The enforcement of EU agreements: Bolstering the effectiveness of treaty law?

Abstract

Many of the recent Court of Justice rulings concerning the relationship between the international legal order and the EU legal order have been on the receiving end of considerable criticism, with the EU level judicial commitment to international law being called into question. One dimension of that critique has concerned the treatment of EU concluded Agreements. An assessment of the extant EU level judicial enforcement practice provides evidence of the emergence of a twin-track approach. Member State level activity challenged for non-compliance with EU Agreements is generally subjected to the full force of those Agreements, whilst in contrast the tendency where EU level activity has been challenged before the Court of Justice appears to have become one of shielding such activity from meaningful review. Even if this trajectory were to be maintained, which remains to be seen, it can be argued that the medium of EU law nevertheless serves to bolster the effectiveness of this increasingly expanding body of Treaty law. For EU law has placed at the disposal of litigants, including the Commission via infringement proceedings, the most powerful of tools for policing the compliance of currently twenty-seven Member States with this growing number of agreements.