crucial roles played by such factors as sovereignty-honoring elements within the institutional structure of the federation, the circumstances of its formation (revolt against distant empire versus aftermath of war among member states), and notably, the internal culture of respect for the rule of law in the member states. -- Stephen M. Griffin, Tulane Law School

Opting Out of the European Union
Opting Out of the European Union

Author: Rebecca Adler-Nissen

Publisher:

Published: 2014

Total Pages: 253

ISBN-13: 9781316002070

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"Opting Out of the European Union European integration continues to deepen despite major crises and attempts to take back sovereignty. A growing number of member states are reacting to a more constraining EU by negotiating opt-outs. This book provides the first in-depth account of how opt-outs work in practice. It examines the most controversial cases of differentiated integration: the British and Danish opt- outs from Economic and Monetary Union and European policies on borders, asylum, migration, internal security and justice. Drawing on over one hundred interviews with national representatives and EU officials, the author demonstrates how representatives manage the stigma of opting out, allowing them to influence even political sensitive areas covered by their opt- outs. Developing a practice approach to European integration, the book shows how everyday negotiations transform national interests into European ideals. It is usually assumed that states opt out to preserve sovereignty, but Adler-Nissen argues that national opt-outs may actually reinforce the integration process"--