Altiero Spinelli and the Idea of the US Constitution as a Model for Europe: The Promises and Pitfalls of an Analogy (original) (raw)

Transatlantic constitutionalism: Comparing the United States and the European Union

European Journal of Political Research, 2004

This article contributes to the European constitutional debate with a comparison of the constitutional evolution of the European Union and the United States. The European Union has more to learn from the American experience of constitutionalism than from any of its own Member States. Like the United States, the European Union will have a frame of government constitution that will try to order a system of multiple and concurrent communities of interests, as happened in America, and designed by an indirectly elected assembly. The European Union and the United States will continue to manifest many differences in other crucial aspects of their institutional and cultural development. However, although constrained by their respective historical and institutional paths, their constitutional evolution is making the Atlantic Ocean less wide than it used to be.

The Myths of a European Constitution

Civitas. Studia z Filozofii Polityki

Is the European Constitution a modern version of political myth? The ample collection of European laws have become the normative basis for the functioning and existence of an enormous amount of different kinds of institutions. These laws particularly limit the power of State authority in the Member States. International law has taken on the character of external obligation, an issue that could be discussed elsewhere in the area of philosophical law, which precisely aims to cover this sphere of reality. What are arguments for and against the description of a European order with reference to this concept? The aim of this article is to present European constitutional ideas and an analysis of the Draft of the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe from the point of view of the changes the European constitution has introduced into the discourse of philosophical law.

European Integration and European Constitutionalism: Consonances and Dissonances, in 'Integration through Law' Revisited (ed. Daniel Augenstein) (Ashgate, 2011)

The two terms, European integration and European constitutionalism, are widely used as labelling and organising concepts in this not-easily-described project-process of possible/putative-polity-formation on the continent of Europe since the end of the Second World War. On the one hand, both concepts seem not to be incapable of broadly corresponding to the sentiment of the ever-vague and oft-repeated mission phrase of the European treaties; ‘ever closer union among the peoples of Europe’, and certainly both are frequently employed in its support. On the other hand, it is not clear, first, that these concepts have a whole lot in common with each other, and second, that either of these concepts, for different reasons, is capable of providing the normative foundations that the European project so badly needs if it is ever to be able to provide good answers to the questions of how to ensure respect for the principles of representation, democracy, self-determination, and what kind of polity it is supposed (eventually) to be. This chapter purports to examine the consonances and dissonances between European integration and European constitutionalism with the hope of clarifying their usefulness to us as we search for these answers.

The role played by Altiero Spinelli in the creation of the European Political Community

This essay is aimed at presenting the first attempt to write a European Constitution, the highest aspiration for the federalist movements in the 50s, in the light of Altiero Spinelli’s ideas and political commitment. First of all, I have outlined Spinelli’s biography in order to understand what experiences led him to imagine and strive for the creation of the United States of Europe. His political convictions have always been accompanied by fervor and sometimes frustration, as it becomes evident by reading extracts from his personal diary. In particular, I have focused on his contribution to the discussions on the institutional architecture that was necessary in order to shape the European federation. On this regard, the study carried out by the Comité d’Etudes pour une Constitution Européenne, hereinafter called CEPE, and the sub-commission appointed within it, deserve to be highlighted due to the fact that the outcome of their analysis was supposed to guide the Constituent Assembly mandated by the governments of the Six . Perhaps needless to say, Spinelli played a significant role in both the CEPE and the sub-commission. Therefore, the essay gives an insight into the preliminary initiatives that predated the draft of the European Constitution by the the ad hoc Assembly, and the constitutional sub-commission appointed within it. However, I haven’t dealt with the governments’ reactions and negotiations on the Statute of the European Community, the final outcome presented by the president of the ad hoc Assembly, P. H. Spaak. On this point, I only have reported Spinelli’s remarks on the constitutional sub-commission’s and the ad hoc Assembly’s documents. In conclusion, I have considered briefly the reasons why the EPC’s project eventually failed, according to Spinelli, and why studying the EPC is relevant nowadays.