“Not Great, Not Terrible” – EU Crisis Management and Constitutional Identity Regarding The COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Summary The conformity of the European Union’s Own Resources Decision with the constitution was brought before the authentic interpreters of the constitutions in Finland and Germany. This paper tends to examine the so-called ‘identity review’ engaged by these interpreters regarding procedural guarantees. In Finland, the competence-related debate between the Constitutional Law Committee and the Grand Committee and their interference with the EU-law as well as the subsequent Finnish legislative process raised some serious concerns. The relevant decisions of the German Federal Constitutional Court also highlight some disadvantages of decision-making in a crisis situation, for instance, the lack of reasoning or the failure to request a preliminary ruling from the Court of Justice of the European Union. In this paper, we aim to highlight the promising and the less favourable aspects of the (quasi-)constitutional courts’ procedure.