Challenges in enforcement of EU law and policies: sources and solutions

Implementation of EU policies and compliance with EU laws by both EU member states and relevant (private) actors is a concern that both academics and practitioners have been trying to tackle, increasingly so in the recent years. The Commission's annual reports on application of EU law show that the Commission brings approximately 700 new procedures and issues approximately 100-300 reasoned opinions per year in light of its traditional enforcement tool (infridgement procedures). As this procedure lasts for several years, the cases pile up. In its strategy paper of 2017, the Commission shows the need to look for alternative solutions like promoting cooperation of supervisors and courts but its ideas are yet far from being close to making a good strategy towards effective enforcement. Where does the enforcement problem lie exactly? How can we try to explain and address those sources of the problematic implementation? This paper aims to offer a agenda-setting overview of this subject matter. It is based on insights from the emerging scholarship in law and public administration (Scholten 2017, Scholten and Luchtman 2017, Scholten and Scholten 2017, Thomann and Sager 2017, van Kreij 2019, van Kreij 2020 (conference paper), etc) and official documents and (case)law. The aim is to get a better grasp on this issue to facilitate the creation of suitable solutions and getting insights for an EU enforcement integration strategy.