L’Unione europea e le crisi del mondo contemporaneo. Tra “valorizzazione” delle competenze e prospettive di riforma, Atti del Convegno “L’Unione europea e le crisi del mondo contemporaneo” (Roma, 22 marzo 2024)

During the last decades of this century, several events have taken place which have induced “decisive changes” in the Union and, hence, may be regarded as crisis of the Union: the health crisis due to the COVID-19 pandemic; the post-pandemic economic crisis; the immigration crisis, consisting in ever huge numbers of non-Union nationals seeking refuge in Europe; the geo-political crisis provoked by the brutal invasion of Ukraine by the Russian Federation; the energy crisis, caused by the rapid and impressive raise of costs of petrol and natural gas, after importation from Russia was drastically reduced; the so-called crisis of the principle of the rule of law, when some Member States introduced reforms in their National legal order which undermined the independence of the judiciary and curtailed several civil freedoms. Each of these crises demanded the Union to act, since several areas of Union competence were affected. However, in most cases, the Union’s powers were limited, sometimes very limited. The fact that, notwithstanding this, the Union found a way to tackle such crisis and elaborate workable solutions for them is clear evidence of its flexibility and resilience. The essays published in this book were presented at the Conference held on 22 March 2024, in Rome, organised by the Research Team of Tor Vergata University of Rome, in the framework of the Research Project of National Interest (PRIN 2020) “REACT - Re-shaping the EU Integration Agenda after the COVID Turmoil” (Principal Investigator: Prof. Adelina Adinolfi, University of Florence - 2020MZ8ZK3_002).