02/11/2026
The EU scrutinises Member States’ respect for the rule of law. But who scrutinises the EU institutions themselves?
That’s what the Shadow EU Rule of Law Report does (even though that’s the job of a distracted and disengaged EU Parliament).
Written by over a dozen academics, including our founder Professor Alberto Alemanno, the report is edited and curated by the Rule of Law Clinic at the CEU Democracy Institute with the support of Stiftung Mercator.
The report’s third edition was launched on Thursday 29 October at a hybrid Policy Dialogue hosted by the EPC in Brussels. The event was co-organised by The Good Lobby, the Rule of Law Clinic and the European Policy Centre’s Connecting Europe project. Barbara Grabowska-Moroz (co-editor of the report), fellow contributors Dimitry Kochenov and Laurent Pech, Filipe Marques (Judge and former President of MEDEL), Johannes Greubel (European Policy Centre) and Sophie in ’t Veld (former MEP), as well as Prof Alberto Alemanno, presented the main findings. The discussion was moderated by Joelle Grogan, co-editor of the report.
What the report found:
- Access to justice at EU level remains undermined by restrictive standing rules and a lack of political will among privileged applicants. Notably, the European Commission systematically fails to bring infringement actions against recalcitrant Member States.
- The EU’s anti-corruption framework has structural weaknesses, from politicised MEP immunity to unenforced conditionality.
- Rule of law concerns in the Single Market, where the rule of law risks being reduced to an instrument of competitiveness.
- Geopolitics increasingly shapes the design, adoption and enforcement of EU law, from Schengen to digital enforcement.
As highlighted by Professor Alemanno, the EU is radically altering how it designs, enacts and enforces its policies. Omnibus legislation, “urgency” without definition, and skipped public consultations and impact assessments are becoming the norm rather than the exception.
This epitomises what he described as a constitutional drift that marks a slow but steady erosion of the legal integrity upon which the EU is founded.