Hungary – Taking Action, Episode 2: The Systemic Infringement Action
When EU member states as Hungary are breaching the fundamental values of the Union and violate their obligations from Art. 2 of the EU treaty, there is little the Union can do about it. Kim Lane Scheppele has made a proposal how to change that: The commission should be able to bring a systemic infringement action against such member states. We put Kim’s proposal up for debate and ask EU legal experts to comment.
Coming from such an established voice advocating the protection of rule of law at the national level, Kim Scheppele’s proposal definitely enjoys sufficient legitimacy to be taken very seriously. In what follows, I look at the “problem” of democracy (1.), the “problem” with bundling infringements (2.), the problem of determining the meaning of “values” (3.), and the problem with penalties (4.). I conclude that two problems are fictitious but two others are real.
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Can the values and objectives of the European Union really (or even at all) be systematically protected and ensured, not just on books but in practice, by legal means, and in particular by courts, let alone the supranational ones? I believe the answer is no.
Continue reading >>While I agree with Kim Scheppelle’s "systemic infringement action" proposal, I am not so sure that it can be accomplished under the existing legal authority. Or better put, the prevailing understanding of what EU Treaties allow the Commission to do requires a much deeper transformation of the Commission’s role than Scheppelle suggests.
Continue reading >>What can the European Union – and in particular the European Commission – do about Member States that no longer reliably play by the most fundamental European rules? The question is now urgent because several Member States are already posing such challenges. Treaty reform could give the Commission new powers. But can the Commission act without waiting for the long and arduous process of treaty reform to provide new tools? Kim Lane Scheppele proposes a new approach, a simple extension of an existing mechanism: the infringement action.
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Was kann die Europäische Union – und vor allem die Kommission - gegen Mitgliedsstaaten unternehmen, die sich nicht länger an die grundlegendsten europäischen Regeln halten? Die Frage drängt, weil bereits mehrere Mitgliedsstaaten uns bereits vor solche Herausforderungen stellen. Eine Vertragsreform könnte die Kommission stärken. Aber kann sie handeln, ohne abwarten zu müssen, bis sie nach einem langen und mühevollen Prozess der Vertragsreform neue Kompetenzen erhält? Kim Lane Scheppele schlägt einen neuen Ansatz vor, die schlichte Ausdehnung eines existierenden Mechanismus - des Vertragsverletzungsverfahrens.
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