Abstract
The purpose of this chapter is to discuss certain aspects of the fairly new concept of EU citizenship. Here we will focus on the rights of people who have, for one reason or another, lost or been deprived of their EU citizenship (which may actually happen, as is shown below).
The article will start with a brief analysis of this growth over time, going back to the introduction of EU citizenship through the Maastricht treaty in the early 1990s. It will then focus on the current legal situation.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
The Maastricht Treaty was adopted in December 1991 and entered into force on 1 November 1993 after it had been ratified by all the then 12 Member States. For a full historical account, see Kadelbach (2005, pp. 455 ff.).
- 2.
For an overview of this jurisprudence, see Wollenschläger (2011, p. 2, fn. 5).
- 3.
C-85/96, Martinez Sala, ECR 1998 I p. 2691.
- 4.
C-184/99 Rudy Grzelczyk, ECR 2002 I p. 6153 (para. 31).
- 5.
C-413/99, Baumbast, ECR 2002 I p. 7091.
- 6.
C-333/13, Dano v Jobcenter Leipzig, EU:C:2014:341.
- 7.
- 8.
In these four cases, C-127/08, ECR 2008 I P. 6241, two British nationals, one German citizen and one Polish citizen all wished to live and work in Ireland with spouses who had been refused asylum in the EU, which serves to underline the controversial nature of the case, as well as the multi-national dimension that the rules on EU citizenship may bring into play in specific cases.
- 9.
In particular Akrich, C-109/01, ECR 2003 I p. 9607.
- 10.
See para. 62 of the judgment. See also Jacqueson (2010).
- 11.
See also the Garcia Avello case, C-148/02, ECR 2003 I p. 11613.
- 12.
C-34/09, Judgment 8 March 2011.
- 13.
See paras. 40–45 of the judgment.
- 14.
This has also been said with regard to a subsequent judgment, given in May 2011, in the case of McCarthy. It has sometimes been suggested that this case implies that the consequences of EU citizenship must now be seen as more limited. C-434/09, McCarthy v Secretary of State for the Home Department, Judgment 5 May 2011, ECR 2011 I p. 3375.
- 15.
Rosas and Armati (2012), pp. 128 ff.
- 16.
See also, in this respect, Art. 22 TFEU and Arts. 39–40 CFR.
- 17.
C-369/90, Micheletti, ECR 1992 I p. 4239.
- 18.
See e.g. C-192/99, Kaur, ECR 2001 p. 1237.
- 19.
See the Kaur case.
- 20.
See C-369/90, Micheletti, ECR 1992 I p. 4239, as well as (and in particular) C-200/02, Zhu and Chen, ECR 2004 I p. 9925.
- 21.
Rosas and Armati (2012), pp. 133 ff.
- 22.
C-135/08, ECLI:EU:C:2010:104.
- 23.
Para. 51 of the judgment.
- 24.
NJA 2014 p. 323. In this case, the claimant had a British mother and Swedish father. When his parents divorced, it turned out during a trial that his father was not, after all, his biological father. As a consequence, the Swedish authorities wrongly deprived him of his Swedish citizenship.
- 25.
Judgment 5 March 2018, Case T 2480-17, NJA 2018, p. 103.
- 26.
A factor that may be revealing here, and that has to be solved before the real negotiations on the future relationship between the UK and the EU can start, concerns the control of the border between Ireland and Northern Ireland (which, as we know, is a part of the UK). Since neither the UK nor Ireland wants to reintroduce the border controls that were abolished in 1998, a possible solution may be to give Northern Ireland a special kind of EEA status. However, Scotland is then likely immediately to ask for a similar status, which will make things difficult for the UK government. Given these facts, UK may after all have to accept a kind of Norwegian solution, but this is of course purely speculative. – It may also be mentioned in this respect that as of 5 April 2018, a so-called citizen’s initiative aiming at letting UK citizens keeping their EU citizenship after Brexit (ECI(2017)000005) was far from receiving the required one million signatures that will, under Article 11 of the EU Treaty, force the EU Commission to analyse whether a legislative initiative should be made. The deadline for achieving this number of signataires is 2 May, 2018.
- 27.
Having this in mind, the legality of actions taken by French and Swedish authorities against gypsy people from Romania in the summer of 2010 must be called into question.
- 28.
It may be noted, however, that these rules do not apply to students.
- 29.
See e.g. C-365/02, Lindfors, ECR 2004 I p. 7183.
- 30.
See C-138/02, Collins, ECR 2004 I p. 2703.
- 31.
C-184/99, ECR 2001 P. 6193, para. 31. See also Joined Cases C-482/01 and 493/01, Orfanopoulos and Oliveiri, ECR 2004 I p. 5257, para. 64.
References
Costello, C. (2009). Metock: Free movement and ‘normal family life in the Union. Common Market Law Review, 46, 587–622.
Currie, S. (2009). Accelerated justice or a step too far? Residence rights of non-EU family members and the Court’s ruling in Metock. European Law Review, 34, 310–326.
Jacqueson, C. (2010). Metock as a shock? The struggle between rights and sovereignty. In H. Koch, K. Hagel-Sörensen, U. Haltern, & J. H. H. Weiler (Eds.), Europe – The new legal realism, essays in honour of Hjalte Rasmussen (pp. 277–296). Copenhagen: DJOF Publishing.
Kadelbach, S. (2005). Union citizenship. In A. Von Bogdandy & J. Bast (Eds.), Principles of European constitutional law (pp. 453–499). Oxford: Hart Publishing.
Rosas, A., & Armati, L. (2012). EU constitutional law – An introduction (2nd ed.). Oxford: Hart Publishing.
The Court of Justice in the Limelight – Again. (2008). Editorial Comment. Common Market Law Review, 45(6), 1571–1579.
Wollenschläger, F. (2011). A new fundamental freedom beyond market integration: Union citizenship and its dynamics for shifting the economic paradigm of European integration. European Law Journal, 17, 1–34.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Nergelius, J. (2019). Former EU Citizen. In: Bartolini, A., Cippitani, R., Colcelli, V. (eds) Dictionary of Statuses within EU Law. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-00554-2_35
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-00554-2_35
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-00553-5
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-00554-2
eBook Packages: Law and CriminologyLaw and Criminology (R0)