THE LISBON TREATY AND THE AREA OF FREEDOM, SECURITY AND JUSTICE AS AN AREA OF LEGAL INTEGRATION

This paper considers the Area of Freedom, Security and Justice (AFSJ) in the broader context of European integration and links it to two trends in the development of the European Union: firstly, the expanding scope of European law and secondly the increasingly fragmented nature of the integration process. The paper provides a historic and thematic description of the AFSJ and argues that it represents, amongst other things, a movement of the EU into areas of ‘high politics’ and the development of a nascent ‘European public order’, linking territory, the state and citizens. In a parallel development, European integration has developed into a system of organising difference and accommodating national preferences. This is epitomised in the AFSJwhere the system of integration, analysed under various parameters, appears to emphasise national autonomy and to facilitate variation.