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The Role of the Court of Justice in the Separation and Division of Powers in the European Union

Within the European Union, we witness a proliferation of constitutional questions, leading increasingly more to tensions between its different constitutional actors. This is not really a surprise. A quick look at other composite legal orders - such as that of the United States - reveals these systems struggled with similar problems. In the United States, much of these were resolved by the Supreme Court. Using the role of the US Supreme Court as a comparative prism, I analyse the role of the European Court of Justice in the vertical and horizontal division of powers in the European Union. An unique aspect of the European Union’ s constitutional structure is that the horizontal and vertical division of powers are essentially interwoven. This provides the European Court of Justice with a unique position; the role it plays vis-à-vis the relations between the Union’s political institutions inter se will also affect the relations between these institutions and those at the Member State level – and vice versa.