This week’s event announcement is below.

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The Rise of Constitutional Identity Review in Europe: A Critical Assessment

12-13 September 2019

Bentham House, UCL Laws, London WC1H 0EG (map)

This two-day research conference will bring together legal scholars, practitioners and constitutional court judges to discuss the rise of constitutional identity review in Europe. This development, most visible in the aftermath of the 2008 Euro-crisis and of the rise of populism in Europe, has thus far not received systematic, cross-country attention. The conference seeks to remedy this by including panels exploring the theoretical roots of the concept and critically assessing doctrines of judicial interpretation invoking constitutional identity, whether in response to domestic or supranational forces.

The conference will bring together judges, practitioners and scholars based in the UK, Italy and elsewhere in Europe to debate questions such as: What, if any, is the added explanatory value of the concept of constitutional identity? Was the rise of constitutional identity review a doctrinal necessity in the face of supranational forces or a doctrinal misstep? Is constitutional identity review constitutional nationalism by another name? Does the simultaneous rise in unconstitutional constitutional amendment doctrines, whereby courts invalidate constitutional amendments on substantive grounds, necessitate constitutional identity review? How much is the rise of constitutional identity review about protecting democracy and how much about enhancing judicial power? Is constitutional identity review especially prone to abuse?

For more information and to register for the conference, please see HERE.

Conference programme

Thursday, 12 September 2019

17:30-17:45 Registration

17:45-18:00 Welcome address

18:00-19:00 Practitioners’ panel: Constitutional identity review before the courts

Prof David Feldman, Emeritus Rouse Ball Professor of English Law, Cambridge University and former international judge, Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina

Sir Jeffrey Jowell QC KCMG, Blackstone Chambers, inaugural Director of the Bingham Centre for the Rule of Law, UK’s member of the Council of Europe’s Commission for Democracy through Law (“The Venice Commission”) (2000-2011) and Professor Emeritus of Public Law, UCL

Judge Francesco Viganò, Judge, Italian Constitutional Court and Professor of Criminal Law, Bocconi University in Milan

Moderators: Dr Cristina Fasone (LUISS Rome) and Dr Silvia Suteu (UCL)

19:00-19:45 Reception

Friday 13 September 2019

09:00-09:15 Registration

09:15-11:00 Panel 2: The theoretical underpinnings of constitutional identity

Bosko Tripkovic (Birmingham), ‘Constitutional Identity and Constitutional Value’

Monika Polzin (Augsburg), ‘The Concept of Constitutional Identity: Still Useful or Prone to Abuse?’

Helen Irving (Sydney), ‘Constitutional Identity Theory and Gender: The Missing Referent’

Silvia Suteu (UCL), ‘Constitutional Identity as Defence against Populism: The Failings of an Incompletely Theorised Concept’

11:00-11:30 Coffee break

11:30-13:15 Panel 3: Comparative approaches to constitutional identity review

Gabor Halmai (EUI), ‘From Human Dignity as “Mother Right” Till the Misuse of Constitutional Identity. The Hungarian Constitutional Court’s Road to Anti-liberal Constitutional Interpretation’

Myriam Hunter-Henin (UCL), ‘Invoking French Constitutional Laïque Identity before the CJEU and ECtHR’

Nicola Lupo (LUISS Rome), ‘The Italian Constitutional Court and the Dialogic Construction of Constitutional Identities and Traditions’

Anna Śledzińska-Simon (Wrocław), ‘Constitutional Identity in Poland: Is the Emperor Putting on the Old Clothes of Sovereignty?’

13:15-14:30 Lunch break

14:30-16:00 Panel 4: Constitutional identity review in between the EU and the Member States

Theodore Konstadinides (Essex), ‘Article 4(2) TEU: Origins and Implementation’

Pietro Faraguna (Trieste), ‘The Constitutionalization of the European Identity Clause’

Cristina Fasone (LUISS Rome), ‘Constitutional Identity Review in the Framework of the New European Economic Governance’