The autonomy of the EU legal order and the law-making activities of international organizations. Some examples regarding the Council most recent practice. Research Papers in Law 03/2012

[Introduction.] It is generally believed that while the principle of the autonomy of the EU legal order, in the sense of constitutional and institutional autonomy that is to say what concerns the autonomous decision-making of the EU, has been clearly strengthened by the most recent jurisprudence of the Court of Justice (eg. Moxplant3, Intertanko or the Kadi/Al Baraakat judgements or the Opinion 1/2009 of the CJEU etc.) as well as, in my opinion, in many aspects by the Treaty of Lisbon, it is still valid to add that the principle of a favourable approach, stemming from the Court jurisprudence, for the enhanced openness of the EU legal order to international law has remained equally important for the EU4. On the other hand, it should be also seen that in a globalized world, and following the increased role of the EU as an international actor, its indispensable and crucial role concerning the creation of world (legal) order in many policy fields ( for example let's think about the G20 issues, the global economic and financial crisis, the role of the EU in promoting and protecting human rights worldwide, the implementation of the multilateral or regional conventional law, developed in the framework the UN (e.g. in the field of agriculture or environment etc) or what concerns the Kyoto process on climate change or the conservation of marine biological resources at international level etc), it seems reasonable and justified to submit that the influence, for example, of the law-making activities of the main stakeholder international organizations in the mentioned policy-areas on the EU (especially on the development of its constantly evolving legal order) or vice-versa the influence of the EU law-making practice on these international organizations is significant, in many aspects mutually interdependent and more and more remarkable. This tendency of the 21st century doesn't mean, however, in my view, that the notion of the autonomy of the EU legal order would have been weakened by this increasing interaction between international law and EU law over the passed years. This contribution is going to demonstrate and prove these departuring points by giving some concrete examples from the most recent practice of the Council (all occuring either in the second half of 2009 or after the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty), and which relate to two very important policy areas in the EU, namely the protection of human rights and the Common Fishery Policy.

British business and the Euro. ACES Cases No. 2008.2

During the Maastricht Treaty negotiations, the United Kingdom obtained an opt-out option on Economic and Monetary Union (EMU). When Tony Blair came to power, he promised there would be a referendum on the euro if the government decided it was in the national interest to join. Many believed Tony Blair intended to call and try to win a referendum on the euro. Therefore, in the late 1990s, the debate over the euro raged in Britain, filling the pages of the tabloids and the minds of many Britons. In this paper based on empirical research conducted in London in 2005-06, I investigate whether the business sector had a clear preference on the issue of British membership in the EMU and tried to influence the government‟s decision. I use Jeffry Frieden's model of interest group preferences regarding exchange-rate policies to develop hypotheses regarding the position of the business sector on the euro. Research findings reveal that the business sector was divided on the issue of euro membership exactly as Frieden's model predicts. However, the intensity of business preferences decreased overtime. By the end of Tony Blair's second term, the business sector had become neutral on the issue of the euro.