In 2005, a number of alarming reports on voter participation, social exclusion and political participation were published by the Electoral Commission in the United Kingdom. One third of the electorate do not feel represented by any of the political parties. Less than one in five votes had any impact on the outcome of elections in 2001 and 2005. In the 2005 election, 39% of registered voters did not vote. The turnout for general elections has declined significantly since 1997, and elected representatives are held in low esteem.

Mutual trust is at the heart of the European Union. Although the Union lacks a general mechanism to enforce its rules and decisions, member states usually comply with them. This remarkable fact can in part be explained by self interest: although individual rules and decisions may be found harmful and are ducked from time to time, all member states know they win by sticking to the rules of the game. The member state that grudgingly applies a rule or a decision, trusts all the others to do the same most of the time. If this were not so, the system would break down, in spite of the European Court of Justice denying the rule of reciprocity legal status in the Union.

COURT, MEET THY PUBLIC

The public stir caused by recent rulings of the European Court of Justice opens a new window on the EU judiciary's condition and especially on its relations with the public. In the Pupino judgment, the Court ordered Italian colleagues to align domestic rules of criminal procedure with the EU ones by way of construction, whenever possible. The Environmental Framework decision ruling was about a legislative act meant to have states protect the environment by the use of criminal sanctions.

Selection and nomination of constitutional justices – American model of judicial review in post-communist countries – Tensions between parliamentary supremacy and excessive activism of Constitutional Courts – Possibility of reappointment and the independence of justices – Lack of cooperation between President and Senate in the Czech Republic – Politicization of judicial nomination and democracy.

Historical background of the Italian Constitution – Main features – Golden age of constitutional enforcement – Italian political renewal – Fathers and sons – The great reform proposal – The 2006 referendum – The upshot.

Dissolution of the Bundestag by the Federal President on advice of Federal Chancellor — A ‘negative’ motion for a vote of confidence — Precedents of 1972 and 1982 — Dissolution in conformity with the constitution according to German constitutional court — The existence of a political crisis sine qua non for a dissolution to be constitutionally legitimate — Limited judicial control on decision to dissolve as set out in a 1983 ruling even further limited in the 2005 ruling — Effects of the exercised judicial self-restraint on constitutional division of powers — No proof for a decline of the rule of law or of acceptance of directly democratic elements — Strengthening of the powers of the Federal Chancellor sign of faith in the stability of the German government system.

Power of state – President as state's and as people's representative – Bicephalism of government – Unity in cabinet – History – Guizot, Chateaubriand – Orleanism – President's arbitration is form of leadership – De Gaulle engaging political responsibility – penal responsibility – Cohabitation – Constitutional amendment and referendum (1962) – President structures parliamentary majority – Weakness of Parliament – Full presidentialization? – Sixth Republic?

Appointment and Censure of the European Commission — Development of Rules of Constitutional Practice — Parliamentary committee hearings 2004 — Guidelines on Approval Procedure of the Commission — Framework Agreement 2005 between European Parliament and Commission — Clash between Parliament and Council on control of European Commission — Responsibility of individual Commissioners.

Features European Arrest Warrant – Article 16(2) German Basic Law, which allows exceptionally for the extradition of German nationals, not read in the light of the European Union integration clause in Article 23(1) Basic Law – Complaint of violation of the democratic principle put in perspective – Preservation of the statehood of Germany – Lack of proportionality in and procedural defects of the implementing Act

Union external action after Constitutional set back – Status under international law – Perspective of democracy and leadership – Pillar structure – Substance and ambition of Union's foreign action.

National parliaments near-universally endorsed in the European Union constitution-building process – Case for national parliaments a composite one: different scholarly approaches and national and European institutions support a greater role for national parliaments for different reasons – The overall endorsement of national parliaments remains a balancing act between competing agendas – Future reforms and treaty-drafting efforts most likely will continue to favour approaches of open-ended political content – No risk for the national governments nor Union institutions.

The editorial board of the European Constitutional Law Review has solicited a number of contributions on presidential elements in government systems in Europe. At the origin of the project are some recent sweeping interventions of heads of state in the political arena. These are notably the (suspensive) veto of the domestic Act implementing the European Arrest Warrant Decision by Czech president Vaclav Klaus and the dissolution, against the will of both the government and the parliamentary majority, of the Assembleia da República by Portuguese president Jorge Sampaio in 2004. They excited our curiosity about the latent ingenuities of systems that we think to understand but of which we know so little.

A constitutional experiment in which a parliamentary system of government under proportional representation was combined with the direct election of a prime minister — the system prior to 1992 — the political context of the 1992 reform — the unintended consequences of the reform in practice — the return to a pure parliamentary form of government, combined with a constructive vote of no-confidence and a prime-ministerial power to dissolve parliament.

Social function of sovereignty – Taming sovereignty through compromise strategies – The sharing strategy – The creation of a new unreal bearer of sovereignty – Leaving sovereignty itself untouched but forbidding the use of it – Abolishing the concept – Redefining the concept – Challenges to the Westphalian paradigm of international legal sovereignty – National answers to the challenges put by European integration – A new compromise formula – Neutralizing the sovereignty question.

Polish constitutional tradition concerning system of government mainly parliamentarian – Round Table before the Fall of the Wall in 1989 as explanation for the role attributed to the President – development towards a variety of ‘rationalised parliamentarianism’ with a relatively strong role for prime-minister in the 1997 Constitution – system of government not really semi-presidential in nature

On 10 November 2005 the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (‘Court’) decided the long-running headscarf battle between Muslim students and Turkish universities in the Şahin judgment. On appeal, it held that the prohibition against wearing headscarves on university premises did not violate Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights (‘Convention’) on freedom of thought, conscience and religion. It thereby confirmed the decision of the Fourth Section of the Court of 29 June 2004.

Influences of the Movimento das Forças Armadas, of earlier Portuguese and of foreign constitutions on Portuguese Constitution of 1976 — A semi-presidential system with originally four political powers: president, parliament, government and Revolutionary Council — Progressive ascendancy of the presidency in practice between 1976–1982 — Constitutional amendment of 1982: Revolutionary Council abrogated, parliamentary powers strengthened, presidential powers reduced — Presidential role in practice not declining, though depending on the political party power constellation — Influence of president as political moderator and institutional regulator at the lowest when political colours of president and parliamentary majority match — President not conducting, directly or indirectly, the country’s general policy.

Habermas's normative vision – Strengths and deficiencies – European Union democracy as solution to global problems – Necessity of developing a European civil society – Normative ideal, functional mechanisms, empirical reexamination – Habermas's criticism of Euro-skeptics – Substance-through-procedure mode of social integration – Adequacy of procedural substance questioned – Empirical limits to Habermasian European Union democracy – ‘Multi-segmented governance’ in the European Union – Supranational redistribution? – Legal integration has not facilitated social integration – Scharpf, Weiler, Joerges, Schmitter – Habermas's Sozialstaat principles jeopardized on Union level – Structural obstacle to coordinated European social welfare policy – European politics will resemble Sektoralstaat – Participation, egalitarianism and accountability

Proportionality review and, in particular, ad hoc judicial balancing of competing rights and interests are probably the most celebrated tools propagated by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) and are currently dominant features of the European discourse on rights. This methodology and its discourse, in fact, have gained such widespread popularity that, although the outcome of Convention-based and other fundamental rights claims is often far from certain, the way they will be treated by judges can be predicted with some confidence.

Tensions between national welfare systems and the social rights of the citizens of the Union — Fundamental principle of free movement and the degree of financial solidarity with nationals from other Member States — Introduction of internal market principles in health care — The balancing role of the Court of Justice of the European Communities.