Polish civil judges as European Union law judges: knowledge, experiences and attitudes

The study seeks to provide a better understanding of the way civil judges of lower courts in Poland – a relatively new Member States of the EU - behave in the context of EU law and, moreover, to explain how the national judges adapt to the new legal circumstances created by the law of the European Union. For that purpose, the study examines the way national judges approach the law of the European Union by providing empirical, that is to say quantitative and qualitative data gathered among Polish private law judges of lower courts. The respective data was collected by means of a questionnaire distributed among the respective judges and semi-structured in-depth interviews conducted with them. The present study is a descriptive attempt at evaluating and explaining what is actually happening in the Polish civil courts in the context of EU law application and more precisely how and why national judges participate in the process of legal integration within the European Union. For the foregoing purpose, the study focuses on three a priori established set of problems which relate to the knowledge of EU law and of the mechanisms of its application among national judges, the daily experiences of judges with the application of EU law and their personal attitudes towards the law of the European Union and the new role it imposes on them and the Union itself. The three clusters of variables are scrutinized in a broader institutional and operational legal context of the daily judicial functioning. In that sense, the study first establishes the formal, legal context in which the judges function and respectively it focuses on the way judges personally construct the EU legality, the way they perceive and understand their function as EU law judges and the way they experience the law of the European Union in the daily practice. By and large, the book offers a contextual and nuanced approach to the problem of operation of EU law in the national legal order

Economic and non-economic values and objectives in the EU’s international trade: Normative tensions, actors and processes

This Europe and the World: A law review special issue comprises selected papers presented at a RENFORCE workshop on the theme of tensions between the EU’s trade and non-economic values, held at Utrecht University in November 2017. The symposium addresses normative dilemmas underlying the EU’s trade law and policy. Normative dilemmas subsist between, on the one hand, the EU’s basic pursuit of its commercial interests and trade liberalization, and, on the other hand, the EU’s mandate to promote and safeguard a number of non-economic values, including human rights and sustainable development. The journal symposium aims to unveil normative tensions existing in the EU’s trade and investment policy, and understand some of the key actors and processes through which normative tensions are created and also mitigated. While the tensions between economic and non-economic values in the EU’s trade law and policy have been extensively discussed in literature, the present symposium highlights some of the recent developments in the EU’s trade relations, analyses not only human rights but also sustainable development, and examines the impact of new technologies

The Role of National Courts in the Process of Legal Integration in the European Union: Retrospective and Prospective

The functioning of national courts as decentralized EU courts has been and will likely remain one of the most constitutive, complex, and intriguing aspects of the process of integration in the European Union. The fact that the law of the European Union can directly affect interests of individuals in the EU, and may be invoked and relied upon by them before national courts, which are in turn obliged to protect the rights individuals derive from EU law, have tremendous implications for the functioning of national judiciaries, and can hardly be overstated. It is the aim of this contribution to briefly look at the development of the role national courts play in the process of legal integration within the EU and, consequently, provide several reflections on the preconditions which seem necessary for the proper fulfillment of the tasks that national judges are assigned by the law of the European Union

The Role of National Courts in the Process of Legal Integration in the European Union: Retrospective and Prospective

The functioning of national courts as decentralized EU courts has been and will likely remain one of the most constitutive, complex, and intriguing aspects of the process of integration in the European Union. The fact that the law of the European Union can directly affect interests of individuals in the EU, and may be invoked and relied upon by them before national courts, which are in turn obliged to protect the rights individuals derive from EU law, have tremendous implications for the functioning of national judiciaries, and can hardly be overstated. It is the aim of this contribution to briefly look at the development of the role national courts play in the process of legal integration within the EU and, consequently, provide several reflections on the preconditions which seem necessary for the proper fulfillment of the tasks that national judges are assigned by the law of the European Union

Defending the Rule of Law or Reality Based Self-defense? A New Polish Chapter in the Story of Judicial Cooperation in the EU

In the course of the last two years, the Polish courts frequently resorted to the procedure of preliminary ruling requesting the Court of Justice to qualify the Polish judiciary reforms introduced by the PIS-regime in the light of the principle of judicial independence, the rule of law and effective judicial protection. Against this backdrop, one could suggest that the issue regarding the use of the preliminary ruling mechanism by national courts and the reasons that incentivise the judges to engage in dialogue with the Court of Justice have gained a novel dimension. It is the aim of this Article to discuss the relevant preliminary questions referred by the Polish courts and place them in the context of various theoretical streams that aim at explaining the reasons and motivation behind national courts’ participation in judicial dialogue with the Luxembourg Court

Prejudiciële vragen over de geldigheid van EU-handelingen en effectieve rechtsbescherming: Eurobolt-arrest.

In juli 2019 heeft het Hof van Justitie uitspraak gedaan in de zaak Eurobolt BV. Het verzoek om een prejudiciële beslissing is ingediend door de Hoge Raad in een nationale procedure die door Eurobolt is aangespannen in reactie op de heffing van antidumpingrechten. Dit arrest van het Hof van Justitie is zeer relevant voor het stelsel van rechtsbescherming in de EU in het kader van rechterlijke toetsing van geldigheid van EU-recht. De kernvraag in deze zaak is of een nationale rechter informatie van EU-instellingen kan opvragen om de mogelijke ongeldigheid van een EU-handeling nader te onderzoeken. In dit artikel worden de uitspraak van het Hof van Justitie en de gevolgen daarvan voor het functioneren van nationale rechters geëvalueerd in de context van het EU-recht en met name de prejudiciële procedure