Overview

The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has become famed - and often shamed - for its political power. In scholarly literature, this supranational court has been regarded as a 'master of integration' for its capacity to strengthen integration, sometimes against the will of member states. In the public debate, the CJEU has been severely criticized for extending EU competences at the expense of the member states. In An Ever More Powerful Court? The Political Constraints of Legal Integration in the European Union, Dorte Sindbjerg Martinsen challenges these views with her careful examination of how judicial-legislative interactions determine the scope and limits of European integration in the daily EU decision-making process. Methodologically, the book takes a step forward in the examination of judicial influence, suggesting a 'law attainment' approach as a novel method, combined with a large set of interviews with the current decision-makers of social Europe. Through a study of social policy developments from 1957 to 2014, as well as a critical analysis of three case studies - EU regulation of working time; patients' rights in cross-border healthcare; and EU posting of worker regulations - Martinsen reveals the dynamics behind legal and political integration and the CJEU's ability to foster political change for a European Union social policy.

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9780198753391

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Reviews

'This excellent book provides a convincing corrective to the apolitical accounts of judicial supremacy that have dominated debates about European legal integration and the power of the Court of Justice of the European Union. Advancing the novel theoretical insight that the EU legislative process makes both codifying and overruling the Court equally difficult, its detailed process tracing of a highly salient domain demonstrates how political and judicial institutions interact to produce particular social policies.' Lisa Conant, University of Denver 'This book is an outstanding piece of work. It intervenes in the scholarly controversy between the 'dynamic view' and the 'constrained view' of Court activism and political judicialization, and while taking side with the latter, it offers an original and persuasive re-specification of such view which forwards the frontiers of analysis and debate.' Maurizio Ferrera, University of Milan 'This book has the potential of becoming a landmark in European policy research. By focusing on the interaction between the Court and political legislation it goes far beyond the conventional opposition of legal vs. political, technocratic vs. interest-driven, or supranational vs. intergovernmental approaches in accounting for the true complexity and contingency of European social integration.' Fritz W. Scharpf, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies, Cologne

This book has the potential of becoming a landmark in European policy research. By focusing on the interaction between the Court and political legislation it goes far beyond the conventional opposition of legal vs. political, technocratic vs. interest-driven, or supranational vs. intergovernmental approaches in accounting for the true complexity and contingency of European social integration. * Fritz W. Scharpf, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies, Cologne * This book is an outstanding piece of work. It intervenes in the scholarly controversy between the 'dynamic view' and the 'constrained view' of Court activism and political judicialization, and while taking side with the latter, it offers an original and persuasive re-specification of such view which forwards the frontiers of analysis and debate. * Maurizio Ferrera, University of Milan * This excellent book provides a convincing corrective to the apolitical accounts of judicial supremacy that have dominated debates about European legal integration and the power of the Court of Justice of the European Union. Advancing the novel theoretical insight that the EU legislative process makes both codifying and overruling the Court equally difficult, its detailed process tracing of a highly salient domain demonstrates how political and judicial institutions interact to produce particular social policies. * Lisa Conant, University of Denver * Another book on the European Court of Justice? Another exploration of the interaction between law and politics, the Court and the political Institutions in the European Union? Yes, and a remarkable book at that. The great strength of this book is its empirical dimension, its subject matter specificity, and its institutional specificity in examining the relationship between the jurisprudence of the Court and the political branches of the Union. Make no mistake, the research is firmly situated in a conceptual and theoretical foundation, but the main achievement is in the differentiated results of the empirical exploration, which lead to a final nuanced and sophisticated new understanding of the relationship. * Joseph Weiler, European Journal of International Law * Empirically rich and analytically clear and innovative, Martinsen's book speaks to various contemporary literatures on the EU. * Maurizio Ferrera, Journal of European Social Policy * Dorte Martinsen's book is a must-read for political scientists and lawyers alike, if they want to understand how sociological and institutional factors, in short the 'politics of law', frame the European political and social system in a legal field that is anything but unified. * Sabine Saurugger, West European Politics *

Author Information

Dorte Sindbjerg Martinsen is a professor at the University of Copenhagen, Department of Political Science. Her research focuses on EU welfare policies, investigating in particular the interaction between law and politics in European integration and Europeanisation. Her work has appeared in journals such as Public Administration, American Review of Public Administration, Journal of European Public Policy, Journal of Common Market Studies, West European Politics and European Union Politics.

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