Overview of New Paths and Patters in EU Tax Development with Focus on EU Soft Law and External Factors (Part 1)

Abstract

EU Tax Law - as other legal systems - relies on formal law established or recognized by the competent governmental authority. But shouldn't there also be 'good law' in order to be obeyed? That goes as well for its provisions making up EU Hard Law as for its nonbinding legal acts of the Commission making up EU Soft Law. In our recent book on EU Tax Law, we told - as most other tax commentators do - extensively the hard tax law story of EU Treaties, EU-legislation, non-written EU tax principles and ECJ fiscal case law. Accordingly, we used to touch only briefly on the other legal source of EU Soft Law - mainly Commission tax initiatives - arguing that they do not deserve the same attention and recognition for lack of a legally binding power, resulting in a low degree of tax efficiency and failure of harmonious connection with the EU-process of tax cooperation. Today we see a distinctive internal shift in the legal premises and status of EU Soft Tax Law. The shift is reflected in recognized stepped-up levels of effectiveness and wider scope of the steering functions of the Commission effectively of raising the legal process of European tax cooperation.