European Union as a State?

Andrea Zjarová

In: Societas et iurisprudentia • 2018 • Volume 6 • Issue 4 • Pages 151-170 • ISSN 1339-5467

Abstract: The European Union is an autonomous entity with its own sovereignty and legal order that is independent of the legal orders of its Member States. The European Union is not a State, since its existence depends on the decisions of its Member States which are the “Masters of Treaties”. The paper focuses on the comparison of the features that characterize the State as defined by the theory of the State and law, with the features that the European Union is currently displaying. The European Union is not an ordinary international organization or a State, but it is an entity that can fit somewhere between these two traditional models of the state organization, with the European Union coming closest to the federation after the adoption of the Lisbon Treaty. The legal literature has established the term of a supranational organization that describes this specific model characteristic for the European Union. It is a “sui generis” organization for which transfer of the decision-making powers from the national level to the transnational level is typical.

Key Words: The European Union; Member State; Supranationalism; State; Characteristics of the State; State Territory; State Power; State Population; Ability to Enter into Relations with Other States; Federalism; Federation.

URL: https://sei.iuridica.truni.sk/archive/2018/04/SEI-2018-04-Studies-Zjarova-Andrea.pdf

Bibliographic Citation

ZJAROVÁ, A. Európska únia ako štát?. Societas et iurisprudentia [online]. 2018, vol. 6, no. 4, pp. 151-170 [cit. 2020-01-01]. ISSN 1339-5467. Available at: https://sei.iuridica.truni.sk/international-scientific-journal/archive/issue-2018-04/european-union-as-a-state/.