The European Parliament in Treaty Reform: Predefining IGCs through Interinstitutional Agreements

Abstract:  Despite the fact that Interinstitutional Agreements (IIAs) are an established part of the mass of informal and formal rules structuring EU decision-making and interinstitutional relations, there is as yet no common understanding of their role and functions in the institutional and legal system of the EU—neither in political science nor legal studies. Tracking the evolution of the European Parliament's competencies in three areas where IIAs figure prominently—comitology, legislative planning, and the establishment of procedures to hold the Commission accountable—this article seeks to show that the European Parliament strategically uses IIAs as instruments to wrest competencies from the Council and the Commission. Having no formal say in treaty reform, the European Parliament 'creates facts' through informal but politically binding IIAs hoping that, once established, it can achieve a later codification of its new rights at IGCs. Viewed this way, the analysis of the role of IIAs in Treaty Reform could help to explain a still under-researched puzzle in European integration theory, namely the incremental parliamentarisation of the institutional system of the EU over the last two decades.     

Codifying Temporary Stability? The Role of Interinstitutional Agreements in Budgetary Politics

Abstract:  The article analyses the potential of Interinstitutional Agreements (IIAs) for resolving conflicts in the field of EU budgetary policy. In the 1970s and 1980s, annual budgetary procedures were characterised by intense interinstitutional battles, mainly between the Council and the European Parliament. IIAs concluded during this period tried to clarify pertinent Treaty provisions, but proved to be insufficient to resolve budgetary conflicts stemming from the more general problem of the uneven allocation of budgetary and legislative power between the two institutions involved. It was not before the fundamental budgetary reform in 1988—agreed upon by the European Council and implemented through an IIA along with the gradually increased role in legislative politics granted to European Parliament through several Treaty amendments—that budgetary stability—arrived. Hence, IIAs can be regarded as an improper means to solve profound constitutional problems. Yet, they can be considered as suitable tools to arrange technical details.     

Sub-Constitutional Engineering: Negotiation, Content, and Legal Value of Interinstitutional Agreements in the EU

Abstract:  This article analyses the roles and impact of Interinstitutional Agreements (IIAs) in the EU, taking into account their relationship to primary law. Concretely speaking, these roles range from (a) explicitly authorised specifications of Treaty provisions via (b) not explicitly authorised specifications of vague Treaty law to (c) pure political undertaking. Based on the distinction between the constitutional and the operational level of the political game, we challenge the assumption that IIAs usually strengthen the European Parliament. As our case study, the 1993 interrelated package of IIAs on democracy, transparency and subsidiarity, illustrates, the European Parliament is not the only institution that benefits from IIAs, especially if they lack a sufficiently precise Treaty basis. Furthermore, if Treaty provisions underlying IIAs are precise, they also tend to produce precise and thus legally relevant content. Conversely, if IIAs deal primarily with elusive concepts they are likely to be legally ambiguous or even irrelevant at all.     

Settlement Agreements: The European Perspective

Key points. This note provides a brief consideration of pasttreatment of settlement agreements in Europe and a considerationof the underlying rationale for scrutinizing such agreementsunder EC competition law. It suggests that a reason for lessfocus by the authorities in Europe than in the US is the generalinterest of the parties in keeping the details of such agreementsconfidential, combined with a lack of any obligation to notifythe authorities. Practical significance. Companies should be reminded of thepossible application of the EC rules to patent settlement agreementsat a time when the Commission has shown a renewed willingnessto review conduct relating to IP and when national authoritiessuch as the OFT have reiterated a willingness to get to gripswith conduct that delays generic entry.     

Power in Paradise: The Political Implications of Santos's Utopia

When we are planning for posterity, we ought to remember that virtue is not hereditary.
—Thomas Paine, Common Sense
Common sense creates the folklore of the future, a relatively rigidified phase of popular knowledge in a given time and place.
Antonio Gramsci, Selections     

The Design of International Agreements

States entering into international agreements have at theirdisposal several tools to enhance the strength and credibilityof their commitments, including the ability to make the agreementa formal treaty rather than soft law, provide for mandatorydispute resolution procedures, and establish monitoring mechanisms.Each of these strategies – referred to as ‘designelements’ – increases the costs associated withthe violation of an agreement and, therefore, the probabilityof compliance. Yet even a passing familiarity with internationalagreements makes it clear that states routinely fail to includethese design elements in their agreements. This article explainswhy rational states sometimes prefer to draft their agreementsin such a way as to make them less credible and, therefore,more easily violated. In contrast to domestic law, where contractualviolations are sanctioned through zero-sum payments from thebreaching party to the breached-against party, sanctions forviolations of international agreements are not zero-sum. Tothe extent that sanctions exist, they almost always representa net loss to the parties. For example, a reputational lossfelt by the violating party yields little or no offsetting benefitto its counter-party. When entering into an agreement, then,the parties take into account the possibility of a violationand recognize that if it takes place, the net loss to the partieswill be larger if credibility-enhancing measures are in place.In other words, the design elements offer a benefit in the formof greater compliance, but do so by increasing the cost to theparties in the event of a violation. When deciding which designelements to include, the parties must then balance the benefitsof increased compliance against the costs triggered in the eventof a violation.     

试论WTO反倾销协议的完善

近年来,面对反倾销法的使用出现了被滥用的现状,对反倾销法的探讨已经深入到整套制度的合理与否与发展趋势。完善各国的反倾销法律最根本的出路还在于国际社会的统一行动。文章分析了WTO反倾销协议的改革路径,指出比较现实的途径是对现行的WTO反倾销规则进行修改。修改国际反倾销法应该切实遵循以下原则:1.限制反倾销措施的使用;2.促进公平竞争;3.提高法律的确定性和可预见性;4.考虑发展中国家的需要。在这些原则的指导下,作者对修改反倾销协议提出了具体的建议。     

The Impropriety of Plea Agreements: A Tale of Two Counties

In this article, the author, a former prosecutor and a former assistant public defender, draws on his five and a half years of experience as a "professional plea bargainer" to explore the many subtleties of a practice that he suggests leads to work avoidance, misplaced loyalties, coercion, and other negative characteristics on the part of courthouse regulars, and to injustice for those criminal defendants who do not wish to plead guilty. He suggests that criminal courts have become overly dependent on plea bargaining, which is used much more extensively than is either necessary or appropriate.     

The Democratic Costs of Constitutionalisation: The European Case

There is little doubt that the European Union suffers from a legitimacy deficit. However, the causes of this deficit and, as a consequence, the remedies are contested. This article wants to show that an important, but often overlooked, cause for the legitimacy deficit lies in the overconstitutionalization of the EU. The European Treaties have been constitutionalized by the ECJ, but are full of provisions that would be ordinary law in states. Constitutionalization means de‐politicization. What has been regulated on the constitutional level is no longer open for political decision‐making. Thus, in the EU political decisions of high salience are not only withdrawn from the democratically legitimized institutions, but also immunized against political correction. Therefore, the consequences from the constitutionalization have to be drawn: The Treaties should be reduced to those norms that reflect the functions of a constitution, whereas all the other parts have to be downgraded to the level of secondary law.     

人民本位:马克思主义民主话语的立论前提

马克思主义的民主话语坚持"人民本位",拒斥"个人本位",但它决不是将个人消弭在人民的普遍性概念之中,而是有着对个人本位民主话语的清醒认识。它既看到后者对个人自由的守护,也看到它固有缺陷对个人自由的限度。首先,作为存在论前提,人民本位规定了马克思主义民主话语不仅要求人民的"在场",更强调人民的"出场"。其次,作为本质论前提,坚持人民本位的民主话语实现的是分属于不同家庭、阶层与社群中的人民的"有机团结",即有差异的同一。最后,作为目的论前提,坚持人民本位的民主话语是要解决个体与类,特殊利益与普遍利益的历史性矛盾,以实现人在自由人联合体中的彻底解放。关于马克思主义民主话语立论前提的讨论,有助于当代中国的民主政治建设贯彻以人民为中心的理念。     

The Oslo Accords: International Law and the Israeli-Palestine Peace Agreements

Netherlands International Law Review -