National Courts and EU Law: New Issues, Theories and Methods

National Courts and EU Law examines both how and why national courts and judges are involved in the process of legal integration within the European Union.

As well as reviewing conventional thinking, the book presents new legal and empirical insights into the issue of judicial behaviour in this process. The expert contributors provide a critical analysis of the key questions, examining the role of national courts in relation to the application of various EU legal instruments.

This insightful and discerning book offers a fresh discourse on the functioning of national courts as decentralised EU courts and a new thematic for revising some older understandings of how national judges apply EU law.

Organised into three key sections, the interdisciplinary chapters combine approaches and theories originating from law, political science, sociology and economics. The first section addresses issues relating to judicial dialogue and EU legal mandates, the second looks at the topic of EU law in national courts and the third considers national courts’ roles in protecting fundamental rights in the area of freedom, security and justice.

The analysis of each is enriched through diverse research methods such as case-law analysis, citation network analysis, interviews, surveys and statistics.