Resumen de Sovereignty, Article 4(2) TEU and the Respect of National Identities: Swinging the Balance of Power in Favour of the Member States?
The question of whether and to what extent sovereignty has been transferred to the European Union (EU) from iits Member States remains a central debate within the EU and is interlinked with issues such as Kornperenz-Kompetenz, direct effect, and primacy. Central to any daim to sovereignty is me principle of primacy, which requires that Member States uphold EU law over nacional law where there is a conflict. However, Iimitations to primacy can traditionally be found in national jurisprudence and the Maastricht Treaty introduced a possible EU limitation with the requirement that the EU respect me national identities of Member States. The Lisbon Treaty provided only minimal further support to the principIe of primacy whilst simultaneously developing the provision on national identities, now found within Article 4(2) of the Treaty of European Union (TEU). There are indications from the literature, national constitutional courts, and me Court of ]ustice of the EU (CJEU) that the provision is gathering strength as a legal tool and is likely to have a wider scope than me texr might indicate. In its new role, Article 4(2) TEU bolsters the Member States' daim to sovereignty and the possibility to uphold aspects crucial to them in conflict with EU law and the principIe of primacy. Consequendy, it is central to the relationship between the constitutional courts of the Member States and the C]EU, and where the final elements of control remain in 'hard cases'.
However, it does so as part of EU law, thereby facilitating me evasion of direcr fundamental conflicts and reflecting the concept of constirutional pluralismo
