Articles for tag: Antidiskriminierung, EuGH, Europarecht, Gleichheit, LGBT Rights, LGBTIQ+, the Hungarian anti-LGBTIQ* law

Somewhere Over The Rainbow

On 5 June 2025, Advocate General Ćapeta issued her Opinion in Commission v. Hungary, a landmark ECJ case on Hungary’s “anti-LGBTIQ” law. While the law is overtly discriminatory, the Commission framed its case around internal market rules, Charter rights, and Article 2 TEU values. While this might seem curious, I argue this reflects a strategic “camouflaging” of non-discrimination claims to better protect LGBTIQ rights within the limits of current EU anti-discrimination and equality law.

11. Juni 2025

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Othering in EU Law

The so-called migrant crisis has been instrumentalized to promote ideas such as “massive invasion” and “the great replacement” – narratives that frame migrants as threats to public security and cultural identity. This rhetoric forms part of a broader phenomenon of othering, in which legal mechanisms are used to exclude and marginalize migrant populations. This text explores how EU migration law actively contributes to this process by reinforcing exclusionary narratives and practices. Drawing on postcolonial scholarship and the concept of borderization, it argues that EU legal frameworks regulate certain groups as undesirable or excessive, echoing colonial patterns of control. These exclusionary dynamics are not merely reflections of societal bias but are structurally embedded in EU law itself.

4. Juni 2025

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Fury and Surprise Anchored in Dogmas and Myths

The Court of Justice’s judgment in Commission v Malta has created quite some upheaval. That the judgment has caught so many legal commentators wrong-footed can be attributed to the fact that both sides overwhelmingly come from the premise that Member States are sovereign to decide who their nationals are and that there is no such thing as a genuine link requirement for nationality. This blog takes a closer look at these alleged certainties, and sets out why the judgment is not that surprising at all – lifting the veil of untenable dogmas and mystifications that have surrounded Declaration No 2 and the Court’s Micheletti judgment for too long along the way.

26. Mai 2025

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Hot Rule of Law Potatoes

Bulgaria’s civil society has much anticipated a key judgment by the CJEU as concerns over the entrenched capture and politicization of the Inspectorate with the Supreme Judicial Council (JI) continue to cast doubts about judicial independence and accountability in the country. Regrettably, however, the highly formalist ruling will hardly make a difference.

26. Mai 2025

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The Human Factor in EU Law

This post emphasizes the human factor as a critical method of analysis for legal scholars specializing in European Union law. The aim is to critically analyse the evolution of the rules governing the CJEU, shedding light on its composition, organization, and functioning, while also proposing reform initiatives. Some of these reforms prioritize greater transparency within the CJEU. Furthermore, by focusing on the human factor in EU law, this method reveals how individuals are positioned within the institution, helping to identify potential phenomena of invisibility or exclusion in decision-making processes.

8. Mai 2025

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It’s solidarity, stupid!

Few cases have triggered as stark reactions as Commission v Malta. In the ruling’s aftermath, many legal scholars and practitioners were quick to discard the decision. While the ruling is bold, innovative, and goes far beyond established precedent, the Court’s reasoning remains brief, ambiguous, in some parts even obscure and sibylline. Yet, most of the Court’s “great” judgments have left room for interpretation. No doubt, Commission v Malta will be subject to many, very different, affirmative or critical interpretations. In the following, I will provide one – of several possible! – readings, which seeks to square the ruling with constitutional reasoning.

7. Mai 2025

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Longing for Safety before the European Court of Justice

On 10 April 2025, Advocate General de la Tour delivered his Advisory Opinion in the joined cases Alace and Canpelli dealing with the powers of Italy – and, by extension, other EU Member States – to legislate on what constitutes a “safe third country” and a “safe country of origin”. The AG confirmed that Italy can list a third country as “safe” when it is “generally” deemed as such, provided that this designation is compliant with EU law. This piece discusses how the human rights of applicants seeking international protection are likely to be hindered by this approach.

7. Mai 2025

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The Silent Engine of European Citizenship

In its ruling on 29 April 2025 in Case C-181/23 Commission v Malta, the Grand Chamber held that Malta’s investor citizenship scheme, which grants Maltese nationality in exchange for predetermined payments or investments, was contrary to EU law. Although the judgment has been criticised (perhaps not without reason) for its lack of doctrinal foundation, it does demonstrate that the EU principle of mutual trust has constitutional character and is normatively capable of challenging national administrative mechanisms, such as the Maltese naturalisation scheme, that are incompatible with the values in Art. 2 TEU.

7. Mai 2025

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What is Citizenship For?

Last week, the CJEU declared Malta’s citizenship for investment scheme incompatible with EU law. Setting aside the evidently highly questionable quality and defensibility of the Court’s legal reasoning, the decision clearly casts Union citizenship as a status constituted by meanings and norms specific to the European Union as a normative legal project. What are we to make of this conception of citizenship, and its use by the Court to strike down citizenship for investment schemes?

6. Mai 2025

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The EU Free Market Does Not Extend to Citizenship

In the landmark Commission v Malta judgment of 29 April 2025, the European Union Court of Justice outlawed the “commercialisation” of EU citizenship, closing a door for corrupt actors. The Grand Chamber judgment not only bars the Maltese practice at issue, but also casts doubt on the legality of citizenship grants under that and similar schemes, while raising legal arguments for would-be citizens to challenge discriminatory laws.

30. April 2025

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