Table of contents
1 What Constitution?;
A Rose by Any Other Name;
2 An Elephant That Cannot Be Defined? What the EU Is, and Is Not;
A. Introduction;
B. Historical Development;
C. The Union Today;
D. State-like Features;
E. Non-state-like Features;
3 Marking the Territory: Principles Governing Union Competences;
A. Introduction;
B. Basic Treaty Provisions on Competence;
C. Articles 114 and 352 TFEU;
D. The Principle of Subsidiarity;
4 Who Is the Boss? In Search of a Master of the Treaties;
A. Introduction;
B. Procedures for Amending the Treaties;
C. Creeping Competences?;
D. The Ties that Bind;
5 Looking Past the Trees to See the Wood: Construing a Hierarchy of Norms;
A. Introduction;
B. Foundations of the Union Legal Order;
C. Primary Law;
D. International Law;
E. Secondary Law and other Acts of the Institutions;
6 Into the Estuaries and up the Rivers: Union Law in the National Legal Orders of the Member States;
A. Introduction;
B. Primacy;
C. Conformity through Interpretation;
D. Direct Applicability and Direct Effect;
7 A Lot More than Brussels Bureaucrats: The Institutional Framework;
A. Introduction;
B. The Union's Institutions;
C. Union Regulatory and Administrative Bodies;
D. Institutions and Bodies of the Member States;
8 A Suprematist Composition? Differentiation and Flexibility;
A. Introduction;
B. Differentiation in Primary Law;
C. Enhanced Cooperation;
9 What Deficit? The EU System of Democracy;
A. Introduction;
B. General Considerations;
C. The Political Institutions;
D. Participatory, Deliberative and Substantive Democracy;
10 Civis Europeus Sum: The Evolving Concept of Union Citizenship;
A. Introduction;
B. Pie in the Sky?;
C. Who is a Union Citizen?
D. The Right to Move and Reside;
E. From Movement to Citizenship and Beyond;
11 Taking Rights More Seriously? The EU System of Fundamental Rights;
A. Introduction;
B. Field of Application;
C. Sources and Material Scope;
D. Non-discrimination;
E. Direct Effect;
12 Broadening Horizons? The Area of Freedom, Security and Justice;
A. Introduction;
B. Border Checks, Asylum and Immigration;
C. Judicial Cooperation in Civil Matters;
D. Judicial Cooperation in Criminal Matters;
E. Police Cooperation;
13 The Internal Market: Liberal, Social, Green or Chameleon?;
A. Introduction;
B. The Economic Free Movement Rights;
C. The Social Dimension;
D. Environment;
14 Building a House by Starting with the Roof? Economic and Monetary Policy;
A. Introduction;
B. Monetary Policy;
C. Economic and Fiscal Surveillance;
D. The Stability Mechanisms;
E. Built to Last?;
15 An Elephant Trumpeting Loud and Clear or a Gaggle of Geese? EU External Relations;
A. Introduction;
B. Institutional Framework for External Action;
C. Union Competences and their Use;
D. The Union and the Member States;
E. Security and Defence;
16 Covenants of No Strength to Secure A Man At All? Issues of Enforcement and Control;
A. Introduction;
B. Control of Union Institutions and Bodies;
C. The Role of Member States' Courts and Authorities;
17 The Elephant in the Room? Concluding Remarks