{"title":"Old wine in a new bottle: Shaping the foundations of EU criminal law through the concept of legal interests (Rechtsgüter)","authors":"Jannemieke W. Ouwerkerk","doi":"10.1111/eulj.12447","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p>Ever since the establishment of EU competence to legislate in criminal matters, legal scholarship has been devoting a fair amount of attention to the scope of these powers as well as to their proper exercise. The many scholarly contributions this has led to make a commendable and laudable body of knowledge with respect to the matter at hand. Yet, as will be argued, its capacities to shape the normative foundations of EU criminal law remain limited, with the main reason being that normative limits of EU-level criminalisation have so far predominantly been articulated in terms of <i>principles</i>. For the reasons set out below, this article proposes to supplement the ongoing debate with another conceptual lens, i.e., the lens of <i>legal interests</i> (<i>Rechtsgüter</i>). The purpose of this article is to substantiate the point of view that the concept of legal interests offers essential opportunities to further shape the normative foundations of EU criminal law.</p>","PeriodicalId":47166,"journal":{"name":"European Law Journal","volume":"27 4-6","pages":"426-440"},"PeriodicalIF":1.4000,"publicationDate":"2022-11-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/eulj.12447","citationCount":"1","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"European Law Journal","FirstCategoryId":"90","ListUrlMain":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/eulj.12447","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"LAW","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 1
Abstract
Ever since the establishment of EU competence to legislate in criminal matters, legal scholarship has been devoting a fair amount of attention to the scope of these powers as well as to their proper exercise. The many scholarly contributions this has led to make a commendable and laudable body of knowledge with respect to the matter at hand. Yet, as will be argued, its capacities to shape the normative foundations of EU criminal law remain limited, with the main reason being that normative limits of EU-level criminalisation have so far predominantly been articulated in terms of principles. For the reasons set out below, this article proposes to supplement the ongoing debate with another conceptual lens, i.e., the lens of legal interests (Rechtsgüter). The purpose of this article is to substantiate the point of view that the concept of legal interests offers essential opportunities to further shape the normative foundations of EU criminal law.
期刊介绍:
The European Law Journal represents an authoritative new approach to the study of European Law, developed specifically to express and develop the study and understanding of European law in its social, cultural, political and economic context. It has a highly reputed board of editors. The journal fills a major gap in the current literature on all issues of European law, and is essential reading for anyone studying or practising EU law and its diverse impact on the environment, national legal systems, local government, economic organizations, and European citizens. As well as focusing on the European Union, the journal also examines the national legal systems of countries in Western, Central and Eastern Europe and relations between Europe and other parts of the world, particularly the United States, Japan, China, India, Mercosur and developing countries. The journal is published in English but is dedicated to publishing native language articles and has a dedicated translation fund available for this purpose. It is a refereed journal.