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THE RULE OF LAW REVISITED — FINNISH APPROACH
certainly a cumbersome way to a common general part of European criminal
law or harmonized general parts of national criminal laws.? For instance, the
Hungarian scholar Norbert Kis demonstrated this difficulty by his analysis
on the principle of culpability.?" In spite of many successful partial reforms,
the harmonization of national criminal laws by EU’s legislative instruments
has turned out to be much more difficult than developing in ECtHR common
standards for criminal procedure.
In a recent European Criminal law Associations’ Forum, Eucrim 2019/4,
there are interesting analyses about the following developments: 20 years since
Tampere, 10 years after Lisbon, 20 years of protecting the financial interests of
the EU, and the establishment of European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO).
As for the future, the Commission officials Péter Csonka and Oliver Landwehr
are. however, pessimistic. although the 2011 Commission Communication on EU
criminal policy, COM(2011)573 final, concluded with a “vision for a coherent and
consistent EU Criminal Policy by 2020”, because Member States’ enthusiasm for
new initiatives is limited”. Problems arise from the diverse legal regimes within
the EU and the countries which have joined ECHR and, therefore, multi-layered
criminal policy. For instance, Mikhel Timmerman concludes his monograph
“Legality in Europe” that the EU legality principle leaves much to be developed
and that the CJEU’s approach to it lacks consistency”’.
?” See especially Kai Ambos, Is the Development of a Common Substantive Criminal Law
for Europe Possible?, Maastricht Journal of European and Comparative Law 12 (2005),
173-191; André Klip (ed.), Substantive Criminal Law of the European Union, Antwerpen,
Maklu, 2011.
Kis, Norbert, The Principle of Culpability in European Criminal Law Systems, in Hollan,
Miklos (ed.), Towards More Harmonised Criminal Law in the European Union, Budapest,
Magyar Tudomänyos Akadémia, 2004, 107-117.
29 See Csonka, Péter — Oliver Landwehr, 10 Years after Lisbon. How “Lisbonised” is the
Substantive Criminal Law in the EU? Eucrim (2019), 261-267.
Timmerman, Legality in Europe, 312.
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