Conference Agenda

The proposal for Trento UACES Annual Conference is aimed at the European Union (EU) as an international player in global governance. The study is related to the large number of coordinating meetings organized by the EU delegation in New York. These diplomatic meetings are set at the highest level in order to reach common positions harmonised between the 27 representatives of the EU Member States at the United Nations headquarters.In other words, maximising harmonisation between EU practices in Brussels and UN practices in New York. The research question to answer and to test beyond such practices, is to what extent the implementation of the Lisbon Treaty has improved the cohesion among the EU Member States (MS) within this EU-UN dichotomy. Particularly in the voting procedures for United Nations Resolutions adopted by the General Assembly as a multilateral forum on various issues.

For the scientific validity of this empirical analysis, it is necessary to take into account all the resolutions adopted by the UN General Assembly (UNGA). This basically means testing the determination which calls for a roll-call vote (adopted by a vote). Practically speaking, an average of 90 resolutions per year multiplied by each of the 27 Member States' positions. For such an analytical exercise, it is assumed that there are also four variables at play: the results of a "yes" or "no" vote, as well as "abstain" or "absent". In this regard, the proposed study has its own timely concerns and therefore will merge current literature and available empirical findings on the matter.

Regarding the limitations of the behavior of the EU's Member States within the United Nations Security Council, this is a differentiated regime where the EU, as an actor, in practice, does not have a seat in this forum, and where voting dynamics by individual EU states can lead to very different results. However, it will be necessary to address certain points in connection with the UNSC in the conclusions of this study.

This article analyses the dynamics of Croatian citizen participation in European Citizen Initiatives (ECI), spotlighting the notably low engagement since Croatia joined the EU. In addition to establishing.a quantiative baselin on Croatian citizens' involvement in ECIs to date, the paper shares qualitative insights from focus group discussions with students of political science, journalism and European studies. Besides, the paper presents new perspectives from interviews with Croatian members of ECI organising committees and supporting organisations, providing an insider view of the challenges and opportunities in mobilizing citizen participation in ECIs. Through this comprehensive approach, the paper aims to unveil the multifaceted factors influencing Croatian citizens' participation in ECIs, contributing to the broader discourse on participatory democracy in the EU.

Initially centred on economically active individuals within the internal market, the Maastricht Treaty’s introduction of Union citizenship extended the entitlement of intra-EU mobility to all EU citizens. This shifted the European Integration project’s aspiration from merely economic cooperation to broader social and political ambitions. For thirty years, Union citizenship’s history as a legal institution has been characterized by continuous evolution induced by the CJEU and legislative initiatives.First of all, Union citizenship is an institution explicitly delineated and established by primary law,Article 20 TFEU. The constitutional nature of the Union citizenship status with important implications for nationals of Member States has been reinforced by the CJEU in all post-Maastricht case law. Thus, the CJEU has contributed to the understanding of Union citizenship by distinguishing it from the logic of the internal market and recognising it as a ‘fundamental status’. On the core of Union citizenship lies, amongst others, the right of Union citizens to move and reside freely within the territory of the Member States,Article 21 TFEU, raised to the status of a fundamental right in Article 45 Charter. The question that may arise is whether the intention was to establish a transnational citizenship that transcends the confines of market freedoms.In Rottmann, Tjebbes, and Wiener Landesregierung, the CJEU clarified that the Member States did not enjoy full discretion in the conferral/ withdrawal of nationality, thereby ensuring the protection of the EU status and rights attached to it provided supranational protection for individuals. In the same vein, the case law of the CJEU, specifically Coman and Pancharevo on the recognition of the personal status of EU citizens, has indicated an increased protection of citizens and their family members.Despite these developments, the CJEU has shown reluctance in some cases, e.g. concerning the social rights of Union citizens (FS judgement), the possession of nationality of a Member State and the status of European citizens, not only concerning its acquisition but also its retention (Prefet du Gers judgement). In this context, when it comes to ‘the fundamental status’ of Union citizenship, these limitations may have consequences on it and the Union’s integration project.Given the dynamic nature of Union citizenship, this paper aims to scrutinise the evolution of Union citizenship as a transnational status of social integration. The paper will be based on doctrinal legal research, relying on an analysis of the primary and secondary EU law and mainly on the case law of the CJEU on Union citizenship.

Since the early 1990s subsidiarity has played a crucial role in delineating the allocation of powers between the supranational entity and its member states, being regarded as a countermeasure against the perceived centralizing tendencies of the EU. However, as the EU's governance system evolves towards what J. Zeitlin has characterized as an "experimentalist architecture of decision-making processes," the continued relevance and effectiveness of subsidiarity warrant a comprehensive investigation.

The aim of the present contribution is to examine the intricate relationship between the principle of subsidiarity and the emerging experimentalist architecture of decision-making processes within the European Union (EU). Considering how the new modes of governance create avenues for the EU to intervene in areas of public policy not expressly mentioned in the Treaties or in which the EU's position was relatively weak, the underlying assumption is that potential tensions and challenges may emerge in relation to the decentralized nature of subsidiarity. Under these circumstances, an attempt will be made to investigate how subsidiarity may adapt to, or integrate with, the experimentalist framework in order to enhance its compatibility with the evolving governance model.

In discussing the broader implications of the interaction between subsidiarity and experimentalist decision-making for the future of EU governance, the research will rely on discursive institutionalism for investigating how different actors within the EU, including member states, institutions, and non-governmental organizations, contribute to discourses on subsidiarity and experimentalist governance and analyzing power dynamics inherent in the discursive construction of these concepts.