Lawyering Europe

European Law as a Transnational Social Field

Antoine Vauchez, Bruno de Witte, Antoine Vauchez, Bruno de Witte

• Publisher: Hart Publishing
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN:
  9781849463782
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9781782250937
• Topic: Law
• Subtopic: Legal Profession
• Index: Law

While scholarly writing has dealt with the role of law in the process of European integration, so far it has shed little light on the lawyers and communities of lawyers involved in that process. Law has been one of the most thoroughly investigated aspects of the European integration process, and EU law has become a well-established academic discipline, with the emergence more recently of an impressive body of legal and political science literature on 'European law in context'. Yet this field has been dominated by an essentially judicial narrative, focused on the role of the European courts, underestimating in the process the multifaceted roles lawyers and law play in the EU polity, notably the roles they play beyond the litigation arena. This volume seeks to promote a deeper understanding of European law as a social and political phenomenon, presenting a more complete view of the European legal field by looking beyond the courts, and at the same time broadening the scholarly horizon by exploring the ways in which European law is actually made. To do this it describes the roles of the great variety of actors who stand behind legal norms and decisions, bringing together perspectives from various disciplines (law, political science, political sociology and history), to offer a global multi-disciplinary reassessment of the role of 'law' and 'lawyers' in the European integration process.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Prelims
• Contents
• List of Contributors
• Introduction. Euro-lawyering, Transnational Social Fields and European Polity-Building
• Part I. Repeat Players
• 1. 'Ten Majestic Figures in Long Amaranth Robes': The Formation of the Court of Justice of the European Communities
• 2. The Role of Legal Services in the Elaboration of European Legislation
• 3. From the Margins of the European Legal Field: The Governments' Agents and their Influence on the Development of European Union Law
• Part II. Centres and Peripheries
• 4. Courts United? On European Judicial Networks
• 5. European Union Law: A Unified Academic Discipline?
• 6. The ECHR and the Birth of (European) Human Rights Law as an Academic Discipline
• Part III. European Elites and their Legal Credentials
• 7. Where Have all the Lawyers Gone? Structure and Transformations of Top European Commission Officials' Legal Training
• 8. The Creation of Institutional Expertise at the European Parliament: Legal and Political Resources of the Members of the Constitutional Affairs Committee
• 9. Law and Lawyers in the Brussels World of Commercial Consultants
• Part IV. The Disputed Role of Law in the Government of Europe
• 10. The Power of Legal Knowledge in the Reform of Fundamental Law: The Case of the European Charter of Fundamental Rights
• 11. Soft Law and the Rule of Law in the European Union: Revision or Redundancy?
• 12. Eurolegalism and the European Legal Field
• 13. Opportunities and Limits of a Weak Field: Lawyers and the Genesis of a Field of European Economic Power
• Index