The European constitutional challenge – The Europe of ‘then’ and ‘now’

Joseph H H Weiler and Andreas P Müller

Chapter 25 in Research Handbook on European Constitutional Law, 2026, pp 455-482 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: Time waits for no man – let alone his institutions. In the last 50 years, the European Union has evolved in manifold ways, shaping the institution we know today. Yet both the Union and its powerful Court of Justice share a common and persistent legal and political basis, a double helix that arose in the Foundational Era. Its two central elements, Pescatorian Hermeneutics and Governance Functionalism, enabled the Union to flourish in the past. However, their continued expression may impede further maturation, and perhaps even endanger the European Project in the present. Through exploration of these phenomena, we argue that the judicial approach to questions of constitutional weight has largely remained the same. We furthermore contend that this retrogressivity is, in many cases, inappropriate to the current circumstance of the Union and humbly offer an alternative solution to such disputes.

Keywords: CJEU; Constitutional DNA; Hermeneutics; Competences; Mixed Grand Chamber; Jurisprudence (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
ISBN: 9781802207866
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