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4 EuConst 1 (2008)

handle is hein.journals/euroclv4 and id is 1 raw text is: Editorial THE DIFFERENCE On 13 December 2007, after a remarkable acceleration of the process under the German and Portuguese presidencies, representatives of the member states put pen to paper and signed the Treaty of Lisbon. Much of the ensuing debate, both in legal circles and among the general public, has centred on its abandonment of the 'constitutional concept'. Indeed, the June 2007 European Council decided to relinquish the idea of a single text repealing the existing treaties and to delete all terminological references to the C-word, and concepts reminiscent thereof, such as the denominations 'Minister of Foreign Affairs', 'laws' and 'framework laws'. Likewise, there was to be no mention of the symbols of the EU such as the flag, the anthem or the motto. The primacy of EU law would be down-ranked to the status of a declaration recalling the existing case-law of the EU Court of Justice. And thus it was formalised in Lisbon. Now what of the 'constitutional concept'? For this Review the matter has some urgency If Lisbon's so-called 'abandonment of the constitutional concept' would indeed affect the constitutional reality of the Union, this could in turn affect the constitutional analysis in which this Review is versed. This is our question: are constitutional discourse and analysis of the Union's evolution as good methods as they were at the time of the conclusion of the Constitutional Treaty in 2004? To answer this question it is best to consider the whole of the difference be- tween Rome and Lisbon, not just the claimed abandonment of the constitutional concept. And to acknowledge that this difference, even if hard to capture, is real and significant. We shall demonstrate that constitutional analysis of the Union is indeed as good as it was, by using it to pinpoint and qualify the difference be- tween Rome and Lisbon in constitutional terms. In a purely legal reading the difference between the two Treaties is lost or made a matter of cosmetics. The House of Commons Foreign Affairs Select Committee indeed concluded that there is no material difference between the provisions on foreign affairs in the Constitutional Treaty which the Government made subject to approval in a refer- endum and those in the Lisbon Treaty on which a referendum is being denied.' 1 Third Report on Foreign Policy Aspects of the Lisbon Treaty, HC 120-I, 20 Jan. 2008 European Constitutional Law Review, 4: 1-5, 2008 @ 2008 TM GASSER PRESS and Contributors doi:10.1017/S1574019608000011

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