Limiting Clauses: On the Continental European Tradition of Special Limiting Clauses and the General Limiting Clause of Art 52(1) Charter of Fundamental Richts of the European Union
Abstract In the Continental European tradition, provisions granting fundamental rights frequently include a written limiting clause such as art 11(2) ECHR: “No restrictions shall be placed on the exercise of these rights other than such as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society ….” Instead of the traditional system of special limiting clauses, in which provisions granting rights include their own limiting clauses, one finds in the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union in art 52(1) a general limiting clause. The introduction of this provision is a welcome basis for analysing the nature of limiting clauses in general and the respects in which general limiting clauses differ from systems of written and unwritten special limiting clauses in particular. The formal requirement of limitation by law and the substantive requirement of proportionality prove to be the essential limiting criteria.
Proportionality in Its Narrow Sense and Measuring the Intensity of Restrictions on Fundamental Rights
Within the criticism that has been made of the principle of proportionality, I intend to contribute to the deepening and improvement of what is understood as the test of proportionality in its narrow sense, which has been the main target of critics. Firstly, I will come up with a conceptual framework which I understand will allow for a better understanding of the norm of proportionality. Secondly, from an analytical perspective, I will explain my understanding of the structure of the norm of proportionality. And, thirdly, I will focus on proportionality in its narrow sense and especially on the Alexy’s weight formula. Here, however, I will frame this effect of proportionality in the light of the philosophy of measurement to explain what is truly done within the scope of this principle; then I will try to reconstruct the metaphor of the weight formula in the light of the compressive strength phenomenon. Finally, I will move on to a mapping of criteria that provide legal operators with a better justification of the intensity measurement of restrictions made to the fundamental rights’ norms.
The Area of Freedom, Security and Justice ten years on: Successes and future challenges under the Stockholm Programme. CEPS Paperbacks. June 2010
This book celebrates the tenth anniversary of the Area of Freedom, Security and Justice (AFSJ) by bringing together the views of key practitioners and policy-makers who have played an outstanding role in thinking about and shaping EU policies on freedom, security and justice. 
 
Ten years ago, the member states transferred competences to the EU for law and policy-making in the fields of immigration, asylum and border controls, and began the transfer process for criminal justice and policing. This decade of European cooperation on AFSJ policies has experienced very dynamic convergence, the enactment of a large body of European law and the setting-up of numerous EU agencies working in these domains. Such dynamism in policy-making has not been without challenges and vulnerabilities, however. As this collective volume shows, the main dilemmas that lie ahead relate to an effective (while more plural) institutional framework under the Treaty of Lisbon, stronger judicial scrutiny through a greater role for national courts and the Court of Justice in Luxembourg, better mechanisms for evaluating and monitoring the implementation of EU AFSJ law and a more solid fundamental rights strategy. The contributions in this volume address the progress achieved so far in these policy areas, identify the challenges for future European cooperation in the AFSJ and put forward possible paths for making more progress in the next generation of the EU’s AFSJ.