Het recht op sociale zekerheid in de Europese Unie: een rechtsvergelijkende analyse op basis van de constitutionele tradities gemeen aan de EU-lidstaten, het Europees Verdrag voor de Rechten van de Mens en het Europees Sociaal Handvest.

The outbreak of the financial and economic crisis had a severe impact on national economies worldwide, including those of the member states of the European Union (EU). Several EU member states with financial difficulties received financial support by the EU institutions. In return, they were obliged to reduce public spending and as a result, national social security systems were drastically reformed. Since the financial and economic crisis, we see that the EU has exercised its competences to supervise national budgets more extensively even for member states not applying for financial aid, e.g. the country-specific recommendations under the European Semester. These recommendations also have an important impact on the national social security systems of the member states. The European Parliament as well as international organisations, such as the ILO and the Council of Europe, NGO's and academics, have criticized these measures and expressed their concern on whether they respect the fundamental social rights, as laid down at national, international and EU level. These concerns are part of a broader debate on the legitimacy of the EU that also includes other issues, such as the impact of EU citizenship, in particular social benefit tourism and social fraud. One of the questions that keeps coming back in both academic and public debate, is the question of the role of fundamental social rights in the EU. Although fundamental social rights found their way in the Charter of Fundamental Rights (CFEU) in 2000, there remains a lot of uncertainty about their content and enforceability. For that reason, this PhD projects looks at one fundamental social right, the right to social security, and aims to contribute to the development of this right in the EU legal order. This PhD project uses the method of general principles of Union law, as a way to further shape and develop the fundamental social rights in the CFEU. This builds on the already existing case law of the Court of Justice on general principles of Union law, in order to guarantee continuity and legal certainty in the EU. The PhD project consists of three parts: 1. An analysis of the right to social security in Art. 34 CFEU and of the general provisions in Title VII CFEU, on the basis of the CFEU itself, the case law of the Court of Justice of the EU and the legal doctrine; 2. A comparative analysis of the right to social security, as laid down in international treaties (the European Social Charter and the European Convention on Human Rights) and the constitutional traditions common to the EU member states. To conclude this part, I will give an overview of the different ways on how to shape the right to social security, as identified in this study; 3. An analysis of the specific features of the EU legal order in the area of social security. The concluding part of this PhD confronts the findings in the previous parts with Part 3, in order to formulate some proposals on how to shape the right to social security in the EU. Each of these proposals is also viewed in the light of a specific policy area. In that way, this PhD project discusses how the right to social security can operate in concreto.

Publication year:2018

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