TY - JOUR A1 - van den Brink, Martijn A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - Zglinski, Jan T1 - Alive and kicking or barely alive? The asymmetry thesis in the twenty-first century EU JF - Journal of European Public Policy N2 - This paper focuses on the legal and institutional assumptions of Fritz Scharpf's famous thesis of an asymmetry between positive and negative integration in the EU. Taking issue with a number of arguments forwarded in the lead piece for this debate section, it questions the relevance of the thesis to the governance of the contemporary EU, objecting to (i) the limited falsifiability of the asymmetry thesis as established by the distinction between structure and agency; (ii) the emphasis of the thesis on the weakening influence of negative integration and (iii) the way in which asymmetry ignores the increasing centrality of positive integration to defining the EU's legal order. As the paper concludes, while the asymmetry thesis pioneered inter-disciplinary exploration of how the EU's legal and political order inter-relates, it needs serious re-thinking in the Europe of the 2020s. Y1 - 2025 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1080/13501763.2025.2527330 N1 - Open Access publication is funded by the Hertie School Library. SP - 1 EP - 12 PB - Informa UK Limited ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - Europe’s expanding coordination space JF - European Law Open N2 - Recent changes to EU fiscal policy, such as the landmark economic governance reform package passed in early 2024, have established a dense ‘coordination space’ that steers crucial social and economic choices at the EU and national levels. This coordination space, however, departs significantly from its historical predecessors. It largely operates within a hard law framework using finance rather than either rules or soft persuasion and peer review as its main tool of influence. In this coordination space, EU law is less a system of uniform rules underlain with sanctions than a negotiation framework where discretion abounds, and rules are never broken but rather ‘adjusted’. As this paper argues, the significance of the coordination space lies not only in its unique governance model and unclear boundaries but rather its increasing centrality to the governance of the EU. As the paper will explore using the rule of law example, even areas of EU law commonly conceived as necessarily insulated from political bargaining are increasingly drawn into the negotiation logic and instruments of coordination, rendering even more crucial a clear understanding of the trade-offs policy coordination implies. By unpacking 8 core features of policy coordination in the 2020s, the paper is therefore devoted to illuminating an expanding battleground within which EU law is being re-defined. Y1 - 2025 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1017/elo.2025.8 N1 - Open Access publication is funded by the Hertie School Library SP - 1 EP - 22 PB - Cambridge University Press (CUP) ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - The Changing Substance of European Law JF - European Constitutional Law Review N2 - Intrinsic relation between form and substance in law and between the institutional law of the EU and its substantive goals – idea and criteria for a ‘substantive core’ to the legal order – the internal market as early EU law’s substantive core – the EU’s changing policy substance and the subsequent ‘de-coring’ of the legal order – the consequences of de-coring and its impact on EU law’s relevance and legitimacy – early attempts to reconcile EU law with the changing substance of EU policy. Y1 - 2024 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1017/S1574019624000233 N1 - Open Access publication is funded by the Hertie School Library VL - 20 IS - 3 SP - 451 EP - 481 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - Bobić, Ana T1 - Unpacking Legal Accountability: The Case of the European Central Bank JF - Politics and Governance N2 - Although the term “legal accountability” increasingly appears in scholarly discourse surrounding the European Central Bank (ECB), it is under-theorised. This article explores three different dimensions of legal accountability, which are often confused. Accountability to law refers to accountability to legal rules and standards. Accountability through law refers to achieving routes of administrative and political accountability through legal institutions. Accountability of law implies the accountability of legal institutions themselves to the wider public (and other courts) for their decisions. We argue that these dimensions are deeply connected in the sense that either improvements or failures along one dimension are easily carried to the others. We demonstrate the argument by applying our concept of legal accountability to ECB activity, comparing judicial review in the context of monetary policy with the Single Supervisory Mechanism. These cases suggest a possible vicious rather than virtuous circle of legal accountability, i.e., a tendency for either unclear legal standards or lack of accountability of courts themselves to undermine accountability for ECB activity as a whole. Y1 - 2025 U6 - https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.17645/pag.8907 VL - 13 ER - TY - RPRT A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - Akbik, Adina T1 - The role of the European Council in the EU constitutional structure: Study requested by the AFCO Committee N2 - This study was commissioned by the European Parliament’s Policy Department for Citizens’ Rights and Constitutional Affairs at the request of the AFCO Committee. It examines the evolving role of the European Council in the EU’s constitutional structure. As the study demonstrates, the increasing tendency of the European Council to instruct other EU institutions and its limited accountability have established an increasing gap between its de jure role under the EU Treaties and its de facto power in the larger system of EU governance. Y1 - 2024 UR - https://www.europarl.europa.eu/thinktank/en/document/IPOL_STU(2024)760125 PB - European Union ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Dawson, Mark ED - Dawson, Mark ED - de Witte, Bruno ED - Muir, Elise T1 - Revisiting Europe’s ‘law-politics imbalance’ T2 - Revisiting Judicial Politics in the European Union N2 - The aim of this chapter is to consider whether accusations of judicial activism towards the European Courts are rooted not in the activity of the CJEU per se but rather a wider ‘imbalance’ between law and politics in the present-day EU. Revisiting an earlier chapter, the chapter considers three sources of such an imbalance: the gap between the jurisdiction of the CJEU and the EU’s legislative competence; judicial reasoning at the EU level; and the imbalance in the EU between market and non-market objectives. While the chapter argues that the EU retains such an imbalance, recent developments, particularly the increasing dynamism of the EU legislature, have significantly narrowed the gap between the EU’s political and legal capacities in the last decade. As the chapter will conclude, the EU carries a less institutionally ‘lonely’ Court than in the past, providing the Union’s judiciary with greater leverage to temper activist claims. Y1 - 2024 SN - 9781035313501 U6 - https://doi.org/10.4337/9781035313518.00007 SP - 17 EP - 33 PB - Edward Elgar Publishing ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - de Witte, Bruno A1 - Muir, Elise ED - Dawson, Mark ED - de Witte, Bruno ED - Muir, Elise T1 - Introduction: locating judicial politics T2 - Revisiting Judicial Politics in the European Union N2 - The Court inhabits a ‘political space’ to which it is called upon to respond. This points to its need to develop cooperative relationships not only with courts but also with political actors (such as national governments and the EU legislature) and even to directly address and explain decisions to EU citizens themselves. This book is aimed at answering the question of ‘How does the CJEU position itself as a political as well as a legal actor?’ with a view to better understanding the work of the Court and addressing its contestation. For that purpose, we explore in this introductory chapter what is meant by judicial ‘activism’ and judicial ‘politics’, before examining the different varieties of judicial politics our authors have shown an interest in. This will pave the way to drawing some lessons on the factors to take into account when seeking to address and respond to contestation of the work of the Court. Y1 - 2024 SN - 9781035313501 U6 - https://doi.org/10.4337/9781035313518.00006 SP - 1 EP - 16 PB - Edward Elgar Publishing ER - TY - JOUR A1 - van den Brink, Martijn A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - Zglinski, Jan T1 - Revisiting the asymmetry thesis: negative and positive integration in the EU JF - Journal of European Public Policy N2 - The ‘asymmetry thesis’, articulated by Fritz Scharpf, holds that EU governance is characterised by an asymmetry between positive and negative integration. The EU has well-developed capacities for negative integration but only limited capacities for positive integration. The present paper challenges the orthodoxy that this thesis has become in EU law and political science scholarship. It argues that the asymmetry thesis no longer accurately depicts European integration, revisiting its key legal and institutional assumptions. Taking the internal market as the most likely case to test the thesis, we show that negative integration has become weaker, positive integration has gained in strength, and both developments have had an impact on the substance of EU law and policymaking, which is promoting non-economic concerns and market-correcting policies to a greater extent than it used to. These shifts, so we contend, could be even more pronounced in other areas of European integration. Y1 - 2023 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1080/13501763.2023.2296940 ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Akbik, Adina A1 - Dawson, Mark ED - Dawson, Mark T1 - From Procedural to Substantive Accountability in EMU Governance T2 - Substantive Accountability in Europe’s New Economic Governance N2 - This chapter provides the volumes general conceptual framework. It begins by addressing why new approaches to accountability are needed, arguing that accountability literature has reached a stalemate as a result of an impasse between deductive and inductive approaches to accountability in the EU. It then argues that overcoming the stalemate requires developing a generalised framework of what accountability is for, deriving four accountability goods to be used in subsequent chapters. The chapter argues that each of the goods can be delivered in procedural or substantive ways, focusing either on the process by which decisions are made or the substantive worth of decisions themselves. The chapter concludes by discussing the strengths and weaknesses of both varieties of accountability before mapping out how the concepts will be applied across policy fields and institutions in subsequent chapters. Y1 - 2023 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009228800.003 SP - 19 EP - 44 PB - Cambridge University Press CY - Cambridge ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Dawson, Mark ED - Dawson, Mark T1 - Introduction: The Accountability Impasse of the EU’s New Economic Governance T2 - Substantive Accountability in Europe's New Economic Governance N2 - This chapter serves as the general introduction to the volume. It discusses two major impasses plaguing EMU in the 2020s: the first, a clash between politicization of EMU decisions, on the one hand, and an institutional structure designed to reject political conflict, on the other; the second, a scholarly impasse between those analysing EMU accountability comparatively and those doing so through EMU specific standards. The chapter briefly introduces the core concepts used in the volume as a means of overcoming this impasse: the distinction between procedural and substantive accountability as well as the normative goods framework developed in Chapter 1. It finally provides an overview of the structure and content of the volume, concluding with a plea to focus scholarly attention on EMUs substantive accountability deficits. Y1 - 2023 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009228800.001 SP - 1 EP - 16 PB - Cambridge University Press CY - Cambridge ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Bois, Julien A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - Towards a legally plausible theory of judicialization in the European Union JF - Journal of European Integration N2 - This article examines the development of judicialization literature in the EU arguing that – in spite of the obvious advantages of interdisciplinary collaboration – scholarship on judicialization in law and political science is drafting apart in the 21st Century. While early political science research on the European Courts found theoretical inspiration in legal research, law and political science have increasingly diverging epistemological and methodological starting points. As the article argues, using prominent papers, this results in both disciplines producing partial accounts of judicial change with limited external validity. The article concludes by offering routes to improving the inter-disciplinary foundations of judicialization research. KW - Judicialization; interdisciplinarity; EU law; EU studies; law and politics Y1 - 2023 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1080/07036337.2023.2190104 VL - 45 IS - 5 SP - 823 EP - 842 ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Bobić, Ana A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - How can law contribute to accountability in EU monetary policy? T2 - The Cambridge Handbook on European Monetary, Economic and Financial Market Integration Y1 - 2022 PB - Cambridge University Press CY - Cambridge ER - TY - EDBOOK A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - Jachtenfuchs, Markus ED - Dawson, Mark ED - Jachtenfuchs, Markus T1 - Autonomy without collapse in a Better European Union N2 - The European Union's history exhibits numerous episodes in which Member States have sought to re-enforce their national autonomy in the face of deepening integration. Efforts to re-gain autonomy, however, are often accompanied by legitimate concerns that autonomy will lead to dis-integration or will have wider destructive consequences. The EU thus faces a dilemma. Calls for autonomy cannot all be dismissed as mere populist rhetoric or national egoism but instead represent a legitimate questioning of the degree of uniformity that EU law and politics presently carry. At the same time, the fear that greater autonomy may carry dis-integrative effects is also legitimate -uniformity is not an accidental by-product of the EU's construction but intrinsically related to its policy goals. Giving too much room for autonomy might create an opportunity structure for the loss of collective goods, deficits in problem-solving, and perhaps even to self-destruction. The EU requires autonomy, but in doing so, it must also avoid collapse. Can it achieve it, and if so, how? Autonomy without Collapse is devoted to exploring innovative answers to this question. It draws together scholars in law and political science interested in exploring how to overcome the central dilemma of preserving sustainable yet real autonomy in the future European Union. Y1 - 2022 UR - https://global.oup.com/academic/product/autonomy-without-collapse-in-a-better-european-union-9780192897541?cc=de&lang=en&# SN - 9780192897541 PB - Oxford University Press CY - Oxford ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - Jachtenfuchs, Markus ED - Dawson, Mark ED - Jachtenfuchs, Markus T1 - Autonomy without Collapse? Towards a Better European Union. T2 - Autonomy without Collapse in a Better European Union Y1 - 2022 UR - https://global.oup.com/academic/product/autonomy-without-collapse-in-a-better-european-union-9780192897541?cc=de&lang=en&# SN - 9780192897541 SP - 3 EP - 20 PB - Oxford University Press CY - Oxford ER - TY - BOOK A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - de Witte, Floris T1 - EU Law and Governance N2 - What is the EU for? In light of the current state of European integration, EU law cannot meaningfully be appreciated without understanding the political, social and cultural context within which it operates. This textbook proposes a fresh, accessible and interdisciplinary take on the subject that is suitable for one-semester and introductory courses wishing to engage the reader with the wider context of the EU project. It situates the institutions, legal order and central policy domains of the EU in their context and offer students the tools to critically analyse and reflect on European integration and its consequences. With pedagogical features such as further reading, class questions and essay/exams questions to support learning, this textbook enables students to form their own informed opinion on whether the EU offers an appropriate answer to the many questions that it is asked. Y1 - 2022 SN - 9781108836173 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108864046 PB - Cambridge ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - Chapter 4: The role of law in multilevel governance: Four conceptualizations T2 - A Research Agenda for Multilevel Governance N2 - This chapter examines the role played by law and legal institutions in systems of multi-level of governance. While the de-centring of state institutions has been a common concern in legal and political science literature in the last three decades, there remains a lack of attention to how literature on multilevel governance can be better coupled with related work in comparative public law. The chapter attempts to fill this gap by sketching four possible conceptualizations of law’s role in multilevel governance systems. Law may either demarcate (by dividing authority), facilitate (by ensuring systems of shared rule), catalyze (by undermining hierarchical systems) or colonize multilevel governance (by shifting power from other spheres in society towards the legal system itself). These conceptualizations are intended to provide a framework on how patterns in the role of law across multilevel governance systems can be analyzed in future work across the social sciences. Y1 - 2021 SN - 9781789908367 U6 - https://doi.org/10.4337/9781789908374.00011 SP - 77 EP - 93 ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Bois, Julien A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - Chapter 7: Sociological institutionalism as a lens to study judicialization: a bridge between legal scholarship and political science T2 - The Politics of European Legal Research N2 - Judicialization - and the influence of trans-national Courts - seems a perfect object of study for inter-disciplinary research and a potential spur for methodological innovation. In the case of the European Courts, however, this chapter argues that divides between law and political science have impeded the developments of accounts of judicialization able to take both the legal and political aspects of judicial activity seriously. The chapter discusses sociological institutionalism as an alternative approach to judicialisation. By stressing the importance of legal norms in structuring the 'space' for legal agency while abstaining from the assumption that norms apply equally in all situations, sociological institutionalism provides an inter- disciplinary framework for the study of Courts able to act as a bridge between both disciplines. As the chapter will conclude, while institutionalist approaches are complex and time-consuming, their focus on the language, ideas and cultural assumptions of actors and institutions provide a compelling method for the study of judicial behaviour. Y1 - 2022 SN - 9781802201185 U6 - https://doi.org/10.4337/9781802201192.00014 SP - 94 EP - 108 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - What Does it Mean to Say that the Court of Justice is not a Human Rights Institution? A Critical Appraisal JF - Journal of Human Rights Practice N2 - What role does the Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU) and EU law play in elaborating the rights and principles embodied by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR)? Over the last 20 years, human (or ‘fundamental’) rights have become a constant part of the way the CJEU interprets and applies EU law. In a period where fundamental rights and values are increasingly under threat both globally and in Europe, judicial institutions remain an important last bastion of protection. Commenting on Judge Rosas’ (2007) observation that the CJEU is not in fact a human rights Court, three critical questions are derived: The first question is the most related to this special issue. What does the development of the CJEU—an institution with human rights responsibilities—mean for general international human rights law? The second takes up Judge Rosas’ observation that the CJEU, unlike the Strasbourg Court, has extensive judicial responsibilities beyond human rights. What does the development of EU human rights law mean for EU law more broadly? Finally, if Judge Rosas is right that the CJEU is not a human rights Court, what does that mean for its relationship to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) and the other organs of the Council of Europe? In answer to this last question, the article cautiously advances the argument that the very fact that the CJEU is not a human rights Court implies a more robust role than Judge Rosas suggests for external review of EU law by international human rights bodies. Y1 - 2022 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1093/jhuman/huab023 VL - 4 IS - 1 SP - 215 EP - 222 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - The accountability of non-governmental actors in the digital sphere: A theoretical framework JF - European Law Journal N2 - The last decade has seen increasing demands for greater accountability in digital governance. What, however, does accountability require and what normative goods does it serve? This article develops a general framework for assessing digital accountability focused on four normative goods: openness, non-arbitrariness, effectiveness and publicness. As the article will evidence, claims for digital accountability often refer to deficits relating to one or more of these goods. While scholarly attention has deservedly focused on tying powerful digital actors to rule of law guarantees, the article argues that accountability offers an important normative yardstick to allow citizens to contest digital decisions beyond strict legality. The framework therefore provides a basis for both conceptually disaggregating and normatively forwarding accountability claims in the digital sphere. Y1 - 2022 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1111/eulj.12420 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - Maricut-Akbik, Adina T1 - Accountability in the EU's para-regulatory state: The case of the Economic and Monetary Union JF - Regulation & Governance N2 - This article revisits Majone's famous argument about accountability in the regulatory state in reference to the European Union's (EU) Economic and Monetary Union. We show that the EU has entered the stage of a “para-regulatory state” marked by increasing EU regulation in areas linked to core state powers. Despite the redistributive and politicized nature of these policy areas, the EU's “para-regulatory state” has continued to rely on its regulatory model of accountability, focused on decisionmaking processes, and interest mediation. In line with Majone, we describe the model as procedural and contrast it to substantive accountability – which is necessary when regulation has clear redistributive implications. Using two case studies from fiscal policy and monetary affairs, we illustrate the predominance of procedural accountability as exercised by the European Parliament and EU Courts. We complement the empirical analysis with a normative discussion of how substantive accountability could potentially be rendered in both fields. Y1 - 2021 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b1570-opus4-42704 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1111/rego.12442 SP - 1 EP - 16 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - Bertolini, Elena T1 - Fundamental Rights as Constraints to and Triggers for Differentiated Integration JF - Swiss Political Science Review N2 - When looking for possible constraints on Differentiated Integration, the fundamental values of the European Union (EU) seem an obvious starting point. Both the Charter of Fundamental Rights and the values articulated in Art. 2 TEU are cross-cutting across EU states. However, while fundamental values have acted as centralising devices in other federal settings, in an EU context marked by extensive value disagreement, they may also act as pathways for differentiation. Insofar as national constitutional orders disagree on the scope of EU rights, attempts to ground EU law in fundamental values trigger inevitable interpretive conflicts across states. This paper will use the examples of asylum and the European Arrest Warrant to demonstrate this argument: while EU law may use fundamental values as a reason to harmonise EU law across states, such values may also be invoked to question the principle of mutual trust underlying the EU legal order, thereby causing rather than limiting differentiation. Y1 - 2021 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1111/spsr.12443 VL - 27 IS - 3 SP - 637 EP - 653 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - Maricut-Akbik, Adina T1 - Procedural vs substantive accountability in EMU governance: between payoffs and trade-offs JF - Journal of European Public Policy N2 - his article introduces a new normative framework for analysing accountability in the European Union’s Economic and Monetary Union (EMU). The framework is anchored in four normative ‘goods’ that accountability is supposed to ensure: openness, non-arbitrariness, effectiveness, and publicness. All of these can be achieved in a procedural or substantive way, depending on whether actors are held accountable for the quality of their decision-making processes or for the actual merit of their decisions. Transposed to EMU, this conceptualisation shows both the payoffs and trade-offs of prioritising procedural accountability. Using different examples across EMU governance, the article illustrates how current mechanisms of political, legal, and administrative accountability predominantly evaluate the procedures followed by EU institutions when performing their tasks. While such an approach can bring clarity, predictability, and autonomy for the actors involved, it distracts attention from the substantive assessment of EMU decisions. The article contributes to the EMU accountability literature by going beyond principal-agent expectations of democratic control rooted in the nation-state or legal debates about principles for accountable behaviour found in EU Treaties. The EMU, and the EU more broadly, need a different perspective on accountability focused on generally-applicable standards for holding power to account. Y1 - 2020 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1080/13501763.2020.1797145 SP - 1 EP - 20 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Bobić, Ana A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - Making sense of the “incomprehensible”: The PSPP Judgment of the German Federal Constitutional Court JF - Common Market Law Review Y1 - 2020 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b1570-opus4-36925 UR - https://kluwerlawonline.com/journalarticle/Common+Market+Law+Review/57.6/COLA2020774 VL - 57 IS - 6 SP - 1953 EP - 1998 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - Fundamental Rights in European Union Policy-making: The Effects and Advantages of Institutional Diversity JF - Human Rights Law Review N2 - This article investigates how the European Union’s political process affects the level of rights protection afforded by European Union (EU) law. It does so in two steps, firstly by analysing how institutional politics plays an important role in the evolution of the EU fundamental rights framework and secondly by demonstrating empirically how legislative interaction affects the level of protection provided by three important EU legislative acts. As the article will demonstrate, this interaction tends to result in the overall level of rights protection being increased. Analysing this finding, the article uses institutionalist theory to argue that the EU’s political process carries certain positive effects: the diversity of the legislative process (both within and between institutions) makes the explicit overlooking of rights-based concerns difficult. These findings carry implications for the increasing tendency to channel EU law and policy outside of the ‘ordinary’ legislative process. Y1 - 2020 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1093/hrlr/ngaa002 VL - 20 IS - 1 SP - 50 EP - 73 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - How Can EU Law Respond to Populism? JF - Oxford Journal of Legal Studies N2 - The rise in Europe of populist movements has created severe anxiety about the stability of the EU legal order. This article argues that, while populist ideas challenge numerous elements of the EU’s constitutional settlement, there exists no fundamental incompatibility between populism and EU law. By comparing its response to populism with attempts by EU law to stabilise its legal order in the face of political contestation arising from other political cleavages, the article discusses three different ways to understand the interaction between EU law and populism. EU law may seek to ‘survive’ the growth of populism by (i) bracketing or insulating its institutions from populist contestation, (ii) accommodating populist ideas or (iii) confronting the constitutional strategies populists utilise domestically. In examining the constitutional foundations of populism and its relation to emerging doctrines of EU law, the article seeks to build a road map of how populist movements might utilise or resist EU law in their development. Y1 - 2020 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1093/ojls/gqaa002 VL - 40 IS - 1 SP - 183 EP - 213 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - Coping with Exit, Evasion, and Subversion in EU Law JF - German Law Journal Y1 - 2020 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1017/glj.2019.95 IS - Special Issue 1 SP - 51 EP - 56 ET - 21 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - The lost Spitzenkandidaten and the future of European democracy JF - Maastricht Journal of European and Comparative Law N2 - This editorial critically examines the decision of EU leaders not to follow the ‘Spitzenkandidaten’ procedure when recently nominating the new President of the European Commission. It does so by situating that decision in a consociational model of democracy, that seeks to share political authority rather than link it directly to electoral processes. As the editorial argues, this model leaves the EU exposed to elitist critique and sits uneasily with certain aspects of Article 17(7) TEU. The review and renewal of the Spitzenkandidaten system promised by the incoming Commission President is thus sorely needed. Y1 - 2019 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1177/1023263X19884434 VL - 26 IS - 6 SP - 731 EP - 735 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - Lynskey, Orla A1 - Muir, Elise T1 - What is the Added Value of the Concept of the “Essence” of EU Fundamental Rights? JF - German Law Journal N2 - This Article introduces our Special Issue by posing a central question: What is the added value of the increasing prominence of the concept of the “essence” of fundamental rights in EU law? It will address this larger question in four steps: First, by examining the function of the concept in EU law and the methods for its derivation; second, by summarizing how its application diverges across EU—and international—law; third, by outlining some enduring difficulties with the essence concept; and finally, by reflecting on its future role in EU law, including its impact on other sites of legal authority—such as domestic fundamental rights, the political institutions of the EU, and international human rights law. As the other articles of this issue demonstrate, while there is not yet a coherent approach to deriving and understanding the essence of rights across the fundamental rights the EU must protects, the essence concept plays an increasingly significant role in demarcating the boundaries between the EU’s legal and political orders and between overlapping sites of legal authority. Recent developments—such as the rule of law “crises”—are likely to further amplify the importance of “essence” to EU law practice and scholarship. Y1 - 2019 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1017/glj.2019.61 VL - 20 IS - Special Issue 6 SP - 763 EP - 778 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - Bobić, Ana T1 - Quantitative easing at the Court of Justice – Doing whatever it takes to save the euro: Weiss and Others JF - Common Market Law Review Y1 - 2019 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b1570-opus4-30368 UR - http://www.kluwerlawonline.com/abstract.php?area=Journals&id=COLA2019097 SN - 0165-0750 N1 - This is a post-peer-review version of an article published in Common Market Law Review. The final authenticated version is available online at http://www.kluwerlawonline.com/abstract.php?area=Journals&id=COLA2019097 VL - 56 IS - 4 SP - 1005 EP - 1040 ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Dawson, Mark ED - Kadelbach, Stefan T1 - The Impact of Brexit on British Law and Democracy: Four Effects T2 - Brexit – and What it Means Y1 - 2019 SN - 9783848760121 U6 - https://doi.org/10.5771/9783748901327-47 SP - 47 EP - 56 PB - Nomos ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Dawson, Mark ED - Mendes, Joana T1 - How Can EU Law Contain Economic Discretion? T2 - EU Executive Discretion and the Limits of Law Y1 - 2019 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b1570-opus4-29889 SN - 9780198826668 N1 - This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedit version of an contribution published in: J. Mendes (ed.) EU Executive Discretion and the Limits of Law (Oxford University Press, 2019). SP - 64 EP - 84 PB - Oxford University Press ER - TY - RPRT A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - Juncker’s Political Commission: Did it Work? T2 - SIEPS - Swedish Institute for European Policy Studies N2 - The ‘political Commission’ may be the defining idea of the Juncker Presidency. But did it work? This paper is devoted to analysing how the notion of a political Commission has framed the organization and policy-making of the Juncker Commission. The idea of the political Commission was to allow the Commission to streamline its agenda and focus on a narrower number of proposals. In the words of the 2018 State of the Union address: to be ‘bigger on the big things and smaller on the small things’. In reality, external constraints, and in particular the divergent preferences and electoral cycles of national governments, have frustrated this promise. The Commission’s confinement to a relatively narrow set of regulatory (rather than distributive) tools limits its ability to be politically responsive to the main challenges the Union currently faces. At the same time, the political Commission undermines some elements of the Commission’s regulatory legitimacy – for example, its promise to be a neutral arbiter in the enforcement of competition, internal market and rule of law norms. While the political Commission continues to be a normatively attractive idea, it has fitted poorly with the institutional and political constraints surrounding the Juncker Presidency. This carries implications for the next Commission and the fate of the Spitzenkandidaten process. Y1 - 2019 UR - http://www.sieps.se/en/publications/2019/junckers-political-commission-did-it-work/ N1 - This paper draws on some ideas discussed in an earlier piece in the Verfassungsblog: ‘Evaluating Juncker’s Political Commission: The Right Idea in the Wrong Hands?’, available at: https:// verfassungsblog.de/evaluating-junckers-political-commission-the-right-idea-in-the-wrong-hands/ ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - Better regulation and the future of EU regulatory law and politics JF - Common Market Law Review N2 - The flurry of recent activity in the EU over “Better Regulation” has important constitutional implications, particularly for the Union’s institutional balance. As this article will argue, however, the main question the Better Regulation debate poses is one of how to reconcile the increasing tension in the EU between different paradigms of regulation. Is regulation “better” because it conforms to the preferences of citizens as expressed in national and EU elections, or rather because it meets technical and procedural standards, from consultation to impact assessment, able to improve the “objective” quality of EU legislation? While Better Regulation tries to split the difference between these two avenues for the future of EU regulatory law and politics, each avenue carries the capacity to significantly frustrate the other. Current debates in the EU about regulatory reform defer rather than answer a fundamental question: what makes regulation better? Y1 - 2016 UR - https://www.kluwerlawonline.com/document.php?id=COLA2016114 SN - 0165-0750 VL - 53 IS - 5 SP - 1209 EP - 1236 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - Augenstein, Daniel A1 - Thielbörger, Pierre T1 - The UNGPs in the European Union: The Open Coordination of Business and Human Rights? JF - Business and Human Rights Journal N2 - The article examines the implementation of the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs) in the European Union via National Action Plans (NAPs). We argue that some of the shortcomings currently observed in the implementation process could effectively be addressed through the Open Method of Coordination (OMC) – a governance instrument already used by the European Union (EU) in other policy domains. The article sketches out the polycentric global governance approach envisaged by the UNGPs and discusses the institutional and policy background of their implementation in the EU. It provides an assessment of EU member states’ NAPs on business and human rights, as benchmarked against international NAP guidance, before relating experiences with the existing NAP process to the policy background and rationale of the OMC and considering the conditions for employing the OMC in the business and human rights domain. Building on a recent opinion of the EU Fundamental Rights Agency, the article concludes with a concrete proposal for developing an OMC on business and human rights in the EU. Y1 - 2018 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1017/bhj.2017.30 VL - 3 IS - 1 SP - 1 EP - 22 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - Bobić, Ana A1 - Maricut-Akbik, Adina T1 - Reconciling Independence and accountability at the European Central Bank: The false promise of Proceduralism JF - European Law Journal N2 - This article revisits the balancing act between independence and accountability at the European Central Bank (ECB). It contrasts procedural and substantive concepts of accountability, and challenges the mainstream idea that independence and accountability can be reconciled through narrow mandates, the indiscriminate increase of transparency, the creation of multiple channels of accountability, and the active use of judicial review. These assumptions form the pillars of a procedural type of accountability that promises to resolve the independence/accountability dilemma but fails to do so in practice. The article brings evidence to show how ECB accountability has become a complex administrative exercise that focuses on the procedural steps leading up to monetary and supervisory decisions while simultaneously limiting substantive accountability. The failure to acknowledge the trade‐off between independence and accountability (said to be ‘two sides of the same coin’) has resulted in a tendency to privilege the former over the latter. Y1 - 2019 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1111/eulj.12305 SN - 1468-0386 VL - 25 IS - 1 SP - 75 EP - 93 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - New governance and the displacement of Social Europe: the case of the European Semester JF - European Constitutional Law Review N2 - Has the European Semester led to a displacement of Social Europe, or to the development of social policy through fiscal processes and actors? – Potential for Semester to increase soft law’s binding effects or ‘socialise’ EU policy-making – Positive effects severely limited by the Semester’s overall goals: fiscal stabilisation and the creation of increasingly uniform economic policies – Dilemma for Social Europe: how can an autonomous EU social policy be (re) established without risking marginalisation? Y1 - 2018 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1017/S1574019618000081 SN - 1574-0196 N1 - Published online: 15 March 2018 VL - 14 IS - 1 SP - 191 EP - 209 ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - Durana, Alieza ED - Ott, Andrea ED - De Witte, Bruno ED - Vos, Ellen T1 - Modes of Flexibility: Framework Legislation v 'Soft' Law T2 - Between Flexibility and Disintegration : The Trajectory of Differentiation in EU Law Y1 - 2017 SN - 978-1-78347-588-9 U6 - https://doi.org/10.4337/9781783475896 SP - 92 EP - 117 PB - Edward Elgar CY - Cheltenham ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Dawson, Mark ED - Patterson, Dennis ED - Södersten, Anna T1 - New Modes of Governance T2 - A Companion to European Union Law and International Law N2 - This chapter approaches new modes of governance (NMG) with the task of clarity in mind. Its essential function will be first to map the dominant conceptions of NMG that frame existing institutional and academic discourse. Second function is to analyze the strengths and weaknesses of NMG as an alternative means of delivering European Union (EU) law and policy, and finally to consider the future prospects of NMG in a political context that both challenges and reinforces their institutional relevance. The chapter also explores that the greatest obstacle to the inside view is the resolute failure of many NMG processes to display the features of bottom-up and experimental rule which theorists like Charles Sabel and Jonathan Zeitlin attribute to them. Experimentalism's attractive normative conceptualization of NMG may be of limited use given its failure to describe adequately how new governance processes operate. KW - Academic discourse KW - Charles Sabel KW - European Union law KW - Institutional development KW - Jonathan Zeitlin KW - New modes of governance Y1 - 2016 SN - 9780470674390 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1002/9781119037712.ch9 SP - 119 EP - 135 PB - John Wiley & Sons CY - Chichester ER - TY - BOOK A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - The Governance of EU Fundamental Rights T3 - Cambridge Studies in European Law and Policy N2 - In spite of a continued increase in the substantive scope and reach of EU fundamental rights, little attention has been paid to their practical enforcement. In this book, Mark Dawson looks at the mechanisms through which EU fundamental rights are protected and enforced, closely examining the interrelation between the EU's pertinent legal and political bodies. He argues that in order to understand EU fundamental rights we must also understand the institutional, political and normative constraints that shape the EU's policies. The book examines the performance of different EU institutions in relation to rights and studies two important policy fields - social rights and rule of law protection - in depth. KW - Human Rights KW - European Law KW - Law Y1 - 2017 SN - 9781107070493 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1017/9781107707436 PB - Cambridge University Press CY - Cambridge ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - Europe Does Need a Constitution. But of What Kind? JF - Verfassungsblog Y1 - 2015 UR - http://verfassungsblog.de/europe-does-need-a-constitution-but-of-what-kind/ N1 - Blog entry ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - Britain’s Neverendum on Europe JF - Verfassungsblog Y1 - 2016 UR - http://verfassungsblog.de/britains-neverendum-on-europe/ N1 - Blog entry ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - de Witte, Floris T1 - Self-Determination in the Constitutional Future of the EU JF - European Law Journal N2 - This article analyses three prominent proposals for the functional and political transformation of the EU from a constitutional perspective. It argues that existing EU reform proposals, to varying degrees, entrench rather than reverse the challenges to individual and political self-determination brought about by the EU's response to its Euro crisis. As the article will conclude, challenging ‘authoritarian liberalism' in an EU context may require the development of a constitutional structure for the Union able to contest, rather than set in stone, the EU's existing economic and political goals. Y1 - 2015 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1111/eulj.12131 SN - 1351-5993 VL - 21 IS - 3 SP - 371 EP - 383 ER - TY - RPRT A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - New Governance in the EU after the Euro Crisis: Retired or Re-born? T2 - EUI Working Papers AEL 2015/01 N2 - This working paper discusses the future of the EU’s ‘new governance’ paradigm, as a particular category of the EU’s legal acts in light of developments in EU economic governance following the Euro crisis. [...] KW - New Governance KW - Euro Crisis KW - EU Economic Governance KW - Open Coordination KW - Experimentalism Y1 - 2015 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b1570-opus4-23350 SN - ISSN 1831-4066 PB - Academy of European Law / European University Institute ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Dawson, Mark ED - Cremona, Marise ED - Azoulai, Loic T1 - New Modes of Governance in the EU after the Euro Crisis: Retired or Re-born? T2 - EU Legal Acts: Challenges and Transformations Y1 - 2017 N1 - forthcoming PB - Oxford University Press CY - Oxford ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - Augenstein, Daniel T1 - After Brexit: Time for a Further De-coupling of National and European Citizenship? JF - Verfassungsblog Y1 - 2016 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b1570-opus4-20999 UR - http://verfassungsblog.de/brexit-decoupling-european-national-citizenship U6 - https://doi.org/http://dx.doi.org/10.17176/20160714-114950 ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - de Witte, Bruno ED - Arnull, Anthony T1 - Welfare policy and social inclusion T2 - The Oxford handbook of European Union law KW - welfare, Lisbon Treaty, social welfare law, social welfare policy, social inclusion, Lisbon Strategy policy Y1 - 2015 SN - 978-0-19-967264-6 SP - 964 EP - 990 PB - Oxford Univ. Press CY - Oxford ER - TY - EDBOOK A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - Enderlein, Henrik A1 - Joerges, Christian T1 - The governance report 2015 : Eurozone crisis ; economic governance ; institutional dilemmas ; constitutionalism ; indicators Y1 - 2015 SN - 978-0-19-873431-4 N1 - Available as print in your Hertie Library. Als Druckversion in der Hertie Bibliothek verfügbar. PB - Oxford University Press CY - Oxford ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - de Witte, Floris T1 - From balance to conflict: a new constitution for the EU JF - European Law Journal Y1 - 2015 SN - 1468-0386 VL - 21 IS - 6 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - The Legal and Political Accountability Structure of ‘Post‐Crisis’ EU Economic Governance JF - JCMS: Journal of Common Market Studies N2 - How should decision-making under EU economic governance be understood following the euro-crisis? This article argues, contra existing depictions, that the post-crisis EU has increasingly adopted methods of decision-making in the economic field which marry the decision-making structure of inter-governmentalism with the supervisory and implementation framework of the Community Method. While this ‘post-crisis’ method has arisen for clear reasons – to achieve economic convergence between eurozone states in an environment where previous models of decision-making were unsuitable or unwanted – it also carries important normative implications. Post-crisis governance departs from the mechanisms of legal and political accountability present in previous forms of EU decision-making without substituting new models of accountability in their place. Providing appropriate channels of political and legal control in the EU's ‘new’ economic governance should be seen as a crucial task for the coming decade. Y1 - 2015 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1111/jcms.12248 SN - 0021-9886 VL - 53 IS - 5 SP - 976 EP - 993 ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - Opening Pandora’s Box? The Crisis and the EU Institutions T2 - Beyond the Crisis: The Governance of Europe’s Economic, Political, and Legal Transformation Y1 - 2015 SN - 9780198752868 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198752868.003.0006 PB - Oxford University Press CY - Oxford ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Dawson, Mark A1 - Enderlein, Henrik A1 - Joerges, Christian T1 - Introduction: The Governance of the Transformation of Europe’s Economic, Political, and constitutional Constellation since the Euro Crisis T2 - Beyond the Crisis: The Governance of Europe’s Economic, Political, and Legal Transformation Y1 - 2015 SN - 9780198752868 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198752868.003.0001 PB - Oxford University Press CY - Oxford ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Dawson, Mark T1 - Introduction: Exploratory Governance in the Euro Crisis T2 - The Governance Report 2015 Y1 - 2015 ER -