Taking the EU to court: annulment proceedings and multilevel judicial conflict

This open access book provides an exhaustive picture of the role that annulment conflicts play in the EU multilevel system. Based on a rich dataset of annulment actions since the 1960s and a number of in-depth case studies, it explores the political dimension of annulment litigation, which has become an increasingly relevant judicial tool in the struggle over policy content and decision-making competences. The book covers the motivations of actors to turn policy conflicts into annulment actions, the emergence of multilevel actors' litigant configurations, the impact of actors' constellations on success in court, as well as the impact of annulment actions on the multilevel policy conflicts they originate from.

Intro -- Acknowledgements -- Praise for Taking the EU to Court -- Contents -- About the Authors -- Abbreviations -- List of Figures -- List of Tables -- Chapter 1 The Neglected Politics Behind EU Annulment Litigation -- Policy and Institutional Relevance of Annulments -- Annulment Over Time and Across Policy Areas: Empirical Evidence -- Structure of the Book -- Cases Cited -- References -- Chapter 2 Towards an Analytical Framework to Study Annulments in the EU -- Research Questions -- Multilevel Governance and Conflict in the EU -- EU Policy Making and Litigant Configurations -- Judicial Politics and Judicial Success -- Conceptualizing Multilevel Annulment Conflict -- Horizontal v. Vertical Conflict -- Simple v. Complex Conflicts -- A Multilevel and Multi-step Analytical Approach -- Cases Cited -- References -- Chapter 3 The Legal Background -- Actions for Annulment: Some Essentials -- An Evolving Set of Reviewable Acts -- An Evolving List of Applicants -- Conclusion -- Cases Cited -- References -- Chapter 4 Studying Annulment Actions -- Research Strategy -- Case Selection -- Data -- Conclusion -- References -- Chapter 5 Motivations: When Conflict Leads to Litigation -- Conceptualizing Motivations for Litigation -- Material Gains -- Institutional Competences -- Ideology -- Political Trust -- Empirical Analysis -- The Legal Factor -- Material Gains-Driven Motivation in Annulment Litigation -- The Potato Starch Case (T-557/13) -- Adjustment of Salaries and Pensions of Eurocrats (C-196/12, C-66/12, C-63/12) -- Institutional Competences-Driven Motivation in Annulment Litigation -- The Renewable Energies Law Case (T-134/14 and T-47/15) -- The Leipzig Halle Case (T-396/08) and the Dresden Airport Case (T-215/09) -- Procedural Competences in Trade Negotiations (C-22/70 and C-425/13) -- The Selective Tax Benefits Cases (T-219/10, T-399/11).