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BENCHMARKING, SAFEGUARD CLAUSES AND VERIFICATION MECHANISMS - WHAT’S IN A NAME? RECENT DEVELOPMENTS IN PRE- AND POST-ACCESSION CONDITIONALITY AND COMPLIANCE WITH EU LAW
Martina Spernbauer
Sažetak
This article looks upon the most recent developments in the European Union’s
accession strategies, as from the start of accession negotiations. It first seeks to
demonstrate that the pre-accession conditionality rationale of stabilising present and
protecting future integration objectives underpins the so-called ‘specific safeguard
clauses’ of the 2003 and 2005 Acts of Accession and the latter’s cooperation and
verification mechanism, accordingly referred to as post-accession conditionality tools. It
then argues that this rationale, emphasised also in the imperative of maintaining the
momentum of European integration of the Union’s ‘integration capacity’, above all
necessitates effective compliance with EU law, and thus full administrative and judicial
capacity of (prospective) Member States. Indeed, the lynchpin of these new conditionality
devices evokes putting them in the wider context of compliance mechanisms in the
enlarged European Union. It thereby becomes apparent how conditionality has lead to a
considerable empowerment of the European Commission which, when reaching into the
post-accession phase, entails a problematic differentiation between the Member States.
Conditionality methodology furthermore, and this is equally shown, has had an impact
on the Commission’s role as ‘guardian of the treaty’ within the overall system of
ensuring compliance with EU law.
Ključne riječi
Hrčak ID:
28562
URI
Datum izdavanja:
2.11.2007.
Posjeta: 1.201 *