European Law

The European Union has placed the elimination of gender based violence among the
political priorities of its Strategy for equality between men and women. This insight of
declarations and instruments adopted by European regional institutions to eradicate this
violation of human rights shows that, although the Parliament and the Council repeatedly
requested a comprehensive strategy to combat violence against women, the EU did not
establish common standards across Member States. This role was played by the Council of
Europe, through the European Court of Human Rights Law case and the Convention on
preventing and combatting violence against women and domestic violence.

When facing eminent change of the way government institutions and activities are structured, legal theory can tell us in what respects legal scholarship needs to take account of such change--and also, in what respects is does not. Using a Kelsenian approach, this paper shows how legal theory (understood as a normative discipline) has no difficulty in coping with modern-day phenomena such as "soft law", "multi-level government", and "legal pluralism". The distinction of the normative and the empirical is key here, where the study of the latter falls into the domain of the social sciences, not legal theory.

The paper documents a presentation at the 2014 convention of junior German-speaking public-law researchers (Assistententagung Öffentliches Recht).

The European Union Fundamental Rights Agency, established in 2007, is a new institution in the EU legal and political framework and a new element in the engineering of fundamental rights protection at EU level. In “Leading by Example: a human rights agenda for the year 2000” – the agenda drafted by a comité des sages comprising Antonio Cassese, Catherine Lalumière, Peter Leuprecht and Mary Robinson – the institution of a monitoring agency focused on human rights was considered a fundamental element to trigger a more proactive and central role of EU institutions in the protection of human rights. Along with the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights and after the Lisbon Treaty entered into force, the Agency has increasingly covered a role in the constitutionalization process of the European Union and has been a new actor within the EU system of governance. Given its importance, we intend to clarify the evolution of this EU body, understand its connections with the EU institutions, analyze its activities, in order to assess its effectiveness in the protection of human rights and its potential in prompting more virtuous policy-making processes.

A perceptive follower of the development of the case-law on access to court and justice in general might have noticed that the less willing the Court of Justice to loosen up the constraints in regard of the locus standi for non-privileged applicants, the more generous it seems to be towards the actual acts which can be amenable to judicial review. Be it for the reasons of democracy and rule of law or for the broadening of its competences, it is apparent that the Court is following this path.
This post shall provide a concise view on one of such cases, namely the recent judgment of the Grand Chamber of the Court of Justice in case C-261/13 P Schönberger v Parliament, where the Court assessed the decisions adopted by the Petitions Committee of the European Parliament (Parliament), by which a petition is either found admissible and further processed or declared inadmissible, in view of the possibility to challenge such decisions before the EU Courts.

At the very end of the year 2014, we marked exactly five years since the Lisbon treaty entered into force. Be it for the considerable impact on the functioning of the EU or for political reasons, some of the changes the Lisbon treaty introduced to the founding treaties required a postponed application in the form of certain transitional provisions. And since by 1 December 2014, a majority of these transitional measures had already expired, now might be the right time to have a look at those parts which the Lisbon treaty was waiting to fully reveal.
The present post shall therefore focus on those amendments foreseen under the Lisbon treaty that became applicable as from the end of the last year, with a view to listing them, describing their substance, and providing a further consideration on the impact these new amendments might have had on the functioning of the EU.

El concepto de federalismo tiene larga trayectoria en las relaciones internacionales y en la política. Con origen, en sus postulados modernos, en la configuración estatal de los Estados Unidos de América, ha sido aplicado en otros países de Europa. Esta misma estructura fue apuntada por Robert Schuman en su discurso en la «Salle de l'horloge» en 1950 para la constitución de una unidad europea. El resultado, la Unión Europea, se ha constituido como la formación federal más avanzada de entre las organizaciones regionales. Su estructura ha experimentado cambios en los últimos 20 años de existencia para adaptarse a los retos de la sociedad europea. En la actualidad, se enfrenta a problemas tales como los nacionalismos, la crisis económica, su propia estructura... En este contexto se plantea si una mayor federalización puede constituir una solución, y en su caso, cómo proceder a su organización.

Baden-Baden: Nomos, 2012. ISBN 978-3-8329-7853-2. --
Das Völkerrecht des beginnenden 21. Jahrhunderts steht nicht mehr im Dienst der Staatsräson, sondern des Gemeinwohls der internationalen Gemeinschaft, zu dessen zentralem Inhalt der Schutz der grundlegenden Rechte des Menschen geworden ist. Der Aufgaben- und Strukturwandel des Völkerrechts manifestiert sich in dessen Hierarchisierung, in der Stärkung der Pflichtenstellung des Individuums, im Zurücktreten des voluntativen Elements in der Begründung der Pflichten der Staaten sowie in der immer grösseren Rolle internationaler Organisationen.
Die Beiträge des Bandes werfen aus drei Perspektiven Schlaglichter auf die suprastaatliche Konstitutionalisierung. Untersucht werden Fragen der Legitimität, Effektivität und Kohärenz des Völkerrechts. Darüber hinaus umfasst der Band eine Forschungsbibliographie, die versucht, die Konstitutionalisierungsliteratur nach Hauptrichtungen und Gegenständen zu ordnen und damit den Zugang zu ihr zu erleichtern.
Der Band ist aus der Arbeit der von den Herausgebern geleiteten Arbeitsgruppe Völkerrecht des 3. Gesellschaftswissenschaftlichen Kollegs der Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes (2009-2011) hervorgegangen. Mit Beiträgen von: Svenja Ahlhaus, Tatjana Chionos, Sué González Hauck, Isabelle Haßfurther, Michael Wolfgang Müller, Markus Patberg, Bettina Rentsch, David Roth-Isigkeit, Julian Udich und Peter Zerrenner.

With this paper I expressed my point of view on the Ukrainian crisis, the events that led to it and the political decisions taken by either sides, West and East.
Evident changes unveil a new balance of powers between Western and Eastern countries, and a new political scenario to face within the 21st century. 
NOVEMBER 2014

Ghervas, Stella. 2014. “La paix par le droit, ciment de la civilisation en Europe? La perspective du siècle des Lumières,” in Penser l’Europe au XVIIIe siècle: Commerce, Civilisation, Empire, ed. Antoine Lilti and Céline Spector (Oxford: Voltaire Foundation), pp. 47-69.

Abstract / Résumé

Tout au long du dix-huitième siècle, des modèles théoriques novateurs (‘projets de paix perpétuelle’) ont été développés, afin de proposer une paix durable entre les Etats de l’Europe, qui soit une alternative à la fois à l’équilibre des puissances (générateur de guerres perpétuelles) et à un empire paneuropéen (‘monarchie universelle’). Cet article analyse trois conceptions parmi les plus significatives: celles de l’Abbé de Saint-Pierre, de Rousseau et de Kant. En particulier, comment ont-ils articulé la mise en œuvre d’un ordre politique pacifique avec le concept d’Europe et de ‘civilisation européenne’? Leurs points de vue divergent à ce sujet, mais la valeur de la paix transcende à chaque fois l’idée même de civilisation.
Ces écrits prospectifs se confrontent au système politique qui a suivi la chute de Napoléon en 1815, et particulièrement au traité de la Sainte-Alliance, qui s’inspira paradoxalement du plan de l’Abbé de Saint-Pierre.

του Γιούργκεν Χάμπερμας.
Απόσπασμα από το βιβλίο:
Δημοκρατία ή Καπιταλισμός. Η Ευρώπη σε Κρίση (Τόμος Α).
Habermas et al, Εισαγωγή στην ελληνική έκδοση: Γιώργος Β. Ριτζούλης
Επίκεντρο, 2014
ISBN 9789604585601
http://www.epikentro.gr/index.php?isbn=9789604585601