The Common Commercial Policy Since The Lisbon Treaty

Law and Practice of the Common Commercial Policy provides a comprehensive analysis of the salient features of the European Union’s trade law and policy since the Treaty of Lisbon: legislation, case law, treaty making and institutional practice.

Présentation de l'éditeur : "Law and Practice of the Common Commercial Policy provides a critical analysis of the European Union (EU)'s trade law and policy since the Treaty of Lisbon. In particular, it analyses the salient changes brought by the Treaty of Lisbon to the Common Commercial Policy (CCP), focussing on the relevant case law of the Court of Justice of the European Union (ECJ), EU free trade agreements, investment protection, trade defence, institutional developments and the nexus between the CCP and other EU policies. The volume brings together a group of distinguished authors, including former and current members of the ECJ, practitioners, officials from EU institutions and Member States and leading scholars in the area of EU trade and external relations law."

Since the beginning of the process of European integration the EU Common Commercial Policy (CCP) has been one of the most dynamic political fields. The EU has achieved a leading role among the economic superpowers and is regarded as a single economic area in which the EU speaks also on behalf of its Member States for most aspects of external economic politics. This volume analyzes the implications of the Treaty of Lisbon for the Common Commercial Policy of the EU. The Lisbon Treaty has declared all matters concerning external commercial policy as exclusive competences of the EU. Which consequences does this have for the Member States of the EU? With regard to institutional modifications, the Lisbon Treaty has significantly strengthened the role of the European Parliament and has substantially changed the role of the ‘High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy’ (HR). Further topics of this volume are the new normative framework of the CCP, inter alia the linkage of the CCP to the general objectives for the EU’s external actions and its dependence on secondary legislation, as well as investment policy now being part of the CCP.

This comprehensive book provides a thorough analytical overview of the European Union’s existing law and policy in the field of international trade. Considering the history and context of the law’s evolution, it offers an adept examination of its common commercial policy competence through the years, starting with the Treaty of Rome up until the Treaty of Lisbon, as a background for understanding the EU’s present role in the World Trade Organization (WTO) framework.

Volume 8 of the EYIEL focuses on the external economic relations of the European Union as one of the most dynamic political fields in the process of European integration. The first part of this volume analyses the recent controversial questions of the external economic relations of the Union, dealing with the complexity of mixed agreements, transparency and legitimacy issues as well as recent proposals in relation to Investor-State-Dispute Settlement, the Trade Defence Instruments and the implications of the “Brexit” in this context. The second part of EYIEL 8 addresses ongoing bilateral and multilateral negotiations of the EU with China, Japan, Australia, Canada and Taiwan. Moreover, the third part deals with the EU in international organisations and institutions, in particular the recent institutional aspects of the EU-UN relationship, representation in the IMF as well as WTO jurisprudence involving the EU in 2015. The volume concludes with reviews of recent books in international economic law.

The first 16 months of the EU's common commercial policy (CCP) in the post-Lisbon period provide indicative insights into how the European Parliament, the European Commission and the Council of Ministers interpret their respective roles under the new legal framework introduced by the Lisbon Treaty. This paper analyses the amendments, the institutional capacities to respond to the reform challenges and the evolving institutional balance applying to Lisbon-era common commercial policy. Against this backdrop, the paper gives an overview of the changing dynamics of EU trade and investment policy in a context of enhanced politicization resulting from the European Parliament's involvement in the decision-making process. Particular importance is given to the question whether enhanced EP involvement in decision-making has the potential to lead to a scenario resembling the policy process in the United States, where congressional responsibility for trade and investment policy has resulted in the capture of the policy agenda by special interest groups and snail-paced policy progress (if any) in recent years. Accordingly, the paper scrutinizes the political preferences that the European Parliament is introducing into current European trade policy debates as well as the framework legislation and trade agreements. Finally, it is argued that parliamentary involvement in making common commercial policy has the potential to narrow the gap between European public political preferences and perceptions, on the one hand, and actual EU trade policies on the other, and to place EU trade and investment policies on a foundation of renewed public political support. In the author's view, however, it is imperative that such an achievement is based on well-informed, responsible, sustainable and clearly communicated policy proposals from the MEPs, who respond to and seek to balance the multiplicity of interests of CCP stakeholders in European civil society and respect the Unions international obligations.

This book offers the first thorough legal analysis of the practice of mixity since the Lisbon Treaty, providing the perspectives of international, EU, and national law. It sets out a detailed theoretical understanding of mixity, the common commercial policy, and the recent case law of the EU Court of Justice. It assesses recent practice and current challenges, such as the non-ratification of mixed agreements, ensuring parliamentary participation in EU treaty-making, the new architecture for concluding EU trade and investment agreements, as well as the new trade agreement between the EU and the UK post-Brexit. In so doing, the author argues that in the field of trade and investment, mixity is no longer a procedural technique to overcome legal uncertainties about competence allocations between the EU and the Member States. Instead, mixity has become a deliberate substantive design choice. This brings a fresh and innovative perspective to a key tenet of EU external relations law.

In sum, it provides the reader with an introduction into the field of international trade regulation from an EU perspective. Presented within the context of the long-standing institutional debate and using case studies on the operation of the CCP in the 1990s, this book facilitates a deeper understanding of the challenges facing Europe in the 21st century.

International trade governance has traditionally aspired to the creation of a multilateral global trade system. However, also in reaction to the slow pace of the multilateral agenda, some players have started boosting bilateral/regional approaches to liberalization as alternative avenues for achieving economic gains from improved international trade liberalization. In this context, some features of the recently negotiated European Union's comprehensive bilateral/regional free trade agreements (“FTAs”) deserve a particular analysis. Not only because their content reflects a new approach in European common commercial policy as compared to the past, but also because they raise some issues as regards their impact on European legal order and on the future of multilateral trade system in general. The paper tries to offer an overview of some significant features of the new generation EU-negotiated FTAs, looking at the new competences conferred upon the European Union by the Lisbon Treaty in the common commercial policy domain. It shall provide some insights on the effects of such agreements on European Union legal order, focusing on the possibility to invoke their direct applicability before European and member States courts, and draw some critical considerations on issues of European governance connected to their conclusion.