Milosz HodunLECTURE MARATHON 2011

THE EUROPEAN COURT OF JUSTICE AND ITS PARTNERS

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European Integration and the ECJ

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Neutrality

• In Europe courts rely on their independency.• They say they are not political,

not create new norms.• They say they are purely legal

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Legalism

• Legalism dominates in Europe.

• “The Community is presented as juristic idea; the written constitution as a secret text; the professional commentary as a legal truth; the case law as a inevitable working out of the correct implications of the constitutional text; and the constitutional court as a disembodied voice of right reason and constitutional teleology”

M. Shapiro, Courts

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Contextualism

• Analysis of legal and political area.

• Some fundamental facets of the supranantional system took crucial strides during the first decade of the EEC when the political decision-making was numb.

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Realism

• The ECJ is a “technical servant” of the member state governments.

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Neo-realism

• The ECJ is intentionally mirroring national-interest calculation in its judging in order to gain support of the national governments for its own policy.

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Neofunctionalism

• The ECJ works with its subnational allies.– Lower national courts,– Private litigants,– Lawyers.

• The ECJ sided with the “little guy”.

• The ECJ created opportunities for the subnational actors to participate in the legal integration.

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The competition-between-courts dynamic

• The ECJ became a second parent for the lower national courts to which they can refer when the first one, the highests national courts, do not approve their decisions.

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Neofunctionalism

• The ECJ works with its supranational allies:– Transnational bussiness,– Law associations,– European Commission.

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Conclusions

• The ECJ played an extraordinary role in the process of European Integration.

• But it has done so as a part of a complex network of actors and institutions.

• Its role must be seen through its relation with national, subnational and supranational partners.

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Thank you for your attention