Insights from Specific Policy Areas: Forging Links between Legal Orders

Summary:

This article discusses the relation between legal orders. All courts and tribunals, both national and international, begin exercising jurisdiction on the basis of their own mandate. This may be found in a national constitution, in a law, in a private agreement, or in a treaty. Describing the legal order which they are applying or placing themselves in any sort of hierarchy or international context is normally a much later exercise.

Given the increasingly transnational and internationally intertwined nature of litigation, both private and public, these analytical tasks must eventually be tackled. But what emerges clearly from the study of cases, both national and international, is that all courts continue to regard their own mandate as paramount and give precedence to this mandate in any conflict with other courts or legal orders.

Further information:

This article is part of the Special Issue: EU Law and Public International Law: Co-implication, Embeddedness and Interdependency.