It is always an honour to be invited to give a named lecture and especially to be invited to do so in this University. But it is an added privilege and also a pleasure to be invited to do so when one has known the person in whose honour the lecture has been named. It is particularly delightful to be able to do so with Lady Mackenzie-Stuart among us.

Thus begins a cruel Oriental tale, freely adapted in a poem by Jacques Prévert, which is, it seems to me, quite a good illustration of the paradox of the judge’s responsibility comparing the extraordinary nature of their power to their relationship to politics. Nevertheless, from this point of view, there is indeed in France a question, that is to say a democratic debate, a conflict of opinion generally perceived to be the result of the growing role of law in the regulation of social relationships and the increasing power of judges in the private domain as well as in the public, economic and social spheres.

The most important conclusion to emerge so far from the interminable debate whether the UK should join European Monetary Union (EMU) is that, as things stand at the moment, neither side appears to be winning the economic argument! It is perfectly true, as supporters of the membership argue, that the country’s economy is so closely linked with those of other nations in Western Europe that the delay in adopting the single currency would be costly in the long term. However, the opponents are also correct when they point out that joining EMU would deprive the UK of important benefits that arise from the ability to pursue ‘independent’ macroeconomic policies.

This paper addresses two legal issues regarding the euro banknotes, in circulation since zero hours 1 January 2002, the currency of some 300 million Europeans. These are the physical representation of the single currency introduced 1 January 1999. Following the introduction of such banknotes, monetary debts may be discharged in a territory that extends from Faro in Portugal to Rovaniemi in Finland, from the Aran Islands in the Atlantic to the island of Crete in the Aegean. No doubt a major and a historical event for Europe.

At the end of 1991, after the Maastricht summit, we could reasonably have predicted that there would be two kinds of political problem generated by the euro. First, that if the euro-zone were in 1997, the first date at which it could have been launched, or 1999, when it did indeed begin, to spread beyond Germany, France, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg and Denmark, then there would be good reason to wonder whether all members of the zone could withstand a single monetary policy. Meeting the convergence criteria specified in the Maastricht Treaty would not necessarily mean that there was sufficient convergence in macro-economic cycles to warrant having the same interest rates over the whole of the euro area.

The level of support to agricultural producers in the Community has remained high notwithstanding the commitments imposed under the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture (‘URAA’). Thus, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (‘OECD’), the ‘producer support estimate’ for the period 1986–1988 amounted to 44 per cent of gross farm receipts and the proportion rose marginally to 45 per cent in 1998. It may also be noted that, while the proportion in the case of the United States was approximately half that of the Community, the figure for 1998 was likewise not dissimilar from that for the period 1986–1988 (respectively 22 and 25 per cent). As a result, Cairns Group countries have felt able to direct strong criticism against the two great exporters of agricultural produce. This state of affairs was not unanticipated.

Much of the debate on European integration centres on the relationship between ‘globalisation’ and ‘Europeanisation’. Whereas the two processes have, in the past, been viewed separately there is now a broad recognition that a relationship exists between them. International relations and politics circles have observed this, but controversy exists over whether the two processes are antagonistic to each other or whether they are in fact ‘working in combination’. Professor Francis Snyder in the legal field asked, in his seminal paper, are they friends or rivals—’is the EU part of the problem or part of the solution in relation to globalisation?’

This essay is continuing the path between the disciplines of law and political science that I have been following for a couple of years now. This is a somewhat delicate exercise. In addressing my own discipline, law, I argue that it should renew its perceptions of reality and open up its normative and dogmatic conceptual structure. To political scientists engaged in integration research, I suggest that they ought to take the law’s normative structure seriously and open up their analytical and empirical models to this peculiar reality. ‘Two goals?! No wonder he never gets anywhere!’ By no means, I would object, we are only looking at the two sides of the same coin. And there are good reasons to undertake such efforts: Europe’s constitution is too important to be left up to the lawyers; but it is also something that cannot be grasped by empirical and analytical approaches which are unable to address the normative dimension of the ‘real’ world.

The evolution of the concept of joint or collective dominance has contributed an important chapter to EC Competition law and has been the focus of intense attention in the academic literature. This thorny notion has proved relevant both in the context of the application of Article 82 EC and of the EC Merger Regulation even if a textual reference to it was clear in the first case but non-existent in the second.

The question of Community competence has been one of the most debated issues since the ruling in Tobacco Advertising I, in which the Court annulled, for the first time, a Community Directive for lack of competence. This judgment is significant in terms of assessing the constitutional role of the Court in the Community legal order.

The aim of this article is not to comment on the Tobacco Advertising judgment. Rather, it is to consider the question of competence from a different angle: that of partial harmonisation.

The interface between trade and competition has long been the focus of scholarship. Its international dimension has in recent years increasingly attracted the attention of commentators, international organisations in general and the European Community (EC) in particular, multilateral and regional judicial bodies, as well as nongovernmental organisations. This article analyses one dimension of this interface, namely the EC Anti-Dumping (AD) Policy directed at non-European dumped goods, and its relationship with the EC Competition Policy.

It is commonly assumed that the European Convention on Human Rights, being a treaty of specific nature, embodies elements of European public order. However, there seems to be no authoritative or generally accepted definition of the public order of Europe, of its essential components, and of its relationship with the notion of international public order. This article will examine these questions. In pursuing this goal, the law-enforcement resources accumulated within the European system of human rights protection will be examined in the context of interaction between the public order of Europe as part of the law of the European Convention, and international public order as part of general international law.

All member states must, as a matter of Community law, provide for a qualified right to go to another Member State to receive treatment at the expense of the competent social security system. According to Article 22 of Regulation 1408/71 such a right is conditional upon prior authorisation by the competent institution. Authorisation cannot be refused when the treatment is amongst the benefits provided for by the State where the individual resides and the treatment cannot be provided within the time ‘normally necessary’ for obtaining the treatment in the State of residence. The Court however has found that Article 49 EC imposes upon Member States obligations that go beyond those contained in the Regulation: thus a prior authorisation requirement constitutes a justified barrier (subject to important qualifications) in the case of hospital treatment and a non-justified barrier in the case of nonhospital treatment. The effects of this interpretation are far-reaching: not only do Member States see their obligations under Community law redefined in a way which might have a significant financial impact on their social security systems; but also the reasoning of the Court could be applied to other branches of the public sector, such as education.

The role of lay judges in the legal system is a matter of considerable importance. Lay judges are not only numerous, but they play an especially important part in many branches of law. Yet they are often ignored in general statements on the judicial role or in discussions by professional judges. Concepts like ‘Judicial Independence’ focus almost exclusively on the professional judge and the conditions for her operational effectiveness. The Council of Europe Recommendation on judicial independence recognises that some principles apply to lay judges as well as to professional judges. But the text amounts to a rather grudging recognition.

The new european Race Directive is one of the latest measures adopted by the Council of Ministers under its enlarged powers aimed at combating racism in the EU. This Race Directive reflects the strategic thinking of EU policy aimed at combating institutionally racist constraints on the free movement of persons within the Community. Nevertheless, this paper argues that the effectiveness of the Directive is likely to be limited. This potential impediment is premised on two factors: the textual ambivalence that surrounds the concepts of ‘race’ and ‘ethnicity’ and the scope of the instrument. In turn, these restrictions are indicative of a power struggle between the EU and nation states, a struggle that threatens to sideline the broader picture of institutional racism and how to defeat it.