Judicial Behavior Under (Minimal) Political Constraints: A Response to Carrubba, Gabel and Hankla (2008)

This paper evaluates the extent to which threats of noncompliance and override influence the rulings made by the ECJ. Using the same dataset as Carrubba, Gabel and Hankla (2008) and correcting for problems with model dependence in their results, we find that the court is generally not responsive to the observations filed by member states. While the court is responsive to the preferences of member-states in infringement proceedings (where non-compliance with ECJ rulings is at stake), member states rarely express their preferences in these cases. Ultimately, we demonstrate that threats of override and noncompliance do not affect the behavior of the European Court of Justice in the vast majority of its cases.