Constitutional Law

This post explores the Court of Justice’s ruling in KS and KD v Council, expanding its jurisdiction in Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) matters while balancing judicial oversight with strategic political decisions, especially regarding human rights in EU missions.

This blogpost is dedicated to legal questions arising from the ongoing ‘coalition crisis’ in Austria, following Environment Minister’s decision to vote in favour of the Regulation on Nature Restoration despite the opposing will of Austria’s Chancellor and 7 Regional Governments.

This piece aims to provide a deeper overview of the EU’s direct commitment towards the LGBTIQA+ community during the EU legislative term 2019-2024.

This post discusses the political and technocratic aspects of the role of a Commissioner, and argues that in order to foster democratic legitimacy, the political side should be more visible in the process of choosing Commissioners.

This blog post aims to provide context for the decision to amend the EU Electoral Act, which might very well change the composition of the European Parliament.

This blogpost argues that the European Commission should address the Hungarian Sovereignty bill as a clear violation of the principle of democracy under Article 2 TEU and aims to show in what respects this principle is violated.

This post discusses the major positive developments resulting from the implementation of the Regulation on the European Citizens' Initiative and questions the potential of these developments to ensure the fulfillment of ECI’s objectives.

This post will explore why the dual-use nature of space assets, combined with the Lisbon Treaty’s particular legal architecture, may complicate or hinder the EU’s plans for broadened and deepened space governance.

This post first covers the main aspects of the judgment in the Deutsche Umwelthilfe case before offering some commentary on the legal effects of international law in the EU legal order and in particular the Aarhus Convention.

This post aims to critique an institutional approach according to which to Member State democracy and proposes instead to develop a citizen-centred conception of democracy.

This post argues that The General Court’s idea that an absence of causality is sufficient to dismiss the case is without any legal or logical basis, a confusion of competences with causes.

This post analyses the effectiveness of the proposed European Media Freedom Act regarding the protection of journalists, assesses the amendments proposed by the LIBE, and argues that they fail to offer a sufficient level of protection for journalists.

This blogpost argues for a wide understanding of democracy under Article 2 TEU, and sets democratic standards that member states are obliged to comply with as a matter of Union law.

This post discusses the use of the infringement proceeding as a lawful route to claim violations of Article 2 TEU, evaluates its effect, and addresses the definition of the values given by the Court of Justice and its necessary character. 

This post argues that the ECtHR functions as an important guardian of the right to a fair trial in cases where the national court refuse to seek a preliminary ruling from the CJEU.

This post engages (speculatively) in a thought experiment on certain legal aspects of the collective abandonment of the EU and the simultaneous creation of an “EU 2.0” that some Member States might consider triggering if the EU’s operations were to be irretrievably paralysed.

This post examines the Court’s definition of the essence of ne bis in idem in the case law leading up to bpost and AG Bobek’s critique thereof, before evaluating the Court’s latest definition.

This post analyses the recent Full Court judgments of Cases C-156/21 Hungary v Parliament and Council and C-157/21 Poland v Parliament and Council.

This post gives an overview of the new Public Consultations’ regime and makes a Preliminary Assessment of the New Regime. 

This post discusses the ruling of the Polish Constitutional Court, according to which Articles 1, 2 and 19 of the TEU are partly unconstitutional.

This post addresses the key points of the Advocate-General’s reasoning against the backdrop of the Achmea judgment, followed by a brief appraisal of the potential importance and consequences if the CJEU were to follow the reasoning of AG Kokott.

This post will analyse the Court’s judgment in the case C-78/18, comment on the importance of the case in the ongoing EU rule of law crisis, and highlight the Court’s approach towards so-called ‘integrated Charter infringements’.

This post shows why the German court taking ever greater ownership in the interpretation of EU law, without engaging the CJEU and while circumscribing the preliminary rulings avenue, is the emerging “new normal”.

This post will argues that, although this dance has for now been paused, it shall continue, but the tune and the steps will not be the same.

This post will, outline the jurisdiction and the admissibility of the infringement proceeding, discuss the merits of the case, and conclude with some comments on the significance and the potential outcome of the proceedings.

This post seeks briefly to summarise the background and the Political Declaration before outlining the sides’ opening negotiation gambits and noting three paradoxes.

This post will analyse the legal sources informing the infringement proceedings and considers the proceedings as a reactive mechanism to ensure the UK’s compliance with EU law during extension, contrasting this to pro-active measures used for previous extensions.

This post presents the relevant developments leading up to this case, discusses AG Kokott’s Opinion and reflects upon the wider implications of Case C-411/17 for the development of EU environmental law and its interaction with the international legal order.

This post argues that autonomy, due to its abstract characteristics, is often subject to power injections leading to incoherent interpretations depending on the subject-matter at hand.

This post presents the report on the application of proportionality and subsidiarity and sketches some (rough) reflections on the place of the principle of subsidiarity in the EU legal order and how to improve its role as a tool to control EU legislative activity.

This post focuses on the AG’s arguments concerning the exclusive jurisdiction of the Court of Justice over the definitive interpretation of EU Law.

This post will argue that it would be more normatively desirable for the European Union’s legislature to adopt measures in order to preserve these electoral rights for UK citizens.

This post will first summarise the judgment in Wightman v Secretary of State, before providing some comments thereupon.

This post analyses the arguments discussed by the Advocate General, building upon the two previous contributions discussing the judgment of the Inner House of the Court of Session in Scotland and arguing in favour of an interpretation of Article 50 TEU as not allowing revocation

This post scrutinizes the role of different European and Maltese institutions on the Pilatus Bank scandal and studies certain problematic aspects of whistle-blowing, banking supervision and money laundering legislation.

This post maps out what might now be safely described as the current position on the horizontal effect of fundamental rights in the European Union and attaches a threefold (mostly positive) meaning to the Bauer judgment.