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Interpreting EU Law: Legal Reasoning of National Courts in the Preliminary Ruling Procedure

In this doctoral dissertation, I explore how national courts interpret EU law in the preliminary ruling procedure. Its starting premise is the autonomy of EU law. The autonomy is reflected in the way EU law is interpreted – independently from how international law or laws of EU Member States are interpreted, with the standards of interpretation of EU law being determined by the Court of Justice. Since EU legal system is decentralised, these standards should also be followed by national courts. National courts deal with most cases that involve the application of EU law. When they apply EU law, national courts must determine what it means and which factual situations are covered by it. In effect, they must interpret EU law in order to apply it. In some cases, national courts request assistance of the Court of Justice with the interpretation of specific questions of EU law. Their communication is enabled through the preliminary ruling procedure. When referring questions for preliminary ruling, some national courts are proposing answers to the Court. They are not only suggesting how certain provisions of EU law should be interpreted, but also offering arguments to support their proposals. In these cases, too, one can get an insight into the legal reasoning of national courts. This is the approach adopted in the present dissertation. Assessing a sample of 102 preliminary references containing 135 questions of interpretation received between 2018 and 2020 and comparing them to the Court’s judgments issued in reply, I demonstrate that national courts in the preliminary ruling procedure interpret EU law in the same way as the Court of Justice. This means that national courts generally use the same types of interpretive arguments like the Court ; give them the same content ; employ them with similar frequency, in similar situations, and to similar ends ; and have the same structure of reasoning as the Court. This confirms the hypothesis that there exists unique EU way of legal reasoning, followed by the Court of Justice and national courts alike. However, when it comes to specific questions of interpretation that are analysed, I find that national courts and the Court of Justice in particular situations rarely reach the same outcomes or adopt similar reasoning. I argue that the reason is that national courts do not have material and procedural resources comparable to the Court’s nor are specialised in the interpretation of EU law like the Court, and at times also do not pursue the same values and interests as the Court. This finding has broader implications for the position of national judges in the EU legal system. Namely, unlike resources and expertise which can be improved and acquired through institutional support and training and education, it is doubtful whether EU values can be instilled in national judges in the same way.

European Union law ; interpretation ; argumentation ; justification ; legal reasoning ; autonomy ; Court of Justice ; national courts ; preliminary ruling procedure ; orders for reference ; questions of interpretation ; interpretive outcomes ; interpretive arguments ; textual arguments ; contextual arguments ; purposive arguments ; authoritative arguments ; structure of reasoning ; values as meta-arguments ; institutional resources ; judicial specialisation

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