European Union Justice and Home Affairs Law
Code
LM104
Department
Área de Ensino
Credits
6
Teacher in charge
Nuno Piçarra
Weekly hours
4.5
Teaching language
Português
Objectives
The aim is to put students in contact with one of the EU objectives which comprises stronger federal implications and which has a very significant impact on the identity of the EU and of its Member States: the goal of offering EU citizens an area of freedom, security and justice (AFSJ) without internal frontiers, in which the free movement of persons is ensured in conjunction with appropriate measures with respect to external border controls, asylum, immigration and the prevention and combating of crime. In this context, it is necessary to analyse the original solutions found by a EU of open internal borders, where it is possible to move as if moving inside a single state, to solve the same problems faced by a federation concerning the ensuring of security an d the administration of justice.
Subject matter
I. The ideological and practical, remote and near, antecedents of the AFSJ: the TREVI group, the Single European Act, the Schengen Agreements, and the EU Third Pillar.
II. From Amsterdam to Lisbon: the simplification and the deepening of the constitutional regime of the AFSJ, the transformation of the Schengen acquis into EU acquis, but the maintaining and the aggravation of the opt-outs for the UK, Ireland and Danemark.
III. The general features of the AFSJ: subjection to the community method with derogations. The AFSJ and its several policies and forms of cooperation; frontiers, visas, asylum and immigration; police cooperation and judicial cooperation in criminal matters and EU criminal law; information systems of the AFSJ (SIS, Eurodac, VIS) and the new agency for their management; the mutual assessment or peers review system and its meaning.
Bibliography
- Manuel Lopes Porto e Gonçalo Anastácio (coord.), Tratado de Lisboa Anotado e Comentado, Almedina, Coimbra, 2012, sobretudo artigos 67.º a 80.º e 82.º a 89.º do Tratado sobre o Funcionamento da União Europeia;
- Nuno Piçarra (coord.), A União Europeia segundo o Tratado de Lisboa, Almedina, Coimbra, 2011: textos de Anabela Miranda Rodrigues, Elspeth Guild, Nuno Piçarra e Stephen H. Legomsky;
- Alun Howard Gibbs, Constitutional Life and Europe’s Area of Freedom, Security and Justice, 2011;
- Nuno Piçarra, “Direito da União Europeia: o espaço de liberdade, segurança e justiça”, in Themis, Revista da Faculdade de Direito da UNL, ano x, n.º 19, 2010, pp. 233-366;
- Nuno Piçarra, “A política de fronteiras da União Europeia: do arranque adiado à centralidade progressiva, in Estudos em Homenagem ao Professor Doutor Paulo de Pitta e Cunha, vol. I, 2010, pp. 936-965;
- Steve Peers, EU Justice and Home Affairs Law, 3.ª edição, 2010;
- Neil Walker (ed.), Europe’s Área of Freedom, Security and Justice, 2004.Teaching method
Teaching in theoretic-practical classes permanently open to students’ participation and based upon interactive analysis of the texts whose knowledge is mandatory (provisions in force, historical texts, case-law, etc.). Practical classes include the analysis of case-law, the resolution of practical cases and comments on legal theory texts. Prior preparation of students is always required. There is a written exam at the end of the semester.