The Centre for Judicial Cooperation dedicates its activities to research into the use and impact of judicial interaction developing in the field of fundamental rights in the EU. It aims to put forward explanations for its specific development. It also clarifies what is the potential of judicial interaction for the European and domestic judiciaries and other national and European actors.
One of the fields where the Centre continually investigated the role and impact of judicial interaction is the migration related sectors. In addition to empirical evidence showing the increasing judicial interactions and their impact, the Centre decided to focus on this field due to the social necessity of helping vulnerable people.
Another key research field that the Centre has investigated and will continue to do is the role and impact of judicial and legal interaction in data protection. Starting with the CharterClick Project, the Centre has been involved in research focused on the interaction among key national and European actors in this field and the impact of the EU Charter and judicial and legal interaction on legislative development and the enhancement of fundamental rights protection.
Judicial cooperation and judicial interactions have been acquiring importance in the academic environment in the course of the past ten years. This has developed from an elusive, hardly traceable institutional dialogue to a quasi-formalised cooperation required in the European Union under the obligation for mutual recognition provided for by the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union.
The elusive nature of judicial interactions as well as cooperation have lead academics to discuss: the scope of these notions (e.g. where does dialogue stop, and where does cooperation start?); the classification of the forms of the broadly understood interaction; and the tools and instruments used by judges when they consider the dialogue essential for their practice, as well as the threats and opportunities that come with its use or lack of its use in practice.
According to the Centre’s methodology, judicial interactions are as a set of techniques used by courts, judges and lawyers to promote coherence and coordination (or, at least, to minimize the risk of conflicts) among different legal and judicial systems to safeguard of some constitutional goods that are protected by various levels of governance, namely the national, international and supranational normative layers.
The area of fundamental rights provides a good foundation for research into the role and impact of judicial interactions on institutional relations; the impact of supranational rules on domestic legal systems; and the delivery of justice. It offers the possibility to investigate how and why such interactions are essential within the EU judiciary system.