Perspectives on Federalism is a free on-line peer-reviewed journal, promoted by the Centre for Studies on Federalism.

1. Closer to the citizens? European constitutional processes, communication policy and publicity
(Giulio Itzcovich/Essay)

... process, this essay provides a short genealogy of publicity within European governance: from publicity concerning specific institutions and epistemic communities, namely the courts and the jurists, ...

2. The returns directive in light of the El Dridi judgment
(Rosa Raffaelli/Note)

The judgment of the Court of Justice of the EU in the El Dridi case clarifies the scope of application of the Returns Directive, in particular with regard to the difference between criminal detention ...

3. Speaking in Name of the Constituent Power: the Spanish Constitutional Court and the New Catalan Estatut
(Giacomo Delledonne/Note)

In June 2010 the Spanish Constitutional Court rendered a very important judgment on the constitutional legitimacy of the new fundamental charter (Estatut) of the Autonomous Community of Catalonia. Faced ...

4. Constitutional Interpretation in Federations and its Impact on the Federal Balance
(Arun Sagar/Essay)

... centralising trend noticeable in the constitutional jurisprudence of all the federations studied. Further, the analysis suggests that constitutional courts often adopt a different approach to interpretation ...

5. And nothing else matters. The ICJ’s judicial restraint in its Opinion on Kosovo’s Independence
(Giuseppe Bianco/Note)

The International Court of Justice gave its Advisory Opinion on the “Accordance with international law of the unilateral declaration of independence in respect of Kosovo” few months ago. It found no prohibition ...

6. Some reflections on the choices of the European Court of Justice in the Kücükdeveci preliminary ruling
(Filippo Fontanelli/Note)

In Kücükdeveci judgment, the European Court of Justice declared that national judges must set aside national norms that are at variance with the general principle of non discrimination on grounds of age, ...

7. The German Constitution in the future of the European Union after the sentence of the Federal Constitutional Court on the Lisbon Treaty
(Thomas Jansen/note)

  This note analyses the legal reasoning and the motivations of the recent judgment of the German Constitutional Court on the Lisbon Treaty and considers the possible impact of this ruling on the future ...

8. Germany and Europe. The judgment of the Court of Karlsruhe
(Antonio Padoa Schioppa/Note)

This note provides a brief comment on the Lisbon Urteil of the German Constitutional Court. The author points out the ambiguities of the judgment and its possible impact on the European integration process ...

9. The Constitutional Court gives fiscal federalism new opportunities, but only for regions endowed with special autonomy
(Marco Calcagno/Note)

These are hard times for fiscal federalism. Although many political parties consider it a sort of flag, despite always being present on the political agenda, the implementation of article 119 of the Italian ...

10. From the Constitution for Europe to the Reform Treaty: a literature survey on European Constitutional Law
(Giuseppe Martinico/Review article)

... of this review article: 1. The Constitution for Europe and the constitutional moment; 2. The Constitutional Treaty and the innovations “proposed”; 3. The European Court of Justice’s activism; 4. The ...

11. The Italian Constitutional Court Turn Its Look at Europe
(Paolo Fusaro/Note)

With the order of April 15, 2008, the Constitutional Court of Italy requested, for the first time, the intervention of the Court of Justice of the European Communities, enabling the mechanism of preliminary ...