The Effect of WTO Dispute Settlement Rulings in the EC Legal Order: Reviewing Van Parys v Belgische Interventie- en Restitutiebureau (C-377/02)

2005 ◽  
Vol 6 (6) ◽  
pp. 1025-1032
Author(s):  
Delphine De Mey
Keyword(s):  
Dispute Settlement ◽  
National Court ◽  
Legal Order ◽  
European Court Of Justice ◽  
Court Of Justice ◽  
Wto Dispute Settlement ◽  
European Court ◽  
The Right ◽  
Community Legal Order

On 1 March 2005, the European Court of Justice (hereinafter ‘ECJ’ or ‘the Court’) got another opportunity to rule on the effect of recommendations and decisions of the WTO Dispute Settlement Body (hereinafter ‘DSB’) in the Community legal order. The ECJ concluded that an individual does not have the right to challenge, before a national court, the incompatibility of Community measures with WTO rules, even if the DSB had previously declared the Community legislation to be incompatible with those rules.

Indirect Discrimination: Interpreting Seymour-Smith

1999 ◽  
Vol 58 (2) ◽  
pp. 399-412 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catherine Barnard ◽  
Bob Hepple
Keyword(s):  
National Court ◽  
European Court Of Justice ◽  
Preliminary Ruling ◽  
Service Employees ◽  
Community Law ◽  
Court Of Justice ◽  
European Court ◽  
Continuous Service ◽  
Indirect Discrimination ◽  
The Right

THE preliminary ruling by the European Court of Justice in the Seymour-Smith and Perez case about the scope and meaning of indirect discrimination has done little to clarify this perplexing concept. The ruling does not tell the thousands of short-service employees whose claims were stayed pending the litigation whether the qualifying period of two years’ continuous service for the right not to be unfairly dismissed is contrary to Community law. Nor does it provide clear standards by which disparate impact is to be tested, nor the relevant time for assessing the legality of an allegedly discriminatory measure, nor the conditions for establishing objective justification. More generally, these proceedings under Article 177 (now Article 234) of the EC Treaty reveal a failure by the Court to perform its function of facilitating the national court in interpreting and applying Community equality law in a way which would be consistent and uniform throughout the Union.

The Compatibility of Investment Arbitration in eu Trade Agreements with the eu Judicial System

2016 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 46-63 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dr. Laurens Ankersmit
Keyword(s):  
Dispute Settlement ◽  
Trade Agreements ◽  
Legal Order ◽  
European Court Of Justice ◽  
Court System ◽  
Foreign Investors ◽  
Investment Arbitration ◽  
Court Of Justice ◽  
European Court ◽  
The Eu

This article explores the legality of investment arbitration in eu trade agreements under eu law. Investor-state dispute settlement (isds), including the Investment Court System, allows foreign investors to challenge eu acts and decisions before investment tribunals and these tribunals may be faced with questions of eu law. Since this system of dispute resolution operates entirely outside the eu judicial framework and rivals with it, the powers of the courts of the Member States and that of the European Court of Justice may be adversely affected. This in turn could affect the uniform interpretation and effectiveness of eu law and the autonomy of the eu legal order.

Centros Ltd—A Complete U-Turn in the Right of Establishment for Companies?

2000 ◽  
Vol 49 (3) ◽  
pp. 621-642 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne Looijestijn-Clearie
Keyword(s):  
United Kingdom ◽  
Member State ◽  
European Court Of Justice ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Court Of Justice ◽  
European Court ◽  
Registered Office ◽  
Set Up ◽  
The Right ◽  
A Company

InCentros Ltd and Erhvers-og Selskabsstyrelesen (hereinafter Centros),1 the European Court of Justice ruled that it is contrary to Article 52 (now Article 432) and Article 58 (now Article 48) of the EC Treaty for the authorities of a member State (in casu Denmark) to refuse to register a branch of a company formed under the law of another member State (in casu the United Kingdom) in which it has its registered office, even if the company concerned has never conducted any business in the latter State and intends to carry out its entire business in the State in which the branch is to be set up. By avoiding the need to form a company there it would thus evade the application of the rules governing the provision for and the paying-up of a minimum share capital in force in that State. According to the Court, this does not, however, prevent the authorities of the member State in which the branch is to be set up from adopting appropriate measures for preventing or penalising fraud, either with regard to the company itself, if need be in co-operation with the member State in which it was formed, or with regard to its members, where it has been determined that they are in fact attempting, by means of the formation of a company, to evade their obligations towards creditors established in the territory of the member State of the branch.

Judges and Policy Making Authority in the United States and the European Union

ICL Journal ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Antonios E. Kouroutakis
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
Legal System ◽  
The United States ◽  
Legal Order ◽  
European Court Of Justice ◽  
Judicial Activism ◽  
Court Of Justice ◽  
European Court ◽  
The Us ◽  
Us Supreme Court

AbstractInstitutions such as the US Supreme Court and the European Court of Justice in due time have developed a status of supremacy through judicial activism. The main target of the article is to identify the judicial activism exercised by these Courts and to reason its need in the legal order. In the first part the US Supreme Court and the European Court of Justice are placed in the overall polity that they belong to and the development of their status and their characteristics are analyzed. The major concern of the first part is to examine how those declared their supremacy and focus on major cases and their reason­ing.In the second part the extent of the judicial supremacy in each legal order is discussed and its effects in the decision making process are examined. The assumption that judicial activ­ism is acceptable only if it expresses consensus in the legal order is tested and it is argued that up to an extent, Judicial Activism does not distort the political agenda when it ex­presses the consensus of the legal system. Finally, it is argued that when such activism exceeds the boundaries of the consensus, the other actors in the legal system would even­tually react and would limit such activism.

scholarly journals GUARANTEE OF THE RIGHT TO SILENCE AND OF THE RIGHT NOT TO CONTRIBUTE TO ONE’S OWN INCRIMINATION IN ROMANIAN CRIMINAL PROCEDURE LAW

2018 ◽  
Vol 2 (83) ◽  
pp. 25
Author(s):  
Carmen Adriana Domocos
Keyword(s):  
Freedom Of Expression ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Fair Trial ◽  
European Court Of Justice ◽  
European Convention ◽  
Criminal Offence ◽  
Court Of Justice ◽  
European Court ◽  
Right To Silence ◽  
The Right

The Romanian legislation establishes in the new penal procedure law the right to silence and the right of non-incrimination of the defendant in the criminal trial.The right to silence (to remain silent) is the implicit procedural guarantee of the right to a fair trial, which results from the case law of the European Court of Justice within the meaning of Article 6 paragraph 1 of the European Convention on Human Rights, according to which judicial authorities cannot oblige a perpetrator (suspected of having committed a criminal offence), a suspect or a defendant to make statements, while having, however, a limited power to draw conclusions against them, from their refusal to make statements.Therefore, the right to silence involves not only the right not to testify against oneself, but also the right of the suspect or defendant not to incriminate oneself. The suspect or defendant cannot be compelled to assist in the production of evidence and cannot be sanctioned for failing to provide certain documents or other evidence. Obligation to testify against personal will, under the constraint of a fine or any other form of coercion constitutes an interference with the negative aspect of the right to freedom of expression which must be necessary in a democratic Romanian society.The right not to contribute to one’s own incrimination (the privilege against self-incrimination) is the implicit procedural guarantee of the right to a fair trial, which results from the case law of the European Court of Justice within the meaning of Article 6 paragraph 1 of the European Convention, according to which judicial bodies or any other state authority cannot oblige a perpetrator (suspected of having committed a criminal offence), a suspect, a defendant or a witness to cooperate by providing evidence which might incriminate him or which could constitute the basis for a new criminal charge. It is essential to clarify certain issues as far as this right is concerned.

The CETA Opinion of the European Court of Justice and its Implications—Not that Selfish After All

2019 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 503-521 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian Riffel
Keyword(s):  
Dispute Settlement ◽  
Trade Agreement ◽  
European Court Of Justice ◽  
Court System ◽  
Eu Law ◽  
Investment Protection ◽  
Constitutional Principle ◽  
Court Of Justice ◽  
European Court ◽  
The Eu

Abstract In Opinion 1/17, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) found the investment court system compatible with European Union (EU) law. The ruling concerned the mechanism in the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) but the Court’s reasoning is equally applicable to other investment courts as established, for example, in the EU’s investment protection agreements with Singapore and Vietnam. This outcome was far from clear, given that in the past the accession to international dispute settlement bodies regularly foundered on the autonomy of the EU legal order. The present article parses the CETA Opinion and explores its implications. It particularly focuses on autonomy as a constitutional principle and its advancement in Opinion 1/17. Importantly, the ECJ accepted the superiority of a court created by international agreement in relation to the said agreement. Furthermore, it clarified that it is not prerequisite for the Court to rule first on the meaning to be given to an act of EU law before that act can be the subject matter of an investment dispute. Finally, the pdrerogative of the EU to autonomously set the level of protection of a public welfare goal must be secured in a treaty for the EU to join it.

The European Court of Justice and the EC External Trade Relations: A Legal Analysis of the Court's Problems with Regard to International Agreements

2003 ◽  
Vol 72 (2) ◽  
pp. 215-251 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rafael Leal-Arcas
Keyword(s):  
Dispute Settlement ◽  
International Agreements ◽  
Legal Analysis ◽  
External Trade ◽  
Intergovernmental Organization ◽  
Trade Relations ◽  
Court Of Justice ◽  
Wto Dispute Settlement ◽  
European Court ◽  
Article 50

AbstractThis article explains why the WTOand the various agreements that form an integral part of the Agreement establishing the WTO raise problems and challenges for the Court of Justice of the European Communities (ECJ). It focuses on the role of the ECJ in relation to exclusive and shared competence. The European Community's (EC) specific problems and challenges for the ECJ are partly related to the EC's position in the WTO. In this sense, the opinion of Advocate General Tesauro in Hermès International v. FHT Marketing Choice is helpful for understanding the unitary character of the EC's external trade relations. This article includes a discussion of Hermès v. FHT Marketing concerning the interpretation of Article 50 of the Agreement on TRIPS, annexed to the 1994 Agreement establishing the WTO. The new mechanisms introduced by the WTO Dispute Settlement Understanding are perhaps not comparable to the full judicial system within the EU, but they have changed both the rules and the legal culture concerning the adjudication and enforcement obligations. Although the WTO is still an intergovernmental organization, powerful private actors have already learned to manipulate the system to reach legal adjudication under the guise of intergovernmental disputes. This paper concludes that the EC wants to deny 'direct effect' to the WTO. This article offers the conclusion that we must aim at the creation of new standards to judge the applicability of international agreements. Otherwise, by allowing policy makers to decide rather than ECJ, the EC legal order may be at risk.

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