The Limits of Legal Reasoning and the European Court of Justice

'Conway's study is timely, well argued, intelligent and provocative ... [His] highly intelligent book provides an excellent entry to the study of the decision making of the Court of Justice. He shows that the Court has a predisposition towards a meta-communautaire reading of the treaties in those cases where it matters most.' Gunnar Beck, International and Comparative Law Quarterly

'With the help of case studies of landmark decisions, Conway ... demonstrates impressively where the reasoning of the Court on the interpretation of EU law seemed to fail to articulate alternative choices and thereby create a sense of inevitability of the Court's solution ... [The] Limits of Legal Reasoning [and the European Court of Justice] is in my view definitely a much-needed, thought-provoking contribution to EU law scholarship, whether you find yourself in agreement with the Court's conclusions or not.' B. Pirker, European Law Blog (europeanlawblog.eu)

'Gerard Conway has ... written an undeniably important book. Praise is due for his searching, tightly knit dissertation, which succeeds in rekindling a fire that has petered out too soon. The principal critique of the Court's creative jurisprudence is well founded, and his alternative theorems merit further scholarly discussion.' Henri De Waele, European Law Review

'Conway normatively discusses the limits of legal reasoning of the Court ... Such a proposition might be perhaps difficult to digest in some of the more traditional quarters of EU law scholarship. It could be seen, however, rather than the indictment of what and how the Court has done in the past, as the suggested recipe for the future. Conway's own conclusion confirms that his main argument is prospective: in a transformed, differentiated and sceptical Union of today, the linear narrative of further integration translated into one-sided reasoning of the Court becomes more of a problem than a solution.' M. Bobek, European Law Review

'... well worth studying closely ... based on thorough research and knowledge of the case law and of EU law, and also of the relevant literature.' Joxerramon Bengoetxea, European Constitutional Law Review

Gerard Conway is a lecturer in law at Brunel University in London. He has also been a visiting lecturer at the University of Buckingham.

1. Introduction and overview: interpretation and the European Court of Justice; 2. Reading the Court of Justice; 3. Reconceptualising the legal reasoning of the Court of Justice: interpretation and its constraints; 4. Retrieving a separation of powers in the EU; 5. EU law and a hierarchy of interpretative techniques; 6. Levels of generality and originalist interpretation in EU law; 7. Subjective originalist interpretation in EU law; 8. Conclusion.