"Unity in Diversity" was the fortunate motto of the otherwise unfortunate Draft Constitutional Treaty. The motto did not make it into the Treaty of Lisbon. This essay argues that it deserves to be kept alive albeit in a new constitutional perspective, namely the re-conceptualisation of European...

In order to be simultaneously effective and liberal, governments must normally be able to count on voluntary compliance - which, in turn, depends on the support of socially shared legitimacy beliefs. In Western constitutional democracies, such beliefs are derived from the distinct but coexistent...

The function of legitimacy is to ensure voluntary compliance with unwelcome exercises of governing authority. Since practically all European law needs to be implemented and enforced by the governments and courts of the member states, the EU does not have to face its citizens directly. It follows...

Many claim a process of judicialization of international dispute settlement procedures is taking place. In order to capture this ongoing process we introduce an analytical framework to assess the degree of judicialization of international dispute settlement procedures. We then proceed to present...

Founded in 1992, Sussex European Institute (SEI) is the leading research and postgraduate training centre on contemporary European issues. SEI has a distinctive philosophy built on interdisciplinarity, a broad and inclusive approach to Europe, policy-relevance at the academic cutting edge, and...

Please note that the EPERN was originally launched as the Opposing Europe Research Network (OERN) but in August 2003 the Network was retitled to reflect a broadening out of the Network's research focus. EPERN Working Papers are therefore a continuation of the original OERN Working Paper Series.