Dissertation thesis "Relationship between National Parliaments and the European Union" examines the impacts of the European integration on the national parliaments - the limitation of their functions and powers, measures undertaken to compensate these limitation in both the EU and the national law and the new roles of national parliaments in the context of European integration. The point of departure of the thesis is the notion of representative democracy as a still unsurpassed concept of a legitimate exercise of public authority. National parliaments mainly fulfil the controlling and legitimising function in the EU affairs. To this end, they have various legal instruments at their disposal. The fulfilment of these functions is limited by political and legal factors stemming from the nature of parliaments as political, not professional bodies and from their role in the national constitutional systems. Special attention is paid to the role of national parliaments in the evolving economic and monetary union. The general findings are confronted with the legal regulation and practice in the Parliament of the Czech Republic.

La thèse compare l’Assemblée nationale et le Bundestag en ce qui concerne l’évolution dans le temps des pratiques des affaires européennes qu’ont les députés, et de leurs discours sur le rôle des parlements dans l’UE. Elle met en lumière une évolution paradoxale : A mesure que les députés se saisissent de l’Europe, les pratiques parlementaires nationales imprègnent de plus en plus leurs discours sur la démocratie parlementaire dans l’UE. L’analyse se fait à travers une « description dense » (« thick description») fondée sur des documents, de la littérature secondaire et des entretiens avec des acteurs parlementaires, en activité aujourd’hui ou dans le passé. Les débats parlementaires sont analysés à l’aide d’une méthode qualitative-quantitative qui compare les clivages des discours dans le temps. La thèse soutient l’argument selon lequel les néo-institutionnalismes, qui prévalent actuellement dans les études européennes, ne suffisent pas pour comprendre les processus d'institutionnalisation, qui ont lieu dans les parlements nationaux, parallèlement à l'évolution de la législation européenne. En intégrant des éléments de la « practice theory », du social-constructivisme de Peter Berger et Thomas Luckmann et de l’« ancien » institutionnalisme de Max Weber, on peut comprendre les observations comme le fruit d’un changement des « motifs d’action » discursive des acteurs. A mesure que leur expérience de l’UE s’accroit, les députés évaluent la démocratie européenne de moins en moins sur la base de réflexions a priori sur le futur de l’intégration européenne, mais en fonction des pratiques qu’ils expérimentent tous les jours. / The thesis compares EU practice and discourse on the role of parliaments in the EU across time, in the Assemblée nationale and the Bundestag. The thesis brings to light the presence of a European Integration Paradox: Members of Parliaments’ rising experience in EU participation has led to an increasing importance of domestic roles for MPs’ ‘word and deed’ in EU affairs. EU practice is analysed through ‘thick description,’ which is based on primary and secondary interview evidence with current and historical parliamentary actors as well as the study of documents and secondary literature. Assessments of discourse on the role of parliaments are conducted through a systematic deductive-inductive analysis of debates on selected EU treaty changes. This thesis argues that neo-institutionalisms currently prevalent in EU studies are inadequate for understanding the institutionalisation processes at work in national parliaments with increasing EU legislation. Integrating elements of practice theory, of the social-constructivists Peter L. Berger and Thomas Luckmann and the ‘old’ institutionalism of Max Weber, the observations can be interpreted as change of ‘motives’ of discursive action of the actors. With rising experience of ‘doing EU’, Members of Parliament evaluate the role of parliaments in the EU less on the basis of a priori considerations but depending of their day-to-day parliamentary practice.

Application of the Lisbon Treaty provisions on involvement of national parliaments in the EU decision-making process 10 years later Abstract Adoption of the Lisbon Treaty has brought about several essential institutional changes in the functioning of the European Union. For example, a further shift towards co-decision by the European Parliament on secondary law that became ordinary legislative procedure. Also, qualified majority voting in the Council has been extended and subjected to the new conditions. Last but not least, the EU competences have been divided as exclusive, shared and supporting. These and related further steps simultaneously gave rise to a more intense involvement of national parliaments, both in the sense of a scrutiny over a due exercise of conferred powers as well as a democratic safeguard of the new processes. The main goal of this thesis is to present a comprehensive picture of existing legal framework in this field, including a brief summary on crucial historical factors that have been shaping it until its current form. Hand in hand with that, it also offers evaluation of the most frequently used mechanisms throughout the 10 years of its application. Consequently, it leads to a reflection on how, and if at all, effectively exploit the potential of national parliaments in this regard,...

The debate regarding a national parliaments’ opposition in EU politics is ambiguous andremarkably underdeveloped. Historically researchers argued that opposition in the context of national parliaments and European integration is decreasing at the national level. However, this idea has been challenged during the last few years by a few researchers when studying opposition in EU Member States and specifically Sweden. Even though the idea of a decreasing opposition at the national level has been challenged, researchers have primarily focused their studies on measuring opposition through quantitative approaches. Consequently, there is a shortage of research examining opposition through a qualitative lens which could grant there search field a more nuanced perspective of the opposition occurring in national parliaments.The purpose of this thesis is to investigate if and how opposition takes place in the Swedish European Affairs Committee [EAC], through a theoretical lens of opposition and parliamentary transformations. The thesis offers a comprehensive qualitative analysis of opposition by usinga reflexive thematic analysis. The results show that opposition exist in the Swedish EAC. However, political parties repeatedly fail to present alternatives to EU proposals and fail to debate suggestions stemming from the EU. This thesis shed light of how domestic opposition in EU politics can be studied through a qualitative lens and provides a more nuanced depictionof opposition.

This essay studies the national parliaments' reasoned opinions at the early warning mechanism. The study aim to declare if there is any variation in which national parliaments who is active in the early warning mechanism, and if there is a variation in type of bills in the early warning mechanism. These study also wants to describe some variation in how the national parliaments argued in the reasoned opinions. The study gives an enhanced understanding of the importance and legitimacy of the early warning mechanism and the reasoned opinions. The result shows that there is a certain group of parliaments who are more active and these are with few exceptions EU 15 countries. The study also shows that there is some kind of bills that is more prevalent than others, there is however some variation. There is also a wide variation in the arguments raised in the reasoned opinions. The results indicate that the national parliaments varies greatly in managing the reasoned opinions and it gives a negatively impacton the early warning mechanism. / Studien granskar de nationella parlamentens motiverade yttranden inom ramen för EU:s subsidiaritetsgranskning. Studiens syfte är att beskriva en möjlig variation angående  vilka nationella parlamenten som är aktiva inom subsidiaritetsgranskningen. Studiens syfte är även att beskriva variationen i vilka lagförslag som återfinns i subsidiaritetsgrankningen, samt om de nationella parlamenten varierar i  argumentering i de motiverade yttrandena. Studien visar att det finns nationella parlament som är vanligare förekommande inom granskningen, samt att vissa typer av lagförslag föranleder fler yttranden än andra. Beträffande argumenteringen i de motiverade yttrandena fanns en stor variation.

Cette thèse explique la participation des parlements nationaux à l’élaboration et au contrôle des politiques européennes de justice et de sécurité intérieure. Le décalage que l’on observe entre les prérogatives formelles des parlements nationaux et la réalité de leur participation à l’élaboration des politiques européennes de justice et de sécurité intérieure nous conduit à adopter une grille de lecture fondée sur le cadre juridique, sur sa concrétisation et sur son interprétation par les acteurs parlementaires. La participation parlementaire est étudiée à l’aide d’une comparaison en deux temps. En premier lieu, les déterminants de l’activité parlementaire sont spécifiés à l’aide d’une comparaison quantitative de l’ensemble des parlements nationaux européens pour la période 2010-2012. La portée de ces déterminants est saisie, en second lieu, par une étude de l’examen parlementaire de trois enjeux de justice et de sécurité intérieure — la Convention d’application de l’accord de Schengen, les négociations pour les Accords Passenger Name Record (PNR) avec les États-Unis et la réforme de la gouvernance de Schengen — dans trois systèmes de gouvernement parlementaire majoritaire différents — la France, l’Italie et la Grande-Bretagne. La comparaison des cas contrastés a confirmé que, malgré les spécificités organiques et fonctionnelles nationales, le contrôle parlementaire des actes européens de justice et de sécurité intérieure revêt, dans les systèmes de gouvernement parlementaire majoritaire, des formes similaires. La participation des parlements nationaux à l’élaboration et au contrôle des politiques européennes de justice et de sécurité intérieure s’explique par un dosage variable de règles formelles relatives au contrôle parlementaire des politiques européens de justice et de sécurité intérieure, d’une part, et par les volontés des parlementaires à en faire usage, d’autre part. / Since the end of the 1980s, the traditional role of national legislatures regarding internal security and the protection of fundamental rights has been questioned by the progressive enforcement of the European Union’s legislative power. This thesis explains how national parliaments contribute to the decision-making process and to the scrutiny of the Area of Freedom, Security and Justice (AFSJ). The gap between the formal scrutiny prerogatives of national parliaments and the reality of their participation in the AFSJ decision-making process leads us to adopt an approach based on the legal framework, its concretization and its interpretation by the parliamentary actors. The involvement of national parliaments in the AFSJ is examined using a two-step comparison. First, the determinants that contribute to the variation of parliamentary activity in the AFSJ are specified through a quantitative analysis of all 27 European national parliaments for the period 2010-2012. Second, the scope of each determinant is assessed though a study of the parliamentary scrutiny of three AFSJ issues – the Convention implementing the Schengen Agreement, the negotiations of the Passenger Name Record Agreement with the United States and the Schengen governance reform- in three different majoritarian parliamentary systems - France, Italy and Great Britain. The most different systems design has confirmed that, despite institutional and functional national specificities, the parliamentary scrutiny of AFSJ takes on similar forms in majoritarian parliamentary systems of government. A mix of formal scrutiny prerogatives and MPs incentives explain the involvement of national parliaments in the AFSJ.

La dimension parlementaire de l’action extérieure de l’Union européenne, entendue comme la place occupée par le Parlement européen et par les parlements nationaux des Etats membres en tant qu’acteurs de l’action extérieure, se déploie à deux niveaux. Elle s’exprime tout d’abord, au sein de l’Union, à travers l’exercice des pouvoirs parlementaires octroyés par les traités (et le cas échéant par les droits constitutionnels nationaux), et ce de façon incontestable. Elle s’exprime ensuite sur la scène internationale au travers de multiples actions de diplomatie parlementaire, en l’absence de cadre juridique érigé par les traités, et ce de façon ambiguë. Dans l’un comme dans l’autre cas, la dimension parlementaire de l’action extérieure apparaît comme un atout, mais sous conditions, pour la poursuite de l’objectif d’affirmation de l’Union sur la scène internationale. Elle est en effet, en principe, un atout pour la légitimité démocratique de l’action de l’Union et pour la cohérence matérielle de l’action extérieure. Néanmoins, dans la pratique, cet atout demande à être confirmé. Afin d’être un atout effectif, la dimension parlementaire de l’action extérieure de l’UE suppose, à cet égard, d’assurer une conciliation harmonieuse de la légitimité démocratique de l’action de l’UE avec l’affirmation de l’Union sur la scène internationale. La quête de cette conciliation conduit à la formulation de réponses – réalisées ou réalisables – qui suivent un mouvement distinct selon l’espace d’expression des parlements. Lorsque le Parlement européen et les parlements nationaux agissent au sein de l’Union, les solutions résident dans la réalisation de multiples adaptations à partir du cadre juridique et institutionnel érigé par les traités. Ces adaptations, qui restent perfectibles, expliquent que la dimension parlementaire de l’action extérieure soit aujourd’hui encore un processus en construction. Lorsque le Parlement européen et les parlements nationaux agissent sur la scène internationale, les solutions résident dans la structuration d’un cadre juridique global, les règles juridiques existantes étant pour l’heure parcellaires et incomplètes. En définitive, l’action extérieure de l’Union s’enrichit d’une dimension parlementaire qui suppose, au sein de l’Union, d’approfondir les multiples adaptations réalisées à partir du cadre juridique existant et, sur la scène internationale, de structurer un cadre juridique global pour l’heure inexistant. / The parliamentary dimension of the European Union’s External Action, to be understood as the involvement of the European Parliament and of the National Parliaments of EU Member States as actors of the External Action, is rolled out on two levels. Firstly, it is undoubtedly articulated within the European Union, through the exercise of parliamentary powers conferred by the treaties (and, where appropriate, by national constitutional Law). Secondly, it is ambiguously articulated on the international scene through various parliamentary diplomatic actions, without any legal framework set up by the treaties. In both cases, the parliamentary dimension of the External Action appears to be an asset, but under conditions, for the assertion of the European Union on the international scene. It is, in principle, an asset for the democratic legitimacy of the EU’s Action and for the coherence of the External Action. However, it needs to be confirmed in practice. In order to be a truly effective asset, the parliamentary dimension of the EU’s External Action requires reconciling the democratic legitimacy of the EU’s Action with the assertion of the European Union on the international scene. The quest for this conciliation leads to different answers – effective or desirable – which follow a particular pattern depending on the parliaments’ “area of expression”. When the European Parliament and the National Parliaments act within the EU, these answers consist of multiple adaptations of the legal and institutional framework established by the treaties. These adaptations, which are still imperfect, can explain why the parliamentary dimension of the External Action is still a process under construction. When the European Parliament and the National Parliaments act on the international scene, the solutions consist of the structuring of a comprehensive legal framework, since the existing legal rules remain piecemeal and incomplete. Eventually, the EU’s External Action is enriched by a parliamentary dimension which implies deepening, inside the EU, the multiple adaptations achieved from the existing legal framework, and which implies structuring, on the international scene, a global legal framework, which is missing for the moment.

This dissertation deals with institutional aspects of the democratic deficit of the European Union, particularly the powers of national parliaments and their capabilities to influence decision-making at the European level. The national parliaments' role in European integration became an interesting research area thanks to their greater involvement in the EU affairs in the last twenty years. However, because of the many developments of the European integration in the last twenty years (including both deepening and broadening of integration), many questions remain open. These include involvement of national parliaments both on European level and on national level; for obvious reasons, the latter has been studied less regarding the parliaments of the Member States that joined the Union in 2004 and 2007. While this dissertation deals with some aspects of the work of national parliaments of all Member States, more detailed studies are devoted to the cases of the Czech Republic, Poland and Slovakia. This dissertation poses questions in the three main areas of research that are all devoted to some practical aspects of national parliaments' involvement in European affairs. First, it examines the involvement of national parliaments at the European level and whether national parliaments do have the...

Questa tesi di ricerca si occupa del ruolo rivestito dai parlamenti nazionali italiano, britannico e tedesco. Analizza il modo in cui questi parlamenti partecipano al processo decisionale ed implementano il diritto dell'Unione europea dopo il Trattato di Lisbona. La ricerca si concentra su un'analisi comparata delle leggi, delle procedure e consuetudini parlamentari al fine di esaminare il ruolo rivestito dai parlamenti nazionali nel contesto europeo. Il nuovo quadro giuridico previsto dal Trattato di Lisbona promuove la creazione di un sistema parlamentare integrato, basato sulle istituzioni europee e sui parlamenti nazionali cui è attribuito un ruolo più incisivo nel processo decisionale europeo, nella convinzione che un loro maggiore coinvolgimento possa contribuire a garantire un livello più efficace di democrazia nel funzionamento complessivo dell'Unione. I parlamenti nazionali possono contribuire a rendere l'U.E. più o meno efficiente. Essi sono chiamati a svolgere un ruolo rilevante nel processo legislativo europeo, in particolare nella fase di formazione delle politiche e del diritto dell’Unione europea (c.d. fase ascendente) e nel monitoraggio dell'esecuzione del principio di sussidiarietà. Il Trattato di Lisbona introduce norme di partecipazione diretta dei parlamenti nazionali nel processo legislativo europeo, trasformandoli in "guardians of subsidiarity". Il Trattato di Lisbona e i relativi Protocolli riconoscono il ruolo della cooperazione interparlamentare, affidando ai parlamenti nazionali il compito di promuovere e organizzare la sua realizzazione all'interno dell'Unione europea. In questa prospettiva le competenze delle commissioni specializzate in affari europei e della COSAC (Conference of Parliamentary Committees for Union Affairs of Parliaments of the European Union) sono ulteriormente potenziate. / This research thesis deals with the role of national parliaments in Italy, United Kingdom and Germany. It analyses the way in which these Parliaments participate in the European Union and implement the Law of the European Union after the Treaty of Lisbon. The research focuses on a comparative analysis of parliamentary procedures, instruments, and practices in order to examine the respective roles of the European Institutions and the national parliaments within the European framework. The new legal framework laid down the Treaty of Lisbon encourages the creation of an integrated parliamentary system, based on the European Parliament and on the national parliaments which are assigned a more incisive role in the European decision-making process, in the belief that these innovations may contribute to guaranteeing a more effective level of democracy in the overall functioning of the Union. The national parliaments can contribute to making Europe more or less effective. They will be called on to play a more important role in the European law-making process, specifically in the pre-legislative dialogue with European institutions and particularly in the monitoring of the enforcement of the subsidiarity principle in European legislation proposals. The Treaty of Lisbon regulations introduce direct participation of national parliaments in the European law-making process, transforming them into the "guardians of subsidiarity". The Treaty of Lisbon and the related protocols recognise and encourage interparliamentary cooperation, entrusting national parliaments with the task of promoting and organising its achievement within the European Union. In this perspective, the competences of the Conference of Community and European Affairs Committees of Parliaments of the European Union (COSAC) are further enhanced. In this thesis, the reasons for overall inclusion of national parliaments in the European Union activities are analysed. The role of national parliaments in the EU according to the specific provisions of the EU treaties is also discussed and the largest part of the work is devoted to the ex ante subsidiarity principle control mechanism (the Early Warning System), which gives the right for the national parliaments to influence the EU legislative process.

Comment des partis politiques dans l'Union Européenne se coordonnent-ils au sein de la même 'famille' politique ? Cette question est traitée sur quatre différentes dimensions : les élections directes au Parlement européen ; le développement des fédérations européennes de partis ; les activités diplomatiques des groupes parlementaires au Parlement européen ; la coordination interparlementaire verticale. Le résultat principal de cette thèse est que les partis politiques dans l'UE n'ont qu'un interêt limité à une coordination transnationale avec d'autres partis issus de la même famille politique et utilisent cette coordination plutôt afin d'obtenir des ressources au niveau national. La coordination transnationale de partis reste confiné au sein du Parlement européen et son environnement institutionnel bruxellois avec une influence limitée sur les organisations nationales de partis. / How political parties in the European Union coordinate beyond national borders with other parties of the same party 'family' ? I examine this question from four different dimensions : the direct elections to the European Parliament; the development of transnational party federations; diplomatic activities of the European Parliament’s political groups vis-à-vis third countries; and vertical intra-parliamentary coordination. The main finding is that political parties in the EU have only limited interest in genuine transnational coordination, and generally use such coordination instrumentally, in order to gain certain resources in domestic politics. Parties' transnational coordination in the EU remains confined to the European Parliament institutional setting and thus has limited impact on the national party organisations at large.