EU Enlargement

The studies, debates and suggestions collected in this work are the result of an international conference on European Law held in September 2000, organized by the T.M.C. Asser Institute in The Hague, in cooperation with the Constitutional and Legal Policy Institute COLPI, Budapest, Hungary. The subject of the conference concerned the impact of the enlargement of the European Union on the constitutional provisions of both levels of legal order: the national and the European level. At the National level, enlargement will, most likely, contribute in many candidate countries to constitutional modernization and fundamental changes. Constitutional provisions have to be regulated and adjusted before accession. Provisions of national constitutions contrary to or contradicting the acquis communautaire have to be amended. National courts interpreting these constitutions (living constitutions) will play a new important independent role as community courts. After accession these national courts of the candidate countries should accept and apply the principles of direct effect, direct applicability and supremacy of community law. At the EU level reorganization and simplification of the Treaties as well as reform of the EC=s institutions (European Parliament, Council, Commission and European Court of Justice) should increase the effectiveness of the legal order of the Union. The contributions in this Volume are grouped around five major themes: i. the European architecture, i.e., the constitutional order and the Charter of Fundamental Rights; ii. the impact of enlargement on constitutions and courts of EU Member States; iii. the impact of enlargement on the constitutions and courts of the candidate countries; iv. the IGC and future perspectives for the European architecture; and v. the practical implementation of the challenges of accession. The contributors, coming from Member States as well as all candidate countries, are representatives and legal experts from national governments, from the EC Institutions, the national judiciary and the academic world (European and constitutional law). The contributions are preceded by a Report on the Conference and followed by Conclusions and Summing up of the Conference. The Annexes include, a.o., documents from the European Council of Nice (December 2000), such as the `Protocol and Declaration of Enlargement', `Declaration on the Future of the Union' and the `Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union'. This book is essential and vital as background information for the broad discussion which will start on the basis of the `Declaration on the Future of the Union' from the European Council of Nice (December 2000), and which process of debates will continue with appropriate initiatives after the `Declaration of Laeken' from the Belgian Presidency (December 2001) till the new Conference of the Representatives of the Governments of the Member States, to be convened in 2004.