The Court of Justice of the European Union for hedgehogs

The Court of Justice of the European Union has been a principal actor of the development of the European Union legal system. Its achievements have been extraordinary and the Court enjoys considerable interpretive authority. Sustaining coherence of the case law has been understood as a vital constitutional responsibility of the Court.
This article explores whether autonomy, defined as an idea of a new legal order with its distinct ontological and axiological character, can be understood as the single, universal, organizing meta vision in terms of which all that the Court does has significance. It is submitted that autonomy serves as an organizing principle, it makes the case law of the Court comprehensible and offers both a better ex ante insight of what is to be expected from the Court in terms of its decision-making as well ex post explanation of the Court’s judgments. Autonomy can be understood as representing the single synoptic vision of coherence and integrity of the Court. A reconstruction of the case law of the Court in light of such a vision offers a starting-point for legal investigation of the jurisprudence of the Court.

Jean Monnet Working Paper Series 1/21