Acquis communautaire

The Community acquis^[1] or acquis communautaire (/ˈækiː kəˈmjuːnətɛər/; French: [aˌki kɔmynoˈtɛːʁ]),^[2] sometimes called the EU acquis and often shortened to acquis,^[2] is the accumulated legislation, legal acts and court decisions that constitute the body of European Union law that came into being since 1993. The term is French: acquis meaning "that which has been acquired or obtained", and communautaire meaning "of the community".^[3]

Chapters

During the process of the enlargement of the European Union, the acquis was divided into 31 chapters for the purpose of negotiation between the EU and the candidate states for membership for the fifth enlargement (the ten that joined in 2004 plus Romania and Bulgaria which joined in 2007).^[4] These chapters were:

Free movement of goods
Free movement of persons
Freedom to provide services
Free movement of capital
Company law
Competition policy
Agriculture
Fisheries
Transport policy
Taxation
Economic and Monetary Union
Statistics
Social policy and employment
Energy
Industrial policy
Small and medium-sized enterprises
Science and research
Education and training
Telecommunication and information technologies
Culture and audio-visual policy
Regional policy and co-ordination of structural instruments
Environment
Consumers and health protection
Cooperation in the field of Justice and Home Affairs
Customs union
External relations
Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP)
Financial control
Financial and budgetary provisions
Institutions
Others

Beginning with the negotiations with Croatia (which joined in 2013), the acquis is split up into 35 chapters instead, with the purpose of better balancing between the chapters:^{[citation needed]} (dividing the most difficult ones into separate chapters for easier negotiation, uniting some easier chapters, moving some policies between chapters, as well as renaming a few of them in the process)

Free movement of goods
Freedom of movement for workers
Right of establishment and freedom to provide services
Free movement of capital
Public procurement
Company law
Intellectual property law
Competition policy
Financial services
Information society and media
Agriculture and rural development
Food safety, veterinary and phytosanitary policy
Fisheries
Transport policy
Energy
Taxation
Economic and monetary policy
Statistics
Social policy and employment (including anti-discrimination and equal opportunities for women and men)
Enterprise and industrial policy
Trans-European networks
Regional policy and co-ordination of structural instruments
Judiciary and fundamental rights
Justice, freedom and security
Science and research
Education and culture
Environment
Consumer and health protection
Customs union
External relations
Foreign, security and defence policy
Financial control
Financial and budgetary provisions
Institutions
Other issues

Correspondence between chapters of the 5th and the 6th Enlargement:^{[citation needed]}

5th Enlargement	6th Enlargement
1. Free movement of goods	1. Free movement of goods
1. Free movement of goods	7. Intellectual property law
2. Free movement of persons	2. Freedom of movement for workers
2. Free movement of persons	3. Right of establishment and freedom to provide services
3. Freedom to provide services	3. Right of establishment and freedom to provide services
3. Freedom to provide services	9. Financial services
4. Free movement of capital	4. Free movement of capital
5. Company law	6. Company law
6. Competition policy	8. Competition policy
6. Competition policy	5. Public procurement
7. Agriculture	11. Agriculture and rural development
7. Agriculture	12. Food safety, veterinary and phytosanitary policy
8. Fisheries	13. Fisheries
9. Transport policy	14. Transport policy
9. Transport policy	21. Trans-European networks (one half of it)
10. Taxation	16. Taxation
11. Economic and Monetary Union	17. Economic and monetary policy
12. Statistics	18. Statistics
13. Social policy and employment	19. Social policy and employment (including anti-discrimination and equal opportunities for women and men)
14. Energy	15. Energy
14. Energy	21. Trans-European networks (one half of it)
15. Industrial policy	20. Enterprise and industrial policy
16. Small and medium-sized enterprises	20. Enterprise and industrial policy
17. Science and research	25. Science and research
18. Education and training	26. Education and culture 10. Information society and media
19. Telecommunication and information technologies
20. Culture and audio-visual policy
21. Regional policy and co-ordination of structural instruments	22. Regional policy and co-ordination of structural instruments
22. Environment	27. Environment
23. Consumer and health protection	28. Consumer and health protection
24. Cooperation in the field of Justice and Home Affairs	23. Judiciary and fundamental rights
24. Cooperation in the field of Justice and Home Affairs	24. Justice, freedom and security
25. Customs union	29. Customs union
26. External relations	30. External relations
27. Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP)	31. Foreign, security and defence policy
28. Financial control	32. Financial control
29. Financial and budgetary provisions	33. Financial and budgetary provisions
30. Institutions	34. Institutions
31. Others	35. Other issues

Such negotiations usually involved agreeing transitional periods before new member states needed to implement the laws of the European Union fully and before they and their citizens acquired full rights under the acquis.

Terminology

The term acquis is also used to describe laws adopted under the Schengen Agreement, prior to its integration into the European Union legal order by the Treaty of Amsterdam, in which case one speaks of the Schengen acquis.^{[citation needed]}

The term acquis has been borrowed by the World Trade Organization Appellate Body, in the case Japan – Taxes on Alcoholic Beverages, to refer to the accumulation of General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and WTO law ("acquis gattien"), though this usage is not well established.^{[citation needed]}

It has been used to describe the achievements of the Council of Europe (an international organisation unconnected with the European Union):^[5]

The Council of Europe's acquis in standard setting activities in the fields of democracy, the rule of law and fundamental human rights and freedoms should be considered as milestones towards the European political project, and the European Court of Human Rights should be recognised as the pre-eminent judicial pillar of any future architecture.

It has also been applied to the body of "principles, norms and commitments" of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE):^[6]

Another question under debate has been how the Partners and others could implement the OSCE acquis, in other words its principles, norms, and commitments on a voluntary basis.

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) introduced the concept of the OECD Acquis in its "Strategy for enlargement and outreach", May 2004. ^[7]

References

^ "EuroVoc: Community acquis". Eurovoc.europa.eu. 11 July 2024. Archived from the original on 18 July 2024. Retrieved 18 July 2024.
^ ^a ^b Collins English Dictionary. "acquis communautaire". Collinsdictionary.com. Retrieved 5 August 2012.
^ Rudolf, Uwe Jens; Berg, Warren G. (2010). Historical Dictionary of Malta. Scarecrow Press. p. 22. ISBN 9780810873902.
^ "Chapters of the acquis - European Commission". neighbourhood-enlargement.ec.europa.eu. 6 June 2012. Retrieved 12 February 2024.
^ Section 12, Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe Resolution 1290
^ Intervention by Ambassador Aleksi Härkönen, Permanent Representative of Finland to the OSCE Archived 16 October 2005 at the Wayback Machine, Annual Security Review Conference.
^ "ANNEX 1: THE CONCEPT OF THE OECD "ACQUIS": A NOTE BY THE DIRECTORATE FOR LEGAL AFFAIRS" (PDF). Oecd.org. p. 44. Archived (PDF) from the original on 9 October 2022. Retrieved 21 January 2022.

External links

EUR-Lex: European Union Law.
JRC-Acquis, Aligned multilingual parallel corpus: 23,000 Acquis-related texts per language, available in 22 languages. Total size: 1 Billion words.
Translation Memory of the EU-Acquis: Up to 1 Million translation units each, for 231 language pairs.

[1] "EuroVoc: Community acquis". Eurovoc.europa.eu. 11 July 2024. Archived from the original on 18 July 2024. Retrieved 18 July 2024.

[Collins-2] Collins English Dictionary. "acquis communautaire". Collinsdictionary.com. Retrieved 5 August 2012.

[3] Rudolf, Uwe Jens; Berg, Warren G. (2010). Historical Dictionary of Malta. Scarecrow Press. p. 22. ISBN 9780810873902.

[4] "Chapters of the acquis - European Commission". neighbourhood-enlargement.ec.europa.eu. 6 June 2012. Retrieved 12 February 2024.

[5] Section 12, Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe Resolution 1290

[6] Intervention by Ambassador Aleksi Härkönen, Permanent Representative of Finland to the OSCE Archived 16 October 2005 at the Wayback Machine, Annual Security Review Conference.

[7] "ANNEX 1: THE CONCEPT OF THE OECD "ACQUIS": A NOTE BY THE DIRECTORATE FOR LEGAL AFFAIRS" (PDF). Oecd.org. p. 44. Archived (PDF) from the original on 9 October 2022. Retrieved 21 January 2022.

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

[5]

[6]

[7]

v t e Judiciary and law of the European Union
Judiciary	Court of Justice of the European Union European Court of Justice members Advocates General General Court Civil Service Tribunal European lawyer Relationship with ECHR Public Prosecutor European civil code
Treaties	Rome Treaty Merger Treaty Single European Act Maastricht Treaty Amsterdam Treaty Nice Treaty Lisbon Treaty Charter of Fundamental Rights Opt-outs
Acts	Acquis: Regulation Directive Framework Directive Decision Recommendation Digital Services Act
Procedures	Ordinary legislative procedure Consultation procedure Consent procedure Commission and Council acting alone Commission acting alone
Principles and terms	Acquis communautaire EUR-Lex Direct applicability Direct effect European labour law European Enforcement Order Gold-plating Four freedoms Home state regulation Indirect effect Incidental effect Minimum harmonisation Maximum harmonisation Preliminary ruling Precautionary principle Principle of legal certainty Recasting Principle of conferral Proportionality Staatenverbund State liability Subsidiarity Supremacy
Regulations	Council Regulation (EC) No. 1206/2001 Council Regulation (EC) No. 1348/2000 Customs Regulation 1383/2003 Regulation (EC) No 261/2004 EU-Eco-regulation Commission Regulation (EC) No. 2257/94 Commission Regulation (EU) No. 1170/2011 Customs Regulation 3295/94 Regulation on roaming charges Brussels Regime CLP Regulation Regulation on Community designs Societas Europaea European Union System for the Evaluation of Substances Commission Regulation (EC) No 474/2006 REACH Rome II Regulation Rule of Law Conditionality Regulation
Directives	Good Clinical Practice Directive Data Protection Directive ATEX directive Battery Directive Best available technology Biocidal Products Directive Birds Directive Capital Requirements Directives Clinical Trials Directive Computer Programs Directive Conditional Access Directive Copyright Duration Directive (93/98/EEC) Copyright Term Directive (2006/116/EC) Cosmetics Directive Dangerous Substances Directive (67/548/EEC) Dangerous Preparations Directive Data Retention Directive Database Directive Database right Directive 2000/43/EC on Anti-discrimination Directive establishing a general framework for equal treatment in employment and occupation Information Society Directive (first Copyright directive) Directive on Privacy and Electronic Communications Directive on the Promotion of the use of biofuels and other renewable fuels for transport Directive on the re-use of public sector information Directive on Electricity Production from Renewable Energy Sources End of Life Vehicles Directive CHP Directive Directive on the energy performance of buildings Directive on the enforcement of intellectual property rights Directive 2004/38/EC on the right to move and reside freely Environmental liability directive European SEA Directive 2001/42/EC European units of measurement directives Habitats Directive Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control Internal Market in Electricity Directive Landfill Directive Directive on the legal protection of biotechnological inventions Directive on the legal protection of designs Markets in Financial Instruments Directive Measuring Instruments Directive Medical Devices Directive Posted Workers Directive Pressure Equipment Directive Rental Directive Resale Rights Directive Restriction of Hazardous Substances Directive Satellite and Cable Directive Directive on services in the internal market Temporary and Agency Work Directive Trade Marks Directive European Directive on Traditional Herbal Medicinal Products Unfair Commercial Practices Directive Universal Service Directive Urban Waste Water Treatment Directive Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Directive Waste Incineration Directive Waste framework directive Water Framework Directive Working Time Directive
Cases	ECJ Rulings (Caselex): Allonby v Accrington and Rossendale College Apostolides v Orams Bosman Cassis de Dijon Chacón Navas v Eurest Colectividades SA Chen Ciarán Tobin Coleman v Attridge Law Costa v ENEL Factortame Francovich Kamer van Koophandel en Fabrieken voor Amsterdam v Inspire Art Ltd Kolpak Microsoft Corp. v. Commission Marleasing SA v La Comercial Internacional de Alimentacion SA Metock Nordsee Palacios de la Villa v Cortefiel Servicios SA Peter Paul and Others v Bundesrepublik Deutschland Procureur du Roi v Dassonville Ralf Sieckmann v Deutsches Patent und Markenamt Tanja Kreil Van Duyn v Home Office Van Gend en Loos
Fraud	Court of Auditors European Anti-Fraud Office Accountability in the European Union
European Union portal Law portal

Chapters

Terminology

See also

References

External links