Professor Federico Fabbrini will discuss his new book, which examines the EU’s responses to Russia’s aggression against Ukraine. From a legal perspective, Fabbrini evaluates how the EU has addressed the conflict and identifies options for improving the EU’s constitutional set-up amidst growing geopolitical challenges and risks.

In his book, Fabbrini analyses the EU’s response to Russia’s aggression against Ukraine, particularly focusing on how the EU (a peacetime organization) has adapted to the challenges posed by war. From a legal perspective, it examines EU action across five policy areas: 

• Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP)

• Fiscal and Economic Policy Area of Freedom, Security and Justice (AFSJ)

• Energy and Industrial Policy

• EU Enlargement and Reform 

The author argues that the EU’s constitutional framework proved flexible enough to enable unprecedented institutional responses to the conflict. However, the book also addresses how structural shortcomings in the EU’s constitution have, in some cases, hampered the EU’s response, while in others, they have occasionally failed to sufficiently constrain EU action. 

The book concludes by exploring potential reforms to the EU’s constitutional set-up, emphasizing the need for improvement in a time of ever-greater geopolitical risks.

This event is co-sponsored by the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law, the Stanford Program in International and Comparative Law, and the Stanford Center on International Conflict and Negotiation.

ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Federico Fabbrini is Full Professor of European Law at the School of Law & Government of DCU, the Founding Director of the Brexit Institute and of the Dublin European Law Institute (DELI). He holds a PhD in Law from the European University Institute and previously held academic positions in the Netherlands and Denmark. He has been a Fellow in Law & Public Affairs at Princeton University and a Fernand Braudel Fellow at the European University Institute.