Month: January 2021

Editorial of February 2021

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Alessandra Silveira (Editor) and Alexandre Veronese (Professor at University of Brasília)
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Thoughts regarding the right to deindexation and the weaknesses of the idea of “being forgotten” online – marking the Data Protection Day

28 January 2021 marks the 15th “Data Protection Day” and the 40th anniversary of the Council of Europe’s Convention 108 – the first international legal instrument regarding personal data protection – which was opened for signature on 28 January 1981.

What began as a European celebration is now a yearly commemoration all around the world. This year, to mark the occasion, the Ibero-American Network for Data Protection and the Council of Europe promoted an event targeted to Latin America. It is interesting to know that, coincidentally, the Brazilian Federal Supreme Court (STF) will hear on 3 February a case regarding a type of “right to be forgotten.” This right is the subject inspiring this essay. In light of this fact, it is essential to assess the (jus)fundamental dimension of the right to deindexation and the weakness of the idea of “being forgotten” online.[i]

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The Court of Justice of the European Union is facing a new challenge: compliance with the rule of law or not as a result of the effects of decisions delivered by the Constitutional Court of Romania

On By officialblogunioIn Essays1 Comment 
Dragoș Călin (Judge at the Bucharest Court of Appeal and co-president of the Romanian Judges' Forum Association)
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1. Some decisions of the Constitutional Court of Romania and the requests for preliminary ruling filed by the courts in Romania

In Romania, the decisions of the Constitutional Court (CCR) have been the subject of endless public discussion in recent years.

Most recently, due to the fact that, according to a press release issued at the beginning of June by the National Anticorruption Directorate, the public opinion found out that, in a number of 801 criminal files regarding the offence of abuse of office, the solution of discontinuance of proceedings was ordered, as an effect of CCR Decision no. 405/2016, according to which, when establishing that the offence of abuse of office was committed, the judicial bodies must take into account only the infringement of the normative prescriptions of the law, and not also the infringement of certain obligations provided by Government decisions or other infra-legal rules. The value of the damage established during the criminal investigation, which has remained unrecovered, according to the Romanian prosecutors, amounts to RON 1,380,564,195, EUR 118,467,830 and USD 25,636,611.

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Short notes regarding the Portuguese presidency of the Council of the European Union: the agreement in principle between the EU and China

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by Pedro Madeira Froufe (Editor)
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Friday, 15 January, marked the first day of the second (relatively general) lockdown in Portugal. At the same time, Lisbon hosted a number of European Commissioners, including the President of the European Commission, Ursula Von der Leyen, for an in-person event with significant political relevance.

The Commissioner’s visit, signaling the beginning of a Member State’s presidency of the Council is, in fact, a tradition. In a manner carrying out some symbolism, this visit to Portugal, by accident coinciding with the second lockdown in the country, can also be seen as a sign of what is expecting the EU in the first semester of 2021. Notwithstanding, the priorities officially set out by the Portuguese presidency, the pandemic narrows down the possible paths. We have to overcome, to remake ourselves, and Europe must keep being Europe, deepening integration (especially now) with pride in the European project.

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Neuro-rights

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by Felipe Debasa (University Rey Juan Carlos, Madrid)
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The history of social evolution is also the history of social rights achievements and in this equation the role of technology must be taken into account. Therefore, we have to ask ourselves whether the technology that exists at any given moment shapes social evolution or whether it is society that creates the technology it needs for its development. We think that it is available technology that shapes society, and in this respect, we could cite how the geographical limits of the provinces in Spain and Portugal were marked according to the technology of displacement existing at the time: the horse. Probably if the limit were set today, it would not be on the basis of the distance a person can travel to and from the place in a single day.

By legal system or law, we are referring to the set of rules that regulate human relations in society and which are imposed by States in a coercive manner. But in the Fourth Industrial Revolution, the era in which social changes occur in a rapid and disruptive manner, the law is also the regulator that allows these social changes to be accelerated or slowed down. Thus, with regard to new technologies, perhaps we could explain why Anglo-Saxon countries implement technology in society much more quickly than Latin countries. Remember Cordeiro, J. L, that in Anglo-Saxon countries what the law does not explicitly prohibit is basically allowed; while in Roman-based legal systems what is not expressly regulated is basically prohibited.

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Editorial of January 2021

On By officialblogunioIn Editorials1 Comment 
Pedro Madeira Froufe (Editor) and Tiago Sérgio Cabral (Managing Editor)
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Heresy, realpolitik, and the European Budget

1. The negotiation preceding the final approval of the 2021-2027 Multiannual Financial Framework (hereinafter, “MFF” or “Budget”) has marked by a significant number of twists, turns and eleventh-hour surprises. From the beginning this would always be a difficult negotiation. Being the first budget without the UK as a Member State, on one hand there was the need to show a united European Union after Brexit, but, on the other hand, there was the always unpleasant matter of redistributing the bill among remaining Member States.

2. In 2018, the Juncker Commission proposed a Budget with the value €1 135 Billion. Parliament considered the proposal not to be ambitious enough, an made a reinforced “counter-offer”, naming a much higher price for its consent in its November 2018 Interim Report on the Budget. However, in Council negotiations, the proposal was on track to be severely reduced. Plenty of factions were formed around the budget discussion such as the frugals (who wished to cap the budget at 1% of the GNI) or the friends of cohesion (who were not satisfied with cuts or shifting of funds from cohesion). Europe’s farming industry also lobbied against the decline in importance of the Common Agricultural Policy, and especially direct payments in the budget. At the end, things certainly seemed to be going into a pretty disappointing direction. The most likely result appeared to be a non-innovative budget pushed through after plenty of (arguably) petty squabbling.

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