The editorial comment discusses the preliminary reference and the Opinion of Advocate General Pikamäe in Joined Cases C-554/21, C-622/21 and C-727/21 Hann Invest, which is currently pending before the Grand Chamber of the Court of Justice. In the preliminary reference – the first reference on the state of the rule of law and independence of the judiciary in Croatia – the referring national court questioned whether the Croatian mechanism for ensuring consistency of case law of second-instance national courts and the Supreme Court complies with Article 19(1) TEU. Unlike the AG, this comment argues it does not.

The inclusion of the so-called ‘horizontal social clause’, namely Article 9 TFEU, in EU primary law imposes on the EU legislator an obligation to balance the objectives of a specific policy area with the social interests contained therein. For instance, when adopting internal market measures pursuant to Article 114 TFEU, the EU legislator would need to reconcile free trade aims and social interests. At the same time, this process also has consequences on the scope of EU competences. Hence, this article analyses which implications related to the scope of EU competences stem from the obligation to read Article 114 TFEU in light of Article 9 TFEU. In addition, it accounts for the consequences that this process entails for the division of powers between the EU and the Member States. The main argument proposed is that the obligation to read internal market powers in light of Article 9 TFEU not only influences the use of EU competences to pursue certain social objectives, but also leads to an expansion of EU harmonising powers in domains that remain of national competence. Thus, the division between EU and Member State competences becomes increasingly blurred. The Court of Justice of the EU has favoured this tendency by recognising on many occasions the possibility for the EU to rely on Article 114 TFEU, while developing a restrictive interpretation of the limitations of EU competences in social fields enshrined in the Treaties.

Since the founding days of the European Coal and Steel Community, the European integration model has been designed as an open one. Therefore, the enlargement of the European Union from its six founding members to its current twenty-seven is considered not only a success story for the EU but for Europe as a whole. Enlargement, as a twofold process, requires adequate preparation by the acceding State and the EU’s capacity to integrate the new member. Despite the transformative power of European integration (where even the prospect of membership can trigger significant reforms), the process is governed by the relatively concise Article 49 of the Treaty on European Union (TEU), which has evolved significantly in practice. The purpose of this paper is threefold. Firstly, it will elucidate the evolving character of the accession procedure. Secondly, it will analyse the balancing act between the increasing complexity of the process and the mechanisms of pre-accession assistance combined with flexibility measures. Thirdly, it will explore the role and significance of political will throughout the entire accession process.

Following the Conference on the Future of Europe, the European Parliament presented a proposal to reform the Treaties, aiming to expand the competences of the EU in emergency contexts and enhance parliamentary participation in the adoption of emergency measures. Notably, the Parliament suggests introducing a new state of emergency clause, modelled on similar provisions included in national emergency laws. This proposal reveals several issues associated with the attempt of transposing the conceptual categories and legal schemes of national emergency law into EU law. Drawing from examples of EU Member States’ emergency laws, this article analyses these issues from a comparative perspective, focusing on the equilibrium between the recognition of extraordinary powers and the construction of appropriate constitutional safeguards. Furthermore, it critically assesses the proposal’s potential implications for EU constitutional law, discussing in particular the trajectory of EU integration, the role of the adjudicature, and the constitutional design of EU competence.

This paper strives to answer the research question of whether Treaty change is necessary to build stronger mechanisms of EU values protection. It analyses the current toolkit of available values protection mechanisms, demonstrates that those mechanisms have not proven to be very effective, and concludes that the EU is ill equipped to find convincing responses. Following on from this, it reflects on the key proposals made in the academic and institutional debate to improve the current values protection framework. Nevertheless, the paper concludes that these proposals merely represent individual puzzle pieces unlikely to change the course of backsliding if taken in isolation and not providing for a comprehensive and concerted strategy. The paper therefore opts for a broader perspective, relying on the idea of reconceptualising the framework of EU values protection pursuing the path of Treaty change. This path rests on three different dimensions: structural, institutional, and substantive reforms.

This paper analyses new fact-finding methods in criminal proceedings, using state-of-the-art innovations in neuroscience and artificial intelligence (AI). It will outline the existing methods and explain their effects. Then it will address the criminal-law aspects of the use of such methods as evidence in criminal proceedings, with an emphasis on the assessment of their admissibility from the perspective of the right to a fair trial and the privilege against self-incrimination. This topic will be observed from the perspective of US and European law, highlighting the existing jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) and the legal standards established by the court in relation to the privilege against self-incrimination. Based on this analysis, the authors will formulate a conclusion suggesting that the use of current AI technologies should be juxtaposed to the relevant benchmark of the privilege against self-incrimination as the requisite standard of the right to a fair trial.