Suchergebnisse

Many of the recent Court of Justice rulings concerning the relationship between the international legal order and the EU legal order have been on the receiving end of considerable criticism, with the EU level judicial commitment to international law being called into question. One dimension of that critique has concerned the treatment of EU concluded Agreements. An assessment of the extant EU level judicial enforcement practice provides evidence of the emergence of a twin-track approach. Member State level activity challenged for non-compliance with EU Agreements is generally subjected to the full force of those Agreements, whilst in contrast the tendency where EU level activity has been challenged before the Court of Justice appears to have become one of shielding such activity from meaningful review. Even if this trajectory were to be maintained, which remains to be seen, it can be argued that the medium of EU law nevertheless serves to bolster the effectiveness of this increasingly expanding body of Treaty law. For EU law has placed at the disposal of litigants, including the Commission via infringement proceedings, the most powerful of tools for policing the compliance of currently twenty-seven Member States with this growing number of agreements.

AbstractDirect democracy exhibits both promise and peril for the EU. The referendum has been deployed by Member States in a way that has shaped and will continue to shape the EU's geographical boundaries, its constitutional evolution, and salient EU policy matters. The referendum's promise is to accord a high degree of legitimacy to a political decision, but that promise varies across different types of EU referendum. Their peril for the EU has become increasingly apparent as they have proliferated in number and type and with a growing failure rate. In contrast, the European Citizens' Initiative is intended to harness the promise of direct democracy for the EU. But current practice raises the question of whether the failure to satisfy the ambitions placed on this novel instrument could, paradoxically, become a source of peril. Contrary to an increasingly pessimistic narrative, it is concluded that practice under the ECI exhibits promise and that the future of this instruments appears bright.

This article draws on federal theory to analyze the dynamics of crafting a privacy regime in the European Union and the United States. Three dimensions of the policy domain are analyzed: how policy was framed, the policy dynamics activated, and the policy instruments used. The main finding is that despite obvious differences in the choice of specific policy instruments, a strikingly similar regulatory dynamic and framing of policy can be detected. Two conclusions are drawn: first, federal theory can reveal novel insights on the politics of regulating privacy, especially in relation to new technologies and counter terrorism measures. Second, applying a comparative research design to EU policy-making can help explain many of its apparent empirical puzzles. Adapted from the source document.

"Why have referendums on European integration proliferated since the 1970s? How are referendums accommodated within member states' constitutional orders and with what impact on the European integration process? What is the likely institutional impact of referendums on the future of the European integration process? Drawing on an interdisciplinary approach, these are just some of the fundamental questions addressed in this book. The central thesis is that the EU is faced with a 'direct democratic dilemma', which is compounded by the EU's rigid constitutional structure and a growing politicisation of the referendum device on matters related to European integration. Referendums and the European Union discusses how this dilemma has emerged to impact on the course of integration and how it can be addressed"--

In recent decades Europe's political landscape has been marked by a notable rise in the use of mechanisms of direct democracy such as the referendum and the citizens' initiative. Our focus in this article is on the national referendums directly connected to the European Union (EU) integration process, a subject which is receiving increasing scholarly attention. Two interrelated questions are asked. First, how do these specific mechanisms of direct democracy interact with the existing federal political institutions of the EU? And, second, how does this affect the institutional stability of the EU polity? In addressing this problematique we undertake a cross-polity comparison of the EU-variant of direct democracy that reveals a range of institutional models and brings to the fore a neglected dimension in the study of EU referendum politics, the role of federal political institutions.

In recent decades Europe's political landscape has been marked by a notable rise in the use of mechanisms of direct democracy such as the referendum and the citizens' initiative. Our focus in this article is on the national referendums directly connected to the European Union (EU) integration process, a subject which is receiving increasing scholarly attention. Two interrelated questions are asked. First, how do these specific mechanisms of direct democracy interact with the existing federal political institutions of the EU? And, second, how does this affect the institutional stability of the EU polity? In addressing this problematique we undertake a cross-polity comparison of the EU-variant of direct democracy that reveals a range of institutional models and brings to the fore a neglected dimension in the study of EU referendum politics, the role of federal political institutions.

In recent decades Europe?s political landscape has been marked by a notable rise in the use of mechanisms of direct democracy such as the referendum and the citizens? initiative. Our focus in this article is on the national referendums that are directly connected to the European Union (EU) integration process. These types of referendums are increasingly recognised by the scholarly community as the source of institutional instability across the wider EU polity. To explain the nature of this empirical puzzle is this article?s main objective. However, instead of pursuing intra-EU comparisons, as does much of the literature, we adopt a comparative perspective on the EU that involves the explicit comparison with other polities. In doing so, we bring to the fore a neglected dimension in the study of EU referendum politics: the operation of federal political institutions. We contend that cross-polity comparison of EU forms of direct democracy with other polities reveal insights that suggest a number of institutional models to overcome the sources of the present instability.