The Transatlantic Space Between Shifting Administrations (Friday, 2nd July 2021)

Organised by the Jean Monnet Chair in Law & Transatlantic Relations & Institute for the Study of European Law, City Law School.

From international economic law, international investment law, international human rights law to sources of public international law, the framework of convergence is more readily deployed to depict evolutions the intersections of legal orders. The EU and US have been pivotal in many of these developments but not necessarily together or with the same approach or outcome.

The conference reflects upon convergence and divergences as to the EU and US with respect to leading international organisations as sites of convergence- from the WTO to the NATO, UN and the Council of Europe. These debates have resonance with how we understand the shifting transatlantic agenda in diverse areas from human rights, trade, security, and the capacity of the transatlantic relationship to set new international agendas, standards and rules.

The EU’s proposed EU-US Joint Agenda for Global Change includes a Transatlantic Trade and Technology Council, uniting subjects and fields in a loose institutionalisation of key global challenges currently not well covered or dealt with by, for example, the WTO.

Outside of practice, the theory of transatlantic relations is similarly fluid. Non-legal scholarship on transatlantic relations is generally unambiguous about the extent to which bilateral transatlantic relations are “institutionally-light”.

In the past, legal scholarship has depicted transatlantic relations to contain more conflict than law. Others suggested that there were various formal and informal institutional dimensions to transatlantic relations which suggest that they are at least quasi-institutional. For example, a Transatlantic Legislators Dialogue between the European Parliament and the US Congress is on-going since 1972.

Similarly, Transatlantic annual summits continue to be held since the 1990s. Both have a new dynamic since the entry into force of the Treaty of Lisbon enhancing the legal component of the EU’s external representation for a variety of institutions.

Moreover, there is direct contact between the US Supreme Court and Court of Justice of the European Union since 2000, in the form of periodic judicial visits and heightened mutual adjudication themes and tools. Where does the state of the art lie?

This event accordingly focuses upon the place of the EU and US in the world and the rising significance of global challenges in particular to the transatlantic alliance and salient legal instruments, practices and developments. It constitutes an effort to understand the transatlantic relationship and in particular how it reveals the EU as a global actor, charged with promoting good global governance in its treaties, engages with significant shifts in the relationship across administrations.

The event focuses upon three major themes:

1. the place of international law and the transatlantic relations
2. organisations and intra-organisational relations
3. norm promotion practices of the EU and US.

It considers: what is the place of the EU and US in public international law going forwards? How do we understand intra-organisational relations? How does the esoteric nature of the EU as a global actor inhibit or assist the US going forward, inside and outside of international organisations?

Speakers in alphabetical order:

• Joseph Dunne, Director of the European Parliament Liaison Office in Washington DC
• Peter Van Elsuwege, Jean Monnet Chair in EU Law, Ghent University
• Daniel Francis, Furman Fellow and Emile Noël Fellow, New York University, Former Deputy Director of the US Federal Trade Commission
• Jenya Grigorova , Dispute Settlement Lawyer at World Trade Organization
• David O'Sullivan, Senior Counselor at Steptoe & Johnson LLP, Former EU Ambassador to the US
• Giulio Kowalski, Doctoral candidate, City Law School, City, University of London
• Maria Kendrick, ‘Assistant Dean, Lecturer in Law, City Law School, City, University of London
• Sara Poli, Professor of Law, University of Pisa
• Kenneth Propp, Georgetown University Law Center, European Union Law, Atlantic Council, Europe Center
• Kai Purnhagen, Professor of Law, University of Bayreuth
• Charles Roger, Assistant Professor and Beatriu de Pinós Research Fellow, Institut Barcelona d’Estudis Internacionals
• Mike Smith, Professor in European Politics, University of Warwick
• Viktor Szep, ELTE Budapest
• Fabien Terpan, Jean Monnet Chair in EU Law & Politics, University Grenoble-Alpes
• Thomas Verellen, Assistant Professor in Law, Utrecht University
• Eva van der Zee, Assistant Professor in International Law with a focus on Behavioral Law and Economics at the Institute of Law and Economics, Faculty of Law, Hamburg University.

Organiser: Elaine Fahey, Jean Monnet Chair of Law & Transatlantic Relations, City Law School, City, University of London