General information
The legal system of the European Union includes:
- primary sources of EU law: the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (formerly the Treaty establishing the European Economic Community, and then the European Community), the Treaty establishing the European Atomic Energy Community, the Treaty on European Union with subsequent supplements and amendments resulting from, inter alia, the Merger Treaty, the Single European Act, the Treaty on European Union, the Treaty of Amsterdam, the Treaty of Nice and the Treaty of Lisbon. Moreover, the primary sources of EU law include all the accession treaties and the so-called general principles of law.
- secondary sources of law: (regulations by EU institutions adopted pursuant to the primary sources of law):
| regulations |
acts of community character which do not need to be mediated into national law (they are immediately enforceable) |
| directives |
they are addressed to specific Member States and require them to take action in order to achieve a particular result (the addressee can freely choose the means and manner of achievement thereof) |
| decisions |
binding in whole on the entities to which they are addressed (it is also possible to make decisions which do not specify any particular addressees) |
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Each of the aforementioned regulations, directives and decisions, which together constitute the secondary law of the EU, may be a legislative act or a non-legislative act (that is a delegated act, an implementing act or an act “without adjective”). |
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recommendations and opinions, international understandings, basic procedures and case law of the European Court of Justice. |
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In a situation where there is a conflict between the EU law and the legal norms of particular countries, the EU law is paramount over the laws of the Member States.
Article 15(3) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union stipulates that "Any citizen of the Union, and any natural or legal person residing or having its registered office in a Member State, shall have a right of access to documents of the Union's institutions, bodies, offices and agencies, whatever their medium".
The Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 put that provision of the Treaty into effect by stipulating in particular that the Commission, the Council and the European Parliament should make their documents accessible with the use of an electronic register.
- European Parliament's register of documents
- Access to Council documents: Public Register
- Register of Commission Documents
More information:
Document last change: 2010.05.24, 14:53.
