The inside story of the daily work of lawyers in the EU institutions and their impact on EU policy making.

This edited collection examines the changing role of the legal profession as experts in the context of European Union policy-making. Drawing on theoretical and empirical research and the idea of law as a social and political practice, this socio-legal work brings together a group of legal scholars and political scientists to investigate how lawyers, through the deployment of their expertise and knowledge, act as experts in matters of EU related policy-making at the national, European and international levels. It provides new theoretical viewpoints and untold stories from legal experts themselves, promotes an evolving definition of what constitutes legal expertise and what shapes legal experts in a time when experts are in equal measure both revered and ignored, and introduces new critical voices in the field of EU socio-legal studies.

This book questions the theoretical premises and practical applications of transparency, showing both the promises and perils of transparency in a methodologically innovative way and in a cross-section of policy instruments. It scrutinizes transparency from three perspectives - methodologically, theoretically, and empirically - both in the specific context of the EU but also in the wider context of modern society in which transparency is embraced as an almost unquestionable virtue. This book examines the ways in which transparency practices can make institutions visible and stands out for its methodological self-reflection: to fully understand the irresistible call for transparency in our governing institutions, we must reflect on our own relationship with it. This book will be of key interest to scholars and students of transparency studies, democratic legitimacy, global governance, governance law, EU studies and law and public policy more widely.

Collegiality is a core legal principle of the European Commission's internal decision-making, acting as a safeguard to the Commission's supranational character and ensuring the Commission's independence from EU Member States. Despite collegiality's central role within the Commission, its legal and political implications have remained critically underexamined. Collegiality in the European Commission sheds light on this crucial aspect of the Commission's work for the first time. In this novel study on collegiality, Maria Patrin proposes an innovative framework for assessing the Commission's institutional role and power. The book's first part legally examines collegiality, retracing collegial procedures and actors in different layers of decision-making -- from the Commission's services to the College of Commissioners. The second part of the book explores the implementation of collegiality through illustrative case studies, focusing on various Commission functions including legislative initiative, infringement proceedings, and economic governance. Partin's empirical analysis unveils a disconnect between the legal notion of collegiality and its concrete application in institutional practices. These variations raise normative questions on how to ensure the unity of the Commission as a collegial body despite the diversification of decision-making functions. They also invite a re-examination of the Commission's multifaceted role in the current EU institutional, legal, and political setting. Adopting an interdisciplinary approach that delves into both the legal substance and the political-institutional practice of collegiality, this book offers a unique, behind-the-scenes insight into the Commission's decision-making processes, furthering our understanding of the EU's institutional system.

This second volume of the Vienna Lectures on Legal Philosophy series presents 11 chapters which are dedicated to normativist and anti-normativist approaches to law. The book focuses on the question: What is law? Is it a set of obligations imposed on courts and officials to guide their conduct and to assess the conduct of others? Or is it the result of settlements reached by opposing sides that accept arrangements and understandings to sustain peaceful cooperation? If law is the former its significance and meaning are independent of a shifting constellation of forces; if it is not, then what the law says depends on the relative power and prestige of the actors involved. With contributions from some of the leading scholars in the field, the collection presents a balanced and nuanced assessment of what is perhaps the most controversial debate in contemporary legal philosophy today.

Separation of powers is the time-tested touchstone of the legitimate exercise of power in modern democracies. This collection examines decision-making in the EU's multilayered and polycentric constitutional structure through this lens. The focus on separation of powers reveals how strong executive powers collaborate in the EU as a single source of public power, which is not sufficiently counterbalanced by parliaments or the judiciary. The collection explores 3 policy fields marked by crisis: the economic and monetary union (EMU), migration, and trade. Drawing on expertise from across these sectors, with a strong conceptual thread linking all the contributions, this important work illustrates how different branches of government co-determine each others' powers.

Whether there is a public health need for the containment and response to swine flu, or an individual need to access health care across the border for a hip operation to alleviate pain, the EU has an increasingly powerful role in the field of human health. Health law and policy is deeply tied into fundamental rights, bioethics and values, with important implications for individuals. However, it is also an expansive area of economic regulation, of social and state arrangements. The growing role of the EU in human health law and policy is contested, particularly as it has implications for the fundamental rights and values that are enshrined in national health law and policy. This book outlines, through case studies, how the expansion of EU power is taking place through law and policy, in both public health and health care. How is law and policy in the field of human health adopted, who are the institutional actors involved, and what is the impact of these developments for fundamental rights?

This book outlines the content of the main treaties that form the 'constitutional' basis of the European Union and analyses changes in these over time. The EU has expanded its policy scope and taken in many more members transferring powers to common supranational institutions in a way seen nowhere else in the world.

The book examines the ways that the successful health lobbies and member states work, identifies weaknesses, and emphasizes the challenge to health policymakers.

This book addresses a gap in both contemporary theorising and empirical analysis of the European Union’s (EU) law and policy frameworks on migration, sex work and anti trafficking. Drawing on the authors’ previous research on these policies and with their practical experience of engaging with various EU institutions in law and policy-making fora around gender, equality and justice, the work examines the processes involved in constructing and enacting policy frameworks and legal interventions on these issues, within a feminist analytical framework. The authors map how EU agenda-setting operates, and detail the roles that various EU institutions, external groups and actors, including non-governmental organisations, play in promoting or blocking policy on these three issues. The book draws on feminist theorising on gender, policy-making and social justice to develop a general theoretical framework to help us understand how and why a consensus has seemingly been achieved at EU level on what constitutes gender equality in these three policy areas. The book presents a valuable resource for academics, researchers and policy makers in Law, Migration, EU policy making and Gender Studies.