European Integration

This chapter aims to analyse the Polish ‘integration clause’: Article 90 of the Constitution as an element of the Polish constitutional imaginary. The notion of constitutional imaginary as formulated by Martin Loughlin will provide the theoretical framework for these considerations. Perceived through the lens of Louglin’s constitutional imaginary concept, Article 90 turns out to be the provision that shapes intricate relations of two big ineffable ideas: sovereignty and European integration. The latter has been perceived in the constitutional practice as both the ineffable aspiration and the object of serious concerns. Since Poland’s accession to the EU, for a long time, constitutional practice with regard to the EU was a syncretic collection of cautious friendliness towards EU law, emphasis on (formal) constitutional supremacy and narrowing down the interpretation of ‘the conferral of competences’. Nevertheless, until recently, the constitutional text had tended to be interpreted as facilitating rather than limiting Poland’s participation in European integration. Therefore, the recent Eurosceptic turn after 2015 was not justified either in the sphere of thought or in the constitutional text. It disturbed the existing balance between ideology and utopia.