Book review: Reconceptualising European Equality Law – A Comparative Institutional Analysis
| Author | Elisabeth Brameshuber |
| DOI | 10.1177/1388262719833753 |
| Published date | 01 March 2019 |
| Date | 01 March 2019 |
| Subject Matter | Book reviews |
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Oxfam (2017) An economy for the 99%, available at https://www.oxfam.org/en/research/
economy-99
Author biography
Abhishek obtained a master’s degree in Development and Labour Studies at the Jawaharlal Nehru
University, New Delhi, India. He has worked as a research associate at the Dattopant Thengdi
Foundation and is currently pursuing his PhD at the Centre for European Studies at the Jawaharlal
Nehru University, New Delhi, India. He also writes for various newspapers.
Croon-Gestefeld, Johanna, Reconceptualising European Equality Law – A Comparative Institutional
Analysis. Oxford, UK / Portland, Oregon, USA: Hart Publishing, 2017, xxiv þ255 pages,
ISBN: 978-1-50990-966-7 (hardcover).
Reviewed by: Elisabeth Brameshuber, WU Vienna University of Economics and Business, Wien, Austria
DOI: 10.1177/1388262719833753
It is undisputed that the concept of equality is of great importance to European law-making. The
references to this concept range from Article 2 TFEU and a whole chapter in the Charter of
Fundamental Rights of the European Union, to directives dedicated to anti-discrimination, and
to the prohibition of discrimination on grounds of nationality. Yet, as Johanna Croon-Gestefeld,
Postdoctoral Fellow in European and International Private Law at Bucerius Law School, Hamburg,
points out in the Introduction (page 2), European equality law is ‘commonly criticised for its
incoherence and perceived unpredictability’. Other pitfalls attributed to EU equality law are
difficulties in comprehension due to its diversification or its functioning. This book aims to provide
its readers with a clearer picture of how ‘the general principle of equality functions in EU law’
(page 3). Thus, as Neil Komesar and Miguel Maduro state in their foreword, this monograph,
which is an extended version of Johanna Croon-Gestefeld’s PhD Thesis at EUI, should be of
interest to academics and practitioners alike.
Johanna Croon-Gestefeld sets out to assess the CJEU’s as well as national courts’ case law not
only within the classic interpre tive framework, but also from the pe rspective of comparative
institutional choice. In this way, she reconciles the different strands of case law by the European
Court of Justice. By doing so, she puts forward new points of view on EU equality law: the
comparative institutional analysis allows the author to present EU equality law as a field of law
where in which the balancing of competing interests is performed by different actors (courts and
legislators in particular) at different levels (EU and Member State level) (page 7). By adopting this
approach, she aims to explain why a specific case was decided in a certain manner. For practi-
tioners, in particular, this approach could prove helpful when trying to evaluate the potential
78 European Journal of Social Security 21(1)
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