The Roles of Constitutional Courts in the European Legal Space

This chapter examines how constitutional and supreme courts have engaged with European Union law and the European Convention on Human Rights, and with the two respective European Courts. It outlines three main roles constitutional courts have played in the European integration. Firstly, they defined their own European mandate to facilitate the reception of Union law and the European Convention on Human Rights. Secondly, in cooperation with the European courts the constitutional courts developed a common constitutional heritage of Europe by cooperating with the European courts. Apart from contributing to a common European constitution, finally, national constitutional courts also preserved their state’s particular version of constitutionalism, sometimes by expressing explicit readiness to defend their constitution against the incoming tide of European law.