The Europeanisation of remedies and procedures through judge-made law : can a Trojan horse achieve effectiveness? : experiences of the Swedish judiciary

Abstract

Through the judge-made requirements developed in its case-law, the Court of Justice has laid down obligations on national courts to provide effective judicial protection for individuals that seek to enforce Community law claims. This thesis will study the Europeanisation of national remedies and procedures that comes about in this process. I will carry out the analysis in two stages. In the first stage, I will look from a European perspective at the principle of effective judicial protection, which I will view as a Trojan horse containing the judge-made requirements, and establish what is understood by effective judicial protection. I will seek to identify more precise obligations incumbent on national courts in relation to different remedies and procedural rules. Moreover, I will seek to establish the rationale of the Court's intervention into national procedural autonomy. In particular, I will consider if the rationale is a concern to protect individual rights or whether the language of 'rights' is rather used as a legitimizing pretext for enhancing the general effectiveness of Community law and for harmonising remedies and procedures. In a second stage, the thesis will empirically study the Europeanisation of remedies and procedures at the domestic level, by looking at the Swedish judiciary's reaction to those judge-made requirements. It is only by looking at what happens when the Trojan horse unfolds in the national legal system that one can understand its role and whether the principle, in practice, achieves the intended rationales, or whether its complexity in fact hampers effective judicial protection. It will emerge that, in the Swedish context, there is a gap between European theory and national practice. In this respect, the study will highlight the role of the national legal and judicial culture in ensuring the effectiveness of Community law. Conclusions will be drawn from the empirical study on whether the Trojan horse really does serve as a functional and effective tool to achieve Europeanisation of remedies and procedures and the Court's intended rationales. I will call for clarifications, coherence and better 'judicial governance' of this complicated area of law.