EUROPEANIZATION AND THE LISBON TREATY, REAL BASES FOR FEDERALISM?
Rodica-Corina CRISTEA
National University of Political and Administrative Studies, Bucharest
Tel: 004-0318.08.97, E-mail: cristea.rodica84@gmail.com
Abstract
In this paper, we compare the achievements of Lisbon Treaty with the principles of a federalist constitution, specifically that of the United States of America, in the context of Europeanization. The questions of my analysis are: “How far is the European Union from a federation, if you consider the achievements of the Lisbon Treaty and the effects of Europeanization?” In the first part of the paper, we present and analyze aspects and rules of federalist theory and I apply them on the US Constitution. The review is focused on the norms of federalism, on the relation between state and its units and on the institutional aspects. The second chapter of the paper is an evaluation of the political model that the Lisbon Treaty sustains, analyzing the new things it brought, from a political and institutional level. The purpose is to see the evolution of the communitarian and intergovernmental perspectives. In the last part, on the one hand, we compare the two political models, using as criteria the political and institutional relations between the European Union and its Member States, respectively the United States of America and its states and, on the other hand, we present, explore and analyze the phenomena of Europeanization, as a positive environment to the potential federation that EU could be.
Keywords: Lisbon Treaty, Europeanization, federalism, European institutions