El diálogo judicial en curso y los poderes del BCE: la sentencia Weiss

Abstract

On the 11 December 2018, the Court of Justice of the EU delivered its preliminary ruling in Weiss, on the legality of the ECB's Public Sector Purchase Programme. The matter had been referred by the German Federal Constitutional Court; this was the second reference ever made by this particular national court, after the landmark case of Gauweiler. And just like Gauweiler before it, Weiss concerns the powers of the European Central Bank and, more broadly, the conflict between different

All Along the Watch Tower: The European Central Bank and Legitimation Strategies in Times of Crisis

“…This is partly because the monetary policy programmes and decisions by the ECB during the Eurozone crisis met with criticism for being on the edge of its mandate. This was not least indicated in the so-called Gauweiler case that ended at the European Court of Justice: It concerned the legality of the Outright Monetary Transactions (OMT) programme of the ECB (Hinarejos, 2019); compare below in the article. Also, the Weiss case concerning the validity of the ECB's programme for the purchase of government bonds on secondary markets in light of EU law was a sign of the deep criticism of the institution (Mooij, 2019); compare below in the article for more on this initiative.…”

“…The programme meant that the ECB could buy assets in the form of bonds from banks in the member countries. This was again done with the aim of restoring economic growth within the EU, but it also created doubts about the ECB's politicisation and actual independence from the political system (Hinarejos, 2019), which can also be seen in relation to the increased frequencies in references to both output and throughput legitimacy in the speeches in 2015.…”