Call for Papers (Deadline Mar 9, 2014): What Form of Government for the EU and the Eurozone?

We are pleased to pass on the call for papers for a new Conference to be organized at Tilburg Law School on June 5-6, 2014. The Conference is entitled "What Form of Government for the EU and the Eurozone?" and one of the lead participants is network member Dan Kelemen. The announcement is below and can be found in PDF form here, 

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What Form of Government for the European Union and the Eurozone?

Venue: Tilburg Law School, Tilburg, the Netherlands

Dates: June 5-6, 2014

Organizers: Federico Fabbrini, Han Somsen on behalf of Tilburg Law School

The debate about the institutional reforms of the European Union (EU) generally, and of the Euro-zone specifically, has recently acquired a new impetus. The Euro-crisis and the constitutional responses to it have profoundly modified de facto and de jure the institutional architecture of the EU designed by the Lisbon Treaty, and a number of influential road-maps have been advanced at the highest level of policy-making to trace the way forward for the EU. The purpose of this Conference is to examine from a comparative constitutional perspective the form of government of the EU and to discuss the prospects of integration and institutional reform in the Eurozone and the EU at large.


The Conference will feature the participation of a number of distinguished scholars, including Paul Craig (Professor of Law, St. John’s College, Oxford), Christian Calliess (Professor of Law, Freie Universität, Berlin) Deirdre Curtin (Professor of Law, Amsterdam), Ernst Hirsch Ballin (Professor of Law, Tilburg and former Minister of Justice of the Netherlands), Daniel Kelemen (Professor of Political Science, Rutgers University), Jean-Claude Piris (Professor of Law, and former Director, Legal Service of the Council of the EU), and Sylvie Goulard (Member of the European Parliament, Committee of Economic and Monetary Affairs) all of which have confirmed their presence.

The Organizers invite the submission of paper proposals, in particular on topics like:

• How has the Euro-crisis changed the form of governance of the EU and the Eurozone? How has the role of the EU institutions, notably the European Council, evolved? And what have been the implications of integration in the Eurozone for the EU as such?
• How do the EU and Eurozone forms of governance feature in (comparative and historical) constitutional perspective? To what extent do these forms of governance resemble features of presidential, parliamentary, semi-presidential or directorial regimes?
• What are the perspective for institutional design in the EU and the Eurozone? What are the advantages of alternative constitutional solutions, such as the parliamentarization of the Commission or the democratization of the European Council? How can checks and balances operate in the context of the new EU and Eurozone architecture?

Applicants are invited to submit an abstract (max. 250 words) and their CV to federico.fabbrini@gmail.com by 9 March 2014. Selected speakers will be required to circulate a draft of their paper by 18 May 2014 and commit to submit in the immediate aftermath of the Conference their revised essays for an edited volume to be published by a top international press. Selected speakers will receive free meals during the days of the Conference and a subsidy of 150 € to defray the costs of their travel to, and accommodation in, Tilburg, the Netherlands.