Union membership as a constitutional problem

EU membership as a constitutional issueThis article deals with the allez and retour provisions (Claes 2005: 84 f) of the Swedish constitution in relation toEU membership. What are the rules governing the transfer of sovereignty to the Union? And what are theprovisions for assessing the constitutionality of the incoming tide of Union law into the domestic legal order?I have three objects in this essay: First, to describe how these two groups of constitutional rules were actuallymodified in the 2010 revision of the 1974 Instrument of Government. I find that neither was changed in anymaterial way. Second, to try to explain the apparent reluctance of the parties involved to clarify the constitutionalimplications of EU membership. I find that this reluctance is rooted in a belief that European integration is notfurthered if the rules contained in the allez and retour provisions are made stricter and more precise. Third, toconfront a question conspicuously omitted by the parties in their revision: namely, by what criterion should theallez and retour provisions be intertwined, if an optimum of bi-level constitutionalism is to be achieved?I argue that, in the end, the underlying issue is whether Swedish citizens want to see the principle of freemovement applied as widely as possible. Do they want this principle to be applied across the board? Or wouldthey prefer instead to restrict its application to the case of capital and goods, thus leaving them free to structurethe labour market and the welfare state as they themselves see fit?