Karlsruhe 5 May 2020 – spelling the “end of the EU” or indicating distrust in judicial dialoque?

Prof Dagmar Schiek shares some thoughts on the German Federal Constitutional Court’s recent ruling on the EU’s PSP Programme. That ruling was the reaction to the CJEU decision returned on the very first reference by the German Constitutional Court, and spectacularly refused to follow the CJEU. Consequently, it has triggered controversial reactions, which so far fall in two camps: there are those who foresee the end of the EU legal order as supranationality of EU law is rejected, while others hail the ruling as a confirmation of constitutional pluralism. This note proposes an alternative reading of the FCC's and other national constitutional courts' reluctance to follow the CJEU: its an indicator of waning trust, and calls for the trust between the EU's and its Member States' highest courts to be rebuilt.