The Rule of Law in a Transnational Key

As an essential component of contemporary constitutional democracies, the rule of law in a transnational key is both about the ways in which transnational actors can and do affect the rule of law at the domestic level, and how the law itself is transnationalised in the process. This process relies in part on the standards that international and regional organizations and advisory bodies create from international and comparative law, as well as what different actors do to protect and promote the rule of law. While transnational standards are meant to serve as benchmarks to assess the performance of national authorities, they are fluid, contested as well as often ignored. How can this be remedied? How can the rule of law be safeguarded as a most precious human invention? What are the interests, power constellations and normative frames involved?

This initiative focusses in particular on cases of so called state backsliding and the actions of international and regional organizations to monitor and counter those tendencies.

The initiative adopts a multidisciplinary approach in the intersection of politics, law and economics and will promote activities seeking to enhance understanding on the working and effects of transnational-national in promoting the rule of law.

Featured publications

Towards a strengthened methodology for the elaboration of the Rule of Law Report

This paper draws on the discussion during a High-Level Policy Dialogue on “How to secure compliance with the Rule of Law,” organised by the EUI School of Transnational Governance in October 2021

Reinforcing rule of law oversight in the European Union

This paper provides a critical overview of options available to the EU to deal with the Rule of Law crisis in some of the Member States.

A citizen’s guide to the rule of law: why we need to fight for the most precious human invention of all time

In our daily lives, the rule of law matters more than anything and yet remains an invisible presence. We trust in the rule of law to protect us from governmental overreach, mafia godfathers, or the will of the majority.

The politics of guarding the Treaties: Commission scrutiny of rule of law compliance

Commission's expectations on eventual compliance explain its different behaviour when dealing with Rule of Law (RoL) crises in Hungary and Poland.

How the EU can and should protect democracy, the rule of law, and fundamental rights in defiant member states : the possibility and desirability of economic sanctions

On 19 March 2018, the School of Transnational Governance and the Department of Law at the European University Institute organised a high-level policy dialogue on the possibility and the desirability of economic sanctions against so-called defiant member states of the European Union (EU).

The EU needs a better and fairer scrutiny procedure over Rule of Law compliance

Recent events in some Member States show that the EU’s values (article 2, TEU), in particular the Rule of Law, are not exempt from being challenged. Constitutional changes in Hungary, executive non-compliance with constitutional court rulings in Romania, and expulsion of Bulgarian and Hungarian Roma citizens in France are some of the episodes that illustrate these challenges.