Europe's Constitutional Challenges in the Light of the Recent Case Law of National Constitutional Courts

This collection contains contributions to an international conference held in Madrid in October 2010. It is based on the view that the European Union and its constitutional law cannot be isolated from its Member States and their respective constitutions, which are part of European constitutional law, and that the case law of the national courts, in particular the constitutional and supreme courts of the Member States, needs to be considered as much as the jurisprudence of the European Court of Justice. It is important to give particular attention to the relevant national constitutional courts' jurisprudence when analyzing European constitutional law. The book demonstrates the seriousness and theoretical depth of the thoughts developed by these courts to grasp the EU's construction and its relation to the Member States, the concepts of primacy of European law, sovereignty and national identity, democracy, and citizens' rights. The comparison of recent case law of the constitutional and supreme courts shows great divergences in concepts and terms, but it makes visible also an emerging dialogue among the courts.