ABSTRACT

The launch of the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) and the introduction of a separate European Union (EU) Treaty provision devoted to the EU’s relations with neighbouring countries sparked the interest of legal scholars. Four recurring themes can be identified. First, specific attention has been devoted to the legal nature, methodology and institutional structure of the ENP. Building upon comparisons with the EU’s enlargement policy, the ENP is essentially regarded as an attempt to overcome the fragmentation of competencies in the field of EU external relations (Cremona and Hillion 2006; Van Vooren 2012). Second, a doctrinal discussion about the actual meaning and implications of the new neighbourhood clause could be observed. Such clause was first introduced in the Draft Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe and after the non-ratification of this document, transferred to the Treaty of Lisbon to become Article 8 of the Treaty on European Union (TEU). This new provision raised multiple questions concerning, inter alia, the relationship with the other Treaty provisions on EU external action and the possibility of using it as a specific legal basis for the conclusion of new types of agreements with neighbouring countries (Hanf 2011; Van Elsuwege and Petrov 2011; Hillion 2014; Comelli 2014). Third, the upgrade of the bilateral legal relations – from Partnership and Co-operation Agreements to Association Agreements (AAs) – with Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia, is the most significant evolution in the legal relations with ENP countries. Whereas the concept of ‘association’ is nothing new in the EU’s external relations practice, not even in the neighbourhood with numerous southern ENP countries already having concluded AAs in the 1990s, the new agreements bring certain innovations that are partly borrowed from other policy areas and partly result from the specificities of the ENP. The provisions on the establishment of Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Areas (DCFTAs) are certainly the most innovative, raising questions about the extent to which this arrangement can be regarded as ‘a new legal instrument for EU integration without membership’ (Van der Loo 2016a). Fourth, EU rule export to neighbouring countries is a core element of the ENP. The mechanisms and principles underlying this process, as well as the actual implications for the national legal systems and judiciaries of the neighbouring countries, formed the object of several legal studies (Van Elsuwege and Petrov 2014; Dragneva and Wolczuk 2011). In what follows, the main discussions and perceptions in the legal literature dealing with the ENP are spelled out along the four identified themes.