European Constitutionalism And Fundamental Rights

Timetable

Module aim (aims)

The course aims at providing students with knowledge on the transformation of the European constitutional order especially when it comes to the EU constitutionalism but also the Council of Europe human rights protection mechanism.

If focuses on the issue of fundamental rights as one of the most important but at the same time very delicate dimension of the European public order. The course analyses complicated relations between the EU, its Member States and the system of European Convention of Human Rights.

It attempts at exploring the current debate on the European fundamental rights protection regime as a field of advancing convergence but also to some extent a field divergence in fundamental rights protection standards and mechanisms as well as tries to put it into theoretical frames spread between doctrines of constitutional pluralism and constitutional monism/patriotism.

The course also aims at developing students’ skills in reading and analysing legal texts and case law as well as giving them a chance to gain some practical skills in legal argumentation and discussion during specially designed activities which will include: presentations, group discussions as well possibly an Oxford Union style debate or a moot court activity.

Pre-requisites in terms of knowledge, skills and social competences (where relevant)

Background knowledge of basic concepts in EU law, Human Rights Law and Constitutional Law is necessary.

Students should know and understand the main principles of EU law, Human Rights Law and Constitutional Law (which may be tested at the begining of the course as an entry condition).

Students should also have at least basic skills in reading and understanding legal acts and case law.

Syllabus

Week 1: Human Rights Law – basic concepts and principles: universality of human rights, human dignity, the post-War positivization; principle of proportionality
Week 2: Council of Europe system and the European Convention of Human Rights
Week 3: ECHR as a “constitutional instrument of European public order”
Week 4: ECHR and its interpretation: between activism and self-restraint
Week 5: EU and CoE: “Twins separated at birth”
Week 6: EU – from economic community to fundamental rights based community
Week 7: EU Charter of Fundamental Rights – the European Bill of Rights?
Week 8: EU and its Member States in the field of fundamental rights: the third wave of the sovereignty dispute
Week 9: Constitutional identity and the EU Member States’ constitutional courts resistance against the CJEU and its ambitions in the field of fundamental rights
Week 10: EU constitutionalism: constitutional pluralism or constitutional monism/patriotism on the European level?
Week 11: The EU accession to the ECHR
Week 12: EU, EU law and its status under the ECHR
Week 13: European multilevel constitutionalism and triangular relations between the ECtHR, CJEU and domestic courts in the field of human rights
Week 14: Presentations/debate/moot court (or spread through each week class)
Week 15: Revisit and discussion of the key concepts introduced during the course: UE’s particular constitutionalism in the light of classical constitutionalism and its characteristics

Reading list

Basic readings:

- P. Craig, G. de Búrca, EU law: text, cases, and materials, OUP 2024;
- J. Habermas, Why Europe Needs a Constitution, New Left Review, vol. 11 (2001);
- J. Jaraczewski, W. Jóźwicki, Z. Kędzia, The EU’s engagement with the Council of Europe and the OSCE (in:) J. Wouters, M. Nowak, A-L. Chané, N. Hachez (eds.), The European Union and Human Rights: Law and Policy, OUP 2019;
- W.  Jóźwicki, Ultra vires and constitutional identity control – apples and oranges or two drops of water?: Some remarks on the possible role of the New Mixed Chamber of the Court of Justice in the context of the “sequential” model of adjudication on art. 4(2) TEU, VerfBlog, 2020/6/15, https://verfassungsblog.de/ultra-vires-and-constitutional-identity-control-apples-and-oranges-or-two-drops-of-water/,
- S. Peers, T. Hervey, J. Kenner, A. Ward, The EU Charter of Fundamental Rights A Commentary, OUP 2021;
- D. Sarmiento, J.H.H. Weiler, The EU Judiciary After Weiss: Proposing A New Mixed Chamber of the Court of Justice, VerfBlog, 2020/6/02, https://verfassungsblog.de/the-eu-judiciary-after-weiss/
- W. Schabas, The European Convention on Human Rights: A Commentary, OUP 2015;
- K. Tuori, European constitutionalism, CUP 2015;
- K. Nicolaidis, We, the Peoples of Europe..., Foreign Affairs, vol. 83, no: 6;
- J.H.H. Weiler, The Constitution of Europe: "Do the New Clothes Have an Emperor?" and Other Essays on European Integration, CUP 1999;
- JHHW [J. H. H. Weiler] (Editorial), Lautsi: Crucifix in the Classroom Redux, European Journal of International Law, vol. 21 no. 1 (2010);

Additional reading materials and case law will be provided during the course.