Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-s2hrs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-17T20:14:33.512Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Judicial Independence and Political Uncertainty: How the Risk of Override Affects the Court of Justice of the EU

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2016

Olof Larsson  and
Daniel Naurin
Get access

Abstract

There is broad agreement in the literature that international courts (ICs) make decisions with bounded discretion in relation to state governments. However, the scope of this discretion, and the determinants of its boundaries, are highly contested. In particular, the central mechanism in separation-of-powers models of judicial politics—the possibility of legislative override—has raised controversy. We argue that the uncertainty that judges face regarding the political reactions to their decisions has important and undertheorized implications for their behavior. On the one hand, cautious judges are likely to be attentive to signals that contain information about the probability of an unfavorable override. On the other hand, misjudgments of the political risks are likely to be made. Thus, the possibility of override is a significant factor affecting judicial behavior, but it is also a fairly blunt mechanism for balancing the independence and accountability of courts. The empirical study focuses on the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), which has long been at the center of theory development regarding the legalization of world politics and the rise of international courts. The results demonstrate a strong correlation between the CJEU's rulings and the political signals it receives, in a pattern that goes beyond legal merit, and that fits with the override mechanism. State governments are crucial parts of the broader audience that defines the political boundaries of judicial discretion.

Type
Research Article
Information
International Organization , Volume 70 , Issue 2 , Spring 2016 , pp. 377 - 408
Copyright
Copyright © The IO Foundation 2016 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Alter, Karen J. 1998. Who Are the “Masters of the Treaty”?: European Governments and the European Court of Justice. International Organization 52 (1):121–47.Google Scholar
Alter, Karen J. 2008. Agents or Trustees? International Courts in Their Political Context. European Journal of International Relations 14 (1):33–63.Google Scholar
Alter, Karen J. 2014. The New Terrain of International Law: Courts, Politics, Rights. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Bailey, Michael A., and Maltzman, Forrest. 2008. Does Legal Doctrine Matter? Unpacking Law and Policy Preferences on the US Supreme Court. American Political Science Review 102 (3):369–84.Google Scholar
Bailey, Michael A., and Maltzman, Forrest. 2011. The Constrained Court: Law, Politics, and the Decisions Justices Make. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Barr, Jason, and Passarelli, Francesco. 2009. Who Has the Power in the EU? Mathematical Social Sciences 57 (3):339–66.Google Scholar
Baum, Lawrence. 2006. Judges and Their Audiences: A Perspective on Judicial Behavior. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Bergara, Mario, Richman, Barak, and Spiller, Pablo T.. 2003. Modeling Supreme Court Strategic Decision Making: The Congressional Constraint. Legislative Studies Quarterly 28 (2):247–80.Google Scholar
Burley, Anne-Marie, and Mattli, Walter. 1993. Europe Before the Court: A Political Theory of Legal Integration. International Organization 47 (1):41–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carrubba, Clifford J., Gabel, Matthew, and Hankla, Charles. 2008. Judicial Behavior Under Political Constraints: Evidence from the European Court of Justice. American Political Science Review 102 (4):435–52.Google Scholar
Carrubba, Clifford J., Gabel, Matthew, and Hankla, Charles. 2012. Understanding the Role of the European Court of Justice in European Integration. American Political Science Review 106 (1):214–23.Google Scholar
Clark, Tom S. 2011. The Limits of Judicial Independence. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Dahl, Robert A. 1957. Decision-Making in a Democracy: The Supreme Court as a National Policy-Maker. Journal of Public Law 6:279–95.Google Scholar
Davies, Bill, and Rasmussen, Morten. 2012. Towards a New History of European Law. Contemporary European History 21 (3):305–18.Google Scholar
Davies, Gareth. 2014. Legislative Control of the European Court of Justice. Common Market Law Review 51 (6):1579–607.Google Scholar
Elsig, Manfred, and Pollack, Mark A.. 2014. Agents, Trustees, and International Courts: The Politics of Judicial Appointment at the World Trade Organization. European Journal of International Relations 20 (2):391–415.Google Scholar
Epstein, Lee. 1998. The Choices Justices Make. Washington, DC: CQ Press.Google Scholar
Epstein, Lee, and Segal, Jeffrey A.. 2005. Advice and Consent: The Politics of Judicial Appointments. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Ferejohn, John, and Kramer, Larry D.. 2006. Judicial Independence in a Democracy: Institutionalizing Judicial Restraint. In Norms and the Law, edited by Drobak, John N., 161–207. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ferejohn, John, and Weingast, Barry R.. 1992. A Positive Theory of Statutory Interpretation. International Journal of Law and Economics 12 (2):263–79.Google Scholar
Garrett, Geoffrey R. 1995. The Politics of Legal Integration in the European Union. International Organization 49 (1):171–81.Google Scholar
Garrett, Geoffrey R., Kelemen, Daniel R., and Schulz, Heiner. 1998. The European Court of Justice, National Governments, and Legal Integration in the European Union. International Organization 52 (1):149–76.Google Scholar
Ginsburg, Tom. 2005. Bounded Discretion in International Judicial Lawmaking. Virginia Journal of International Law 45 (3):1–42.Google Scholar
Ginsburg, Tom. 2014. Political Constraints on International Courts. In The Oxford Handbook of International Adjudication, edited by Romano, Cesare P.R., Alter, Karen J., and Shany, Yuval, 483–502. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Harvey, Anna, and Friedman, Barry. 2006. Pulling Punches: Congressional Constraints on the Supreme Court's Constitutional Rulings, 1987–2000. Legislative Studies Quarterly 31 (4):533–62.Google Scholar
Hatzopoulos, Vassilis, and Hervey, Tamara. 2013. Coming into Line: The EU's Court Softens on Cross-Border Health Care. Health Economics, Policy and Law 8 (1):1–5.Google Scholar
Helfer, Laurence R., and Slaughter, Anne-Marie. 2005. Why States Create International Tribunals: A Response to Professors Posner and Yoo. California Law Review 93 (3):899–956.Google Scholar
Höpner, Martin, and Schäfer, Armin. 2012. Embeddedness and Regional Integration: Waiting for Polanyi in a Hayekian Setting. International Organization 66 (3):429–55.Google Scholar
Kelemen, Daniel R. 2001. The Limits of Judicial Power Trade-Environment Disputes in the GATT/WTO and the EU. Comparative Political Studies 34 (6):622–50.Google Scholar
Kelemen, Daniel R. 2012. The Political Foundations of Judicial Independence in the European Union. Journal of European Public Policy 19 (1):43–58.Google Scholar
Keohane, Robert O., Moravcsik, Andrew, and Slaughter, Anne-Marie. 2000. Legalized Dispute Resolution: Interstate and Transnational. International Organization 54 (3):457–88.Google Scholar
King, Gary, and Zeng, Langche. 2006. The Dangers of Extreme Counterfactuals. Political Analysis 14 (2):131–59.Google Scholar
Kleine, Mareike. 2013. Informal Governance in the European Union: How Governments Make International Organizations Work. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Lombard, Matthew, Snyder-Duch, Jennifer, and Bracken, Cheryl Campanella. 2002. Content Analysis in Mass Communication: Assessment and Reporting of Intercoder Reliability. Human Communication Research 28 (4):587–604.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lupu, Yonatan. 2013. International Judicial Legitimacy: Lessons from National Courts. Theoretical Inquiries in Law 14 (2):437–54.Google Scholar
Maduro, Miguel Poiares. 1998. We, the Court: The European Court of Justice and the European Economic Constitution. Oxford, UK: Hart.Google Scholar
Martinsen, Dorte Sindberg. 2015. An Ever More Powerful Court? The Political Constraints of Legal Integration in the European Union. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Mattli, Walter, and Slaughter, Anne-Marie. 1995. Law and Politics in the European Union: A Reply to Garrett. International Organization 49 (1):183–90.Google Scholar
Naurin, Daniel, Cramér, Per, Larsson, Olof, Lyons, Sara, Moberg, Andreas, and Östlund, Allison. 2013. Coding Observations of the Member States and Judgments of the Court of Justice of the EU Under the Preliminary Reference Procedure 1997–2008. CERGU Working Paper 2013:1. Gothenburg, Sweden: University of Gothenburg.Google Scholar
Owens, Ryan J. 2010. The Separation of Powers and Supreme Court Agenda Setting. American Journal of Political Science 54 (2):412–27.Google Scholar
Pescatore, Pierre. 1983. The Doctrine of “Direct Effect”: An Infant Disease of Community Law. European Law Review 8 (3):155–77.Google Scholar
Pollack, Mark A. 2003. The Engines of European Integration: Delegation, Agency, and Agenda Setting in the EU. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Pollack, Mark A. 2013. The New EU Legal History: What's New, What's Missing? American University International Law Review 28 (5):1257–310.Google Scholar
Posner, Eric A., and Yoo, John C.. 2005. Judicial Independence in International Tribunals. California Law Review 93 (1):1–74.Google Scholar
Scharpf, Fritz W. 2010. The Asymmetry of European Integration, or Why the EU Cannot Be a “Social Market Economy.” Socio-Economic Review 8 (2):211–50.Google Scholar
Schulz, Heiner, and König, Thomas. 2000. Institutional Reform and Decision-Making Efficiency in the European Union. American Journal of Political Science 44 (4):653–66.Google Scholar
Segal, Jeffrey A. 1997. Separation-of-Powers Games in the Positive Theory of Congress and Courts. American Political Science Review 91 (1):28–44.Google Scholar
Segal, Jeffrey A., and Spaeth, Harold J.. 2002. The Supreme Court and the Attitudinal Model Revisited. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Segal, Jeffrey A., Westerland, Chad, and Lindquist, Stefanie A.. 2011. Congress, the Supreme Court, and Judicial Review: Testing a Constitutional Separation of Powers Model. American Journal of Political Science 55 (1):89–104.Google Scholar
Staton, Jeffrey K., and Moore, Will H.. 2011. Judicial Power in Domestic and International Politics. International Organization 65 (3):553–87.Google Scholar
Stein, Eric. 1981. Lawyers, Judges, and the Making of a Transnational Constitution. American Journal of International Law 75 (1):1–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steinberg, Richard H. 2004. Judicial Law-Making at the WTO: Discursive, Constitutional, and Political Constraints. American Journal of International Law 98 (2):247–75.Google Scholar
Stone Sweet, Alec. 2004. The Judicial Construction of Europe. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stone Sweet, Alec, and Brunell, Thomas L.. 1998. Constructing a Supranational Constitution: Dispute Resolution and Governance in the European Union. American Political Science Review 92 (1):63–81.Google Scholar
Stone Sweet, Alec, and Brunell, Thomas L.. 2012. The European Court of Justice, State Noncompliance, and the Politics of Override. American Political Science Review 106 (1):204–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stone Sweet, Alec, and Brunell, Thomas L.. 2013. Trustee Courts and the Judicialization of International Regimes: The Politics of Majoritarian Activism in the ECHR, the EU, and the WTO. Journal of Law and Courts 1 (1):61–88.Google Scholar
Thomson, Robert. 2011. Resolving Controversy in the European Union. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tsebelis, George, and Garrett, Geoffrey. 2001. The Institutional Foundations of Intergovernmentalism and Supranationalism in the European Union. International Organization 55 (2):357–90.Google Scholar
Uribe, Alicia, Spriggs, James F. II, and Hansford, Thomas G.. 2014. The Influence of Congressional Preferences on Legislative Overrides of Supreme Court Decisions. Law and Society Review 48 (4):921–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vauchez, Antoine. 2012. Keeping the Dream Alive: The European Court of Justice and the Transnational Fabric of Integrationist Jurisprudence. European Political Science Review 4 (1):51–71.Google Scholar
Voeten, Erik. 2007. The Politics of International Judicial Appointments: Evidence from the European Court of Human Rights. International Organization 61 (4):669–701.Google Scholar
Voeten, Erik. 2009. The Politics of International Judicial Appointments. Chicago Journal of International Law 9 (2):387–406.Google Scholar
Voeten, Erik. 2013. International Judicial Independence. In Interdisciplinary Perspectives on International Law and International Relations: The State of the Art, edited by Dunoff, Jeffrey L., and Pollack, Mark A., 421–44. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Weiler, Joseph H.H. 1994. A Quiet Revolution: The European Court of Justice and Its Interlocutors. Comparative Political Studies 26 (4):510–34.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Larsson and Naurin supplementary material

Appendix

Download Larsson and Naurin supplementary material(File)
File 594.4 KB