European Law Journal最新文献

In recent years, the European Union Agency for Asylum (EUAA) has been variously involved in the decision-making processes of national authorities deciding on individual asylum applications. In spite of its capability of affecting national asylum procedures and the circumstances in which they are carried out, holding EUAA accountable for its action is prevented by the lack of clear allocations of tasks and the consequent inadequacy of the judicial remedies available. By analysing and comparing the main role played by the Agency in Italy and Malta, this article sheds some light on the different problems of effective judicial protection, which vary and arise differently depending on the tasks performed by EUAA in each national legal system.

Next to the rule of law ‘crises’ within Member States, a new facet of this rule of law crisis is emerging at the external borders of the EU, and sees the EU border agency Frontex as its epicentre. This article illustrates the multiple facets of this crisis which concerns Frontex's functioning and activities, discussing a form of ‘agency capture’ that occurred under the mandate of the former Executive Director and a legal framework ensuring limited monitoring and transparency on operations. Subsequently, the article delves into the constitutional meaning of the rule of law for an agency such as Frontex, both for its significance on relations between authorities and individuals and for the interplay between the rule of law and accountability. The article concludes by calling for a rethinking of the accountability instruments in place, to constrain more effectively the exercise of discretion by agencies.

This article analyses to what extend the rapid growth of Frontex has been accompanied by adequate democratic accountability, whereby the author draws on her experiences as a Member of Parliament. She elaborates on the safeguards in legislation but also on their application in practice, with a focus on the lessons the Parliament learned from its own inquiry on the role of Frontex in pushbacks. The contribution subsequently puts democratic control to a test on two relatively recent tasks of Frontex: return and external cooperation. Regarding the latter, the Parliament's role is highlighted in the negotiations on the Frontex status agreements between the EU and Mauritania/Senegal. The article answers the question of what obstacles must be overcome, through legislative amendments or changes in practice and culture, for the Parliament to exercise its role effectively. Two of these factors are dealt with more prominently: transparency and cooperation with national parliaments.

The essay deals with the enhancement of the legal framework for informal readmissions at internal borders enshrined in the proposal on an amended Schengen Border Code, which in turn requires enhancement of bilateral police cooperation. It focuses on the impact of the new rules on the prohibition on police controls equivalent to border checks to highlight that the case-law of the Court of Justice on the matter creates a huge grey area which is critical for the ideal of a border-check-free Union. Increased use of video surveillance and other technologies also faces the legal bottleneck of prohibition on police controls having equivalent effects to border checks, as well as raising serious concerns on fundamental rights. It is argued that the situation resulting from these amendments to the Schengen Border Code should be considered in terms of an impending rule of law crisis at internal borders. [Correction added on 19 July 2024 after first online publication: The Abstract section was previously omitted and has been included in this version.]

Access to justice depends on the ability of the person who is alleging a breach of human rights to establish to a credible extent the facts of the case. Where the individual is unable to provide supporting documentation about the facts, the claims are likely to be found inadmissible, or at least the defendant's lawyers are likely to seek to have the case dismissed on the basis of no case to answer. The transnational nature of state authorities' violence in external border controls (border violence) complicates the ability of victims to establish what has actually happened. Indeed, victims are often on one side of the border and those seeking to assist them on the other, while border police themselves are most reluctant to assist in establishing facts which may result in liability for themselves. This article examines how the EU can establish effective monitoring mechanisms with the competence to investigate allegations of state agencies' border violence building on existing structures.

Does the emergence of the European Union (EU) disrupt the frames of reference of the contemporary history of Europe to such an extent that historians distrust it? It would seem that methodological Euroscepticism exists. European integration arouses scepticism among some in the community of historians of contemporary Europe, since the conceptual underpinnings of that history cannot in themselves account for European integration. This billet expresses, more than a word of caution, a call for enhanced dialogue on the EU as an object of study among the different strands of historical studies and different disciplines. On the one hand, some of the analyses provided by historical studies on contemporary Europe constitute a fertile source for the study and understanding of European integration, notably in the field of history. Using them can stimulate the development in the European studies field of new concepts, new representations and new hypotheses for grasping the EU as a reality and a comparatively new object of academic interest. On the other hand, the critical study of the EU conducted in the specific field of the history of the EU questions and sheds a new light on the analytical categories of contemporary European history. In this regard, the fruitful interaction between history, political geography, law and political science can enrich contemporary European history. Interdisciplinary studies on European integration notably enable us to decentre notions of sovereignty, territory and democracy, which have classically taken the nation state as their reference in broad explanatory narratives of contemporary European history. Research mutualisation would offer all the potential interpretative and analytical benefits of the conceptual and methodological rethink of our various disciplines and of European integration as an object of study.