EU Law notes 2020-2021
Introduction to the course: The law of the European
Union: what’s it all about? Chronology of events. Who’s
in? And who wants to be in? Who wants to be out?
Thursday, 6 August 2020
12:03
Reading: Steiner & Woods EU Law, Chapter 1.
Introduction to the course
• The development of the European Union
• Processes for accession and exit
• Decision making and sources of law
• The nature of Union law: direct effect and primacy
• The Court of Justice of the EU and its jurisdiction
• General principles of Union Law - fundamental rights
• Free movement of goods
• Free movement of persons, services and establishment
• EU Citizenship
• The area of Freedom, Security and Justice
• Exit of the UK from the Union
Delivery and assessment
Delivery:
• Lectures for the course will be available online according to the weekly schedule set out
below. Timetable slots will however be scheduled for tutorials that will take place in
weeks 3, 5, 6, 9, 10 and 11.
Assessment:
• Formative: submission of an assignment to tutors—individual feedback;
• Summative: Online Examination, worth 100% of the course grade. Part A (one question)
and Part B (one question).
What is the EU?
• A economic and political union between 27 European countries
• Today, the EU has competence to enact wide range of laws which bind the
governments, companies and individuals in all 27 member states.
• Policy fields include:
• Competition law; Environmental Law; Economic Law; International trade policy;
Agricultural law and policy; Consumer protection; Research policy; Culture; Citizenship;
Human rights
,How the EU began?
History, Origins and Objectives
• Desire for peace in a war-torn and divided continent
• Europe endured two World Wars in first half of 20th Century.
• Fuel crisis →Successive severe winters
• Lack of exports →series of bad harvests + foreign reserves
• Economic and Political ties between European countries deemed necessary.
• Pooling and sharing of resources to ensure peace and economic prosperity.
Schuman Declaration 9th May 1950
“Europe will not be made all at once, or according to a single plan. It will be built through
concrete achievements which first create a de facto solidarity. The coming together of the
nations of Europe requires the elimination of the age-old opposition of France and Germany.
Any action taken must in the first place concern these two countries.”
“It proposes that Franco-German production of coal and steel as a whole be placed under a
common High Authority, within the framework of an organization open to the participation of
the other countries of Europe. The pooling of coal and steel production should immediately
provide for the setting up of common foundations for economic development as a first step in
the federation of Europe, and will change the destinies of those regions which have long been
devoted to the manufacture of munitions of war, of which they have been the most constant
victims.”
The European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) 1951
• 6 founding countries: Germany, France, Italy, BENELUX
• Preamble:
• “RESOLVED to substitute for historic rivalries a fusion of their essential interests; to
establish, by creating an economic community, the foundation of a broad and
, independent community among peoples long divided by bloody conflicts; and to lay
the bases of institutions capable of giving direction to their future common destiny”
• “HAVE DECIDED to create a European Coal and Steel Community”
Article 1 ECSC:
The High Contracting Parties institute among themselves a European Coal and Steel
Community based on a common market, common objectives, and common institutions.
Article 4: Prohibitions:
Import and Export Duties & Quantitative Restrictions on the movement of Coal and Steel;
Practices discriminating among producers, buyers or consumers;
Subsidies or state assistance;
Restrictive practices tending towards the division of markets or the exploitation of the
consumer.
ECSC Institutions
• Creation of an independent High Authority with “supranational” power to determine
conditions of coal & steel production and prices
• Schumann Declaration makes no reference to other institutions
• Monnet sees an independent High Authority as essential to ensuring success of project
• Reluctance to return to traditional, intergovernmental means of cooperation
• Jean Monnet:
• “It is clear that to entrust the Authority to a Committee of Governmental Delegates
or to a Council made up of representatives of Governments employers and workers,
would amount to returning to our present methods, those very methods which do
not enable us to settle our problems. It should be possible to find quite a small
number of men of real stature able without necessarily being technicians, and capable
of rising above particular or national interests in order to work for the accomplishment
of common objectives.”
Article 7 ECSC: A Novel Institutional Framework
• High Authority
• Council of Ministers
• Assembly
• European Court of Justice
The European Economic Community (EEC) 1957
EEC 1957 - Preamble
• DETERMINED to establish the foundations of an ever closer union among the
European peoples,
• DECIDED to ensure the economic and social progress of their countries by common
action in eliminating the barriers which divide Europe,
• RESOLVED to strengthen the safeguards of peace and liberty by establishing this
combination of resources, and calling upon the other peoples of Europe who share their
ideal to join in their efforts
European Economic Community (EEC) 1957
• The free movement of goods, services, capital & persons (‘fundamental freedoms’).
, • signed in parallel with a second treaty which set up the European Atomic Energy
Community (Euratom).
• established certain policies as joint policies among the member countries which would
replace national policies (common agricultural policy, common trade policy, transport
policy)
• Customs Union → abolished quotas and customs duties + established a common
external tariff on imports from outside the EEC
• EU Foundation Treaties: The EU Constitution
• Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU; Treaty of
Rome since 1957) (originally European Economic Community Treaty
→formerly European Community Treaty)
• Treaty on European Union (TEU; Maastricht Treaty 1992)
• European Atomic Energy Community Treaty (signed at same time as
treaty of rome in 1957)
• EU Charter of Fundamental Rights (made binding with treaty of lisbon in
2007)
• Amendments to the Foundation Treaties
• Single European Act 1986
• Treaty on European Union 1992 (Amending Part)
• Treaty of Amsterdam 1997
• Treaty of Nice 2001
• Treaty of Lisbon 2007
The enlargement of the EU
• 1952: The Founding States (6)
• European Coal and Steel Community
• France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Belgium
• 1973: First Enlargement (9)
• Denmark, Ireland, United Kingdom
• UK initially reluctant to join the ECSC and EEC
• UK changes view, tries to join in 1960s → was rejected in 1963
because President Charles de Gaulle used his veto power to block
Britain’s first formal application to the EEC → vetoed a second
application from Britain in 1969
• 1981: Second Enlargement (10) + 1986: Third Enlargement (12)
• Greece
• Spain and Portugal
o Not economically in a strong position BUT politically
crucial to support the recently emerged democracies
after varying period of authoritarian or dictatorial right-
wing rule
• 1995: The Fourth Enlargement (15)
• Austria, Finland, Sweden
o Economic downturn, difficulties exporting into the EU,
end of the cold war.
• 2004: The Fifth Enlargement (25)
• Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta,
Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia
o Political aim of reuniting Europe
o Requires adjustment to voting rules in Council and EP.
2007 & 2013: The Sixth & Seventh Enlargement
• 2007: Bulgaria & Romania
• 2013: Croatia
• 2020: Brexit (27)
Future Enlargement?
