Jörgen Hettne

Professor, Prefekt Institutionen för handelsrätt

EU State Aid Policy: Concealed Transfer of Competences?

Författare

Jörgen Hettne

Redaktör

Antonina Bakardjieva Engelbrekt
Per Ekman
Anna Michalski
Lars Oxelheim

Summary, in English

This chapter concerns the role of competition policy, and in particular EU State aid rules, in the European integration process. The Treaty of the Functioning of the European Union contains a ban on State aid. However, this ban is not without exceptions. Through a centralized system, there is scope for exceptions in many policy areas. This also applies to areas where the member states are reluctant to transfer powers to the EU. To illustrate this situation, three such areas will be described: tax policy, industrial policy and housing policy. It will be demonstrated that that the development of an increasing number of detailed exceptions to the State aid ban raises important questions of competence. While the member states have been careful to delimit the EU’s powers, this has not prevented the EU from indirectly steering these policies through the application of the State aid rules.

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