Abstract
With reference to its unique characteristics, the European Union (EU) regularly requests a special position in treaty cooperation or external judicial control mechanisms. Recurrently, these requests are successful and lead to the EU being treated differently from other treaty parties. These situations have been captured by the concept of ‘European exceptionalism’. EU requests for special treatment can also be witnessed in the supportive and facilitative procedures of compliance mechanisms in international environmental law. In those mechanisms, however, EU requests for special treatment are subject to careful scrutiny, and are even met with strong opposition by treaty institutions and treaty partners. Taking a closer look at the EU’s participation in compliance mechanisms, the present article discusses how certain unique EU characteristics may prompt an EU request for special treatment under compliance mechanisms and explores how compliance institutions and treaty partners have treated existing requests so far. With this outside perspective of non-EU actors, it is possible to understand where such requests can be successful and where they fail to be. In this way, the insights gained permit reflection upon the EU’s participation in compliance mechanisms and whether it truly constitutes a further phenomenon of ‘European exceptionalism’.
Highlights
As an active international actor, the European Union (EU) participates in very different ways in international cooperation
EU requests for special treatment are subject to careful scrutiny, and are even met with strong opposition by treaty institutions and treaty partners
The EU’s participation in non-confrontational and supportive multilateral environmental compliance mechanisms falls into this latter category.1. Recently has this type of EU external action drawn the attention of a broader audience,2 when the EU requested, with reference to its unique characteristics, special treatment under the compliance mechanism of the Aarhus Convention3 and was refused such treatment
Summary
As an active international actor, the European Union (EU) participates in very different ways in international cooperation. The making of requests for EU special treatment is quite well known from other areas of the EU’s external engagement, treaty negotiations and its participation in external judicial control mechanisms.4 In view of this observed behaviour, international law scholars, who took inspiration from debates held in a US context, have been prompted to study, and to criticise, such situations as phenomena of ‘European exceptionalism’.5. Sharing this interest in whether and how the EU is treated differently, the present article uses the concept of ‘European exceptionalism’ as a lens through which to study the EU’s participation in compliance mechanisms For this purpose, the article first briefly introduces compliance mechanisms in international environmental law and subsequently discusses how certain unique EU characteristics may prompt an EU request for special treatment under such mechanisms. It identifies EU characteristics which may warrant special treatment in the eyes of external actors and reflects on whether the treatment accorded allows for understanding the EU’s participation in compliance mechanisms as yet another phenomenon of ‘European exceptionalism’
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