Maria Elena Gennusa

What is the CJEU’s policy rationale for recognising the direct effect of certain provisions of European Union law? The analysis conducted in this study highlights that, while the initial decisions on this subject had revealed the CJEU’s aim of enhancing the role of individuals as «subjects of rights» in the just established European Communities, the predominant objective stated by the CJEU in the following judgments has become to ensure the useful effect of Community law. However, this twist in the CJEU’s arguments corresponded to a gradual loss of coherence in the doctrine of direct effect as a whole. The purpose of this work is to assess whether the more recent judgments recognising the direct effect of certain provisions of the Charter of Fundamental Rights have succeeded in regaining the original intent characterising the first phase of the CJEU’s case law and, in doing so, remedying inconsistencies and contradictions in the doctrine of direct effect.