The Normativity of the European Union provides an account of what has made European integration possible. Reconstructing the integration process up to the Eurozone crisis, Eriksen provides novel insight into the conditions for integration and the nature of the EU as well as highlighting why European solidarity has become a moral duty.

The notion of Normative Power Europe (NPE) is that the EU is an 'ideational' actor characterised by common principles and acting to diffuse norms within international relations. Contributors assess the impact of NPE and offer new perspectives for the future exploration of one of the most widely used ideas in the study of the EU in the last decade.

The Normativity of the European Union provides an account of what has made European integration possible. Reconstructing the integration process up to the Eurozone crisis, Eriksen provides novel insight into the conditions for integration and the nature of the EU as well as highlighting why European solidarity has become a moral duty.

This book examines how the EU and international law frameworks impact the EU’s ability to act normatively in its external action in the area of fisheries. The EU, a major fishing power, portrays itself as a normative actor and a champion of sustainable fishing. The volume reconceptualises the Normative Power Europe narrative by identifying three interrelated elements – universality, use of instruments, and legitimacy – as the key criteria against which to evaluate the normativity of the EU’s conduct. The universality element examines the level of international acceptance of the stated aims of EU action; the use of instruments element examines the EU’s participation limitations in relevant international institutions and the means (persuasion as opposed to coercion) through which it acts; and the legitimacy element examines the substance of the EU’s action in terms of legality, protection of common or self-interests, and coherence and consistency. The book draws upon extensive research into both the international and EU legal frameworks relating to fisheries and the EU’s practice in its external fisheries relations. It consecutively discusses four sets of challenges: (i) to the EU’s normativity posed by lack of membership in global institutions; (ii) created notwithstanding membership in other global or regional bodies; (iii) connected to multileveled coercive action and (iv) to accessing foreign fishing resources. It claims that, while the EU’s normativity depends greatly on its internal and external powers, it is the EU’s inability to freely wield these powers that damages its normativity. To act normatively, the EU primarily needs the full Member States’ support, as its present constitution prevents it from acting completely independently from them. The volume is aimed at academics and practitioners alike working in the area of fisheries globally but also on the EU’s external action more generally. Mihail Vatsov is Programme Manager with the European Commission in Brussels, Belgium.

The supranational law of the European Union represents a uniquely powerful, far-reaching, and controversial instance of the growth of international legal governance, one that has forever altered the political and legal landscape of its Member States. The EU has attracted significant attention from political scientists, economists, and lawyers who have analysed its polity and constructed theoretical models of the integration process. Yet it has been almost entirely neglected by analytic philosophers, and the philosophical tools that have been developed to analyse and evaluate the Union are still in their infancy. This book brings together legal philosophers, political philosophers, and EU legal academics in the service of developing the philosophical analysis of EU law. In a series of original and complementary essays they bring their varied disciplinary expertise and theoretical perspectives to bear on central issues facing the Union and its law. Combining both abstract thought in legal and political philosophy and more tangible theoretical work on specific legal issues, the essays in this volume make a significant contribution to developing work on the philosophical foundations of EU law, and will engender further debate between philosophers, political philosophers, and EU legal academics. They will be of interest to all those engaged in understanding the nature and purpose of this unique legal entity.