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Europe and the Loss of Sovereignty1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 January 2008

Konrad Schiemann
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Abstract

The concept of sovereignty plays too large a part in contemporary discussion. No nation is sovereign in the sense that it is free to do what it wants within its own borders and not subject to influences from outside. It is not self evident either that political systems have to be hierarchically organized or that there should be one final arbiter of law for all decisions. There are advantages in having different centres of power for decisions affecting differing matters. There is a case for the co-existence of overlapping power centres and for sharing in decision-making and being prepared to live with a decision which does not in itself reflect the wishes of your State. There are advantages in being part of a larger conglomerate. The State can then have some influence and control over what goes on outside its boundaries. There is no reason why that conglomerate should itself be a large sovereign State. The European Union offers the hope of transcending the sovereign State rather than simply replicating it in some new superstate. It may prove to be a model and an inspiration.

Type
Articles
Information
International & Comparative Law Quarterly , Volume 56 , Issue 3 , July 2007 , pp. 475 - 489
Copyright
Copyright © British Institute of International and Comparative Law 2007

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References

1 My interest in the subject-matter of this article was stimulated 40 years ago by Werner von Simson, Souveränität im rechtlichen Verstand der Gegenwart. I am also indebted to three outstanding recent books: Philip Bobbitt, The shield of Achilles–War, Peace and the Course of History, a collection of essays in European Constitutionalism Beyond the State (edited by JHH Weiler and Marlene Wind) and Neil MacCormick, Questioning Sovereignty. I shall refer to them in the footnotes to what follows as Bobbitt, W&W and MacCormick.

2 Wind in W&W 126.Google Scholar

3 Bobbitt, 487.Google Scholar

4 Wind in W&W 124.Google Scholar

5 ibid.

6 Vattel cited by Philip, Allott in W&W 212.Google Scholar

7 Allott, op cit 210.Google Scholar

8 Renaud, Dehousse in W&W 139.Google Scholar

9 Maduro in W&W 81.Google Scholar

10 Poiares Maduro in W&W 84.Google Scholar

11 Dehousse in W&W 138.Google Scholar

12 MacCormick, 135.Google Scholar

13 Wind in W&W 124.Google Scholar

14 Advocate General at the European Court of Justice.

15 W&W 100.Google Scholar

16 MacCormick, 94.Google Scholar

17 ibid at 191.

18 Wind in W&W 127.Google Scholar

19 W&W 20 ff.

20 ibid 22.

21 ibid at 126.

22 W&W 98.Google Scholar