The legitimacy of exits from the European Union

Abstract

Justifications for extending the Union's boundaries to include new Member States have been much discussed. Only since the Brexit referendum have justifications for shrinking the Union's boundaries through withdrawals of Member States received the same attention. This paper uses concepts of historical responsibility to ask whether decisions Member States take together constrain the manner in which any one of them can justifiably exit the Union? It argues that much depends on how far Members States make laws together that are important to the lives of their citizens; that preempt their subsequent choices; and which affect their ability to manage collective action problems.

Principled resistance and future of the ECtHR

“…1 The possibility for each participating state to continue to withdraw from the obligations assumed during the ratification of the treaty is an important form of dissent which entails the relative legal and political consequences. Obviously, as can be understood in international practice, withdrawal is the last resort not frequent enough and questionable (Hill, 1982;Vahlas, 2005;Priollaud, Siritzky, 2005;Piris, 2006;Louis, 2006;Athanassiou, 2009;Hofmeister, 2010;De Bùrca & Weiler, 2011;Craig & De Bùrca, 2011;Tatham, 2012;Nicolaides, 2013;Auvret-Finck, 2013;Bosse-Platière & Rapoport, 2014;Emmert & Petrovi, 2014;Loth & Paun, 2014;Caddous, 2015;Grosclaude, 2015;Barnard, 2016;Hillion, 2016;Łazowski, 2016;Čapeta, 2016;Craig, 2016;Eeckhout & Frantziou, 2017;Nicolaides & Roy, 2017;Haguenau-Moizard & Mestre, 2017;Closa, 2017;Lord, 2017;Mangas Martìn, 2018;Schütze & Tridimas, 2018;Hatje et al, 2018;Aloupi et al, 2019;Schwarze et al, 2019;Huysmans, 2019;Kellerbauer et al, 2019;Berry et al, 2019;Bradford, 2020;Fitzmaurice & Merkouris, 2020) 2 especially when it comes to matters of human rights and economic relations ...…”

Sovereignism and its Implication: The Differentiated Disintegration of the European Union

“…Indeed, in the other EU member states, the Brexit referendum ended up generating the unintended effect of undermining the appeal of national independence, although it has not weakened the nationalistic narrative. Although fully legitimate, the UK's exit from the EU has remained 'a case in itself' (Lord 2017), epitomizing a sort of swan song: the defeat of independent nationalism exactly when it appeared to have won. This has had unexpected consequences for nationalism.…”

The Democratic Ambivalence of EU Disintegration: A Mapping of Costs and Benefits

“…Against this background, democratic theory shows a growing interest in the legitimacy of disintegration. The existing literature primarily deals with (or at least responds to) the Brexit case and asks to what extent the UK’s withdrawal from the EU can be considered legitimate, and how its ramifications, both for individuals and collectives, should be addressed (Bellamy 2019; Huber 2019; Kostakopoulou 2018; Kröger 2019; Lord 2017; Morgan 2016; Olsen and Rostbøll 2017). What is missing, however, is an analysis that extends beyond Brexit and takes the debate to a more general level by comparing the democratic implications of different possible forms of disintegration.…”