The K-Zone: EU terminology

EU law and politics is a terminological minefield. Even the term EULaw has a less than transparent meaning. Partly, no doubt, the problem is to be explained by the multilingual nature of the EU. However, even the EU's own organs appear to be unable to use terms in a consistent way.

For example, it is not uncommon to find that an institution or agreement has been renamed by some treaty after it was formed, and then the new name is used in ammendments to older treaties. Take, for instance, the change of name of the EuropeanCommunities effected by the TreatyOfMaastricht, signed in 1992. The European Communities were renamed to the `European Community'. By the time of Maastricht, the European Communities were dominated by the EEC, the ECSC and Euratom were still in force. Even the EU's own publications sometimes use the term `EC' as if it were synonymous with `EEC'. Since the European Community was, effectively, created by the TreatyOfMaastricht, you might think that the name `Treaty Establishing the European Community' refers to the one signed at Maastricht. Wrong. It is the original Treaty of Rome that was officially renamed to the `Treaty Establishing the European Community'. The Treaty of Rome was signed in 1957, about 40 years before there even was a European Community. The Europa Website blandly refers to:

``Treaty establishing the European Community (signed in Rome on 25 March 1957)''

in its indices. How can this be? How can a treaty signed in 1957 create something that did not exist until 1992? If you then read the text of the treaty, you will see that it contains provisions on, for example, citizenship of the Union. The Union, of course, did not exist in 1957 either. British legislation is, of course, not above inserting provisions into older enactments by way of ammendment. However, what we have here is the equivalent of Parliament passing a Bill that, say, renames the Theft Act (1968) to the Appropriation Act (1968), then inserts provisions into earlier statutes using the Appropriation Act.

What's even worse, perhaps, is the way the institutions of Europe have been renamed over the years, in such a way that various different bodies can have had the same name at different times. Writers on EU matters then use whichever of the terms takes their fancy, without realizing that the term is ambiguous. Anyone who doubts this should consider how many different European bodies have been referred to as `the Council' over the years (see Council for the answer).

The effect of all this is to cause general confusion to students, who have more than enough to cope with as it is. To be sure, one eventually gets used to it, but surely we could have done better than this?

EULaw