Articles for category: AAA General

What’s Missing from the EU AI Act

The AI Act negotiators may still have been recovering from the political deal that was struck during the night of December 8 to 9 when two days later Mistral AI, the French startup, open sourced its potent new large language model, Mixtral 8x7B. Though much smaller in size, it rivals and even surpasses GPT 3.5 on many benchmarks thanks to a cunning architecture combining eight different expert models. While a notable technical feat, this new release epitomizes the most pressing challenges in AI policy today, and starkly highlights the gaps left unaddressed by the AI Act: mandatory basic AI safety standards; the conundrum of open-source models; the environmental impact of AI; and the need to accompany the AI Act with far more substantial public investment in AI.

13. Dezember 2023

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Taking Revenge for Dissent

Hungary’s latest judicial reform in May 2023 came in response to  EU decisions to suspend the country’s access to funds due to serious rule of law concerns. The reform aimed, among other things, to strengthen the independence of the Kúria, the Supreme Court of Hungary. Experience to date shows that while on the level of formal legal rules, some improvements towards the rule of law have been made, in actual daily practice, the opposite is happening: While steps have been taken to restore the independence of the Kúria, the Chief Justice is working on further eroding the independence of individual judges.

13. Dezember 2023

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Why Poland Should Join the European Public Prosecutor

After the Polish parliamentary elections, the question of rebuilding the rule of law in Poland has been frequently raised in academic debate. The discourse is largely dominated by the status of the so-called neo-judges and the legal effects of rulings of the politically appropriated Constitutional Tribunal. We would like to highlight another problem that the new government will have to deal with – the functioning of the public prosecutor's office occupied by people associated with the Law and Justice party. There is a great risk that high-level prosecutors may effectively block or obstruct investigations into the irregularities committed under the PiS government. We believe that a partial solution to this problem might come from Poland's quick accession to the European Public Prosecutor’s Office planned by the democratic opposition.

12. Dezember 2023

Trick and Treat?

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Almost a year has passed since the European Union decided to block the payment of EUR 27 billion in union funds to Hungary under several instruments. Access to the largest part of the frozen funds - altogether EUR 13 billion - depends on whether Hungary complies with its undertakings to strengthen judicial independence. The government claims to have met all four of the so-called super milestones by adopting a judicial package in May 2023 and requests access to the blocked funds under Hungary’s Recovery and Resilience Fund (RRF) and ten different operative programmes. However, upon taking a closer look at the preconditions to the payments and the nature and implementation of the proposed reforms, it becomes clear that Hungary is still playing tricks to avoid compliance.

12. Dezember 2023

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Third Time’s A Charm?

The second process to draft a new constitutional text in Chile ended on November 7. A referendum to be held on December 17 will decide upon the fate of the constitutional proposal that resulted from it. Polls indicate that the proposal will be rejected, even if the option in favor of the proposal has been gaining support lately. Irrespective of the outcome of the referendum, it might be fair to say that this second version of the constituent process has already failed. In particular, I argue that just like the first draft, the second proposal seeks to constitutionally entrench the goals of the political factions that held the majority within the drafting organ, instead of providing a constitutional framework that would allow for broad self-governance based on the democratic principle.

11. Dezember 2023

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The Sound of RBG

The year 2023, which is slowly approaching its end, has marked a twofold jubilee of the late US Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. It is both the 90th anniversary of her birth and the 30th anniversary of her Supreme Court appointment. Her immense impact on US law and culture has been honored in a variety of ways, from a special issue of the Harvard Law Review and a ship’s name to a LEGO figure. One dimension of her remembrance, however, often escapes notice, although it offers a unique understanding of RBG’s legacy. This dimension is classical music. Music history has on many occasions venerated living or recently deceased contemporaries – it is enough to mention Verdi’s Requiem and the tangled ways of Beethoven’s Eroica dedication. It is, however, an extremely rare form of tribute when extended to lawyers for the sake of their legal accomplishments as such. Let's take a look.

8. Dezember 2023

Protecting the Fairness of European Parliament Elections via Preliminary Ruling

Supreme or constitutional courts regularly step in to protect the democratic process by deciding election disputes. It is remarkable that the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has so far barely been engaged concerning the European Parliament (EP) elections. Using Hungary as an example, I will argue in the following that the CJEU is institutionally well-positioned to help protect the integrity of the 2024 EP elections via preliminary ruling procedures. Hungarian democracy has been in decline, according to the EP, the Commission and various democracy indices. The problems include the lack of a level playing field, targeted action by authorities against opposition parties, overlaps between the activities of the government and the governing party, state funding of campaigning and party financing in general, lack of media pluralism, and the different means of voting for citizens living abroad (postal vote for some and not for others). I argue that the CJEU could and should be engaged to protect the fairness of the EP elections in Hungary.

7. Dezember 2023

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The Pilnacek case – A challenge also for the European rule of law

With the “Pilnacek” case, the debate on corruption in Austria – ongoing since the "Ibiza affair" (May 2019) but largely inconclusive so far – is heading for a new high point. The affair showcases massive political influence on the Austrian criminal justice system and proves that it is challenging to bring the problem of corruption under control. One of the main reasons is that Austria has not made the necessary adjustments to the European "acquis communautaire" since its (relatively late) accession to the EU and keeps ignoring fundamental principles of EU law. Since 2000, there have even been setbacks. The case of Christian Pilnacek illustrates the problem of corruption in Austria in an exemplary manner. Likewise, it underlines the continuing backlog of reforms in Austria and the country’s unwillingness to adjust to the European rule of law.

7. Dezember 2023

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