ABSTRACT
Many scholars argue that the Court of Justice of the European Union, perceived as having extensively shaped the European Union integration process, has created an understanding of “integration through law” exclusively based on economic rights. Its pro-integration case law would have a purpose, which is to build an internal market based on the free movement of goods, persons, services and capitals, and more generally to defend the values of a liberal economy. We argue, on the contrary, that market integration is only one among other values defended by the Court.
To provide evidence of the pluralism in the Court’s values, a typology of values draws on the existing literature on law and politics. This typology is applied to a selection of landmark rulings and analyse the content of these rulings to unveil the values of the Court. Describing the Court as market biased, and hence defending a purely market-based identity of the EU, while one of the aspects of legal integration is not the only one. Four other values are present in the Court’s rulings: social values aimed at developing solidarity and the social dimension of the EU, while limiting in some occasions the effects of the internal market; human rights; EU governance, including democracy/rule of law, good governance and institutional balance between EU institutions; and the autonomy of European legal order.
