LAW 338 - European Union Law

Human rights, democracy and the rule of law are core values of the European Union. Embedded in its founding treaty, they were reinforced when the EU adopted the Charter of Fundamental Rights in 2000, and strengthened still further when the Charter became legally binding with the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty in 2009. In this course, after a brief introduction of European integration, the course provides a general approach of the framework and functioning of the legal system of the European Union, introducing a general study on the decision-making process, the distribution of power between member states and the EU, and the principles that govern the relationship between the legal systems of the EU and its member states. Then the course will focus its attention on the human rights policy developed by the EU in the last years. We will study this main policy looking at the European Court of Justice leading cases on this subject and at the same time we will cover the main case law of the European Court of Human Rights reviewing EU Law and the interaction between both European Courts of Justice.