The book considers the changes which national sovereignty has undergone through the supranational European integration. In various contributions by renowned academics and high judges demonstrate the serious impacts of supranationality on the EU member states and even on third countries which are connected with the EU by international treaties. It becomes clear that primacy of EU law, the most significant expression of supra-nationality, collides with national sovereignty as anchored in the national constitutions. The studies clearly show that most member states do not fully deny EU law primacy but are aware of the need to find an adequate balance between the supranational and the national orders. The result from the analyses of the authors from various European countries is that the upcoming constitutional paradigm is "constitutional identity", a concept established by jurisprudence in Germany, France, Czech Republic (without being named so) and debated also in Poland which, herself, denies supranational impact on the national Constitution entirely.

Studies on selected EU member states clarify the specific national approaches towards the limitations of their sovereignty as developed by the constitutional jurisprudence (Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania, Italy, Germany with comparative references to United Kingdom and France). It is illuminated that traditionally strong sovereignty concepts (UK, France) are considerably relativized and functionally opened towards the integration challenges. Basic issues are furthermore reflected, such as the supranational impact on the State's power to reform its Constitution, the relation of national and constitutional identity and the national and supranational perspectives of identity. The book also includes Europe beyond the EU by research on the supranational character of association treaties (from a Ukrainian perspective) and on the Europeanization of a third country preparing EU membership (Albania).

Inhalt

Foreword.- 1. Limitation of Sovereignty by European Integration: the German Experience in a Comparative View; Rainer Arnold.- 2. European Integration and Limitation of Power of Constitutional Reform; Francisco Balaguer Callejon.- 3. National and Constitutional Identity as al Legal and Political Instrument; Luca Mezzetti.- 4. National identity and market freedoms after the Treaty of Lisbon; Sinisa Rodin.- 5. The European Union in the Constittutional Framework of Member States: The Italian Case; Diana-Urania Galetta.- 6. Limitation of Sovereignty by the European Integration - the Polish approach; Boguslaw Banaszak.- 7. The Transfer of Sovereignty in the case-law of the Hungarian Constitutional Court; Peter Kovacs.- 8. An 'Entirely-Specific' Situation or a Routine Limitation of National Autonomy? Slovak Pension XVII of the Czech Constitutional Court; Jiri Zemanek.- 9. The Infra-Constitutionality of European Law in Romania and the Challenges of the Romanian Constitutional Culture; Manuel Gutan.- 10. Europeanization of Albanian Constitutional Law; Arta Vorpsi.- 11. The Supranational Character of the Association Agreements; Viktor Muraviov.