Applying the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union in law and policymaking at national level. Guidance

Foreword	5
Acronyms and abbreviations	9
Introduction	11
Part I: 
General orientation 	17
	1	European Union system of fundamental rights 	17
	Two sources of fundamental rights 	17
	General principles of European Union law 	18
	Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union	19
	Field of application	19
	What is the rationale of Article 51 of the Charter?	21
	Beneficiaries	22
	Charter principles and Charter rights	22
	2	How does the Charter relate to national and international fundamental rights instruments?	24
	European Convention on Human Rights	24
	Other international human rights instruments	25
	National fundamental rights	26
	3	Reasons to check whether the Charter applies	27
	Duty to respect, observe and promote the Charter	27
	More and/or stronger rights offered by the Charter	28
	National courts can apply the Charter	32
	The Court of Justice of the European Union can interpret the Charter	36
	Violating Charter rights could lead to an infringement procedure	38
	4	How to check whether the Charter applies	39
	Where should you start your assessment?	39
	What is the necessary requirement for applying 
the Charter?	40
	Existence of a link to European Union law as a minimum requirement 	41
	5	In which situations does the Charter apply? 	42
	When Member States act as an agent for the European Union 	42
	When Member States need to rely on authorisation under European Union law	44
	6 How to apply the Charter	46
	What are the relevant tools for interpretation?	46
	In what circumstances can the exercise of rights be limited?	47
Part II: Practical tools	49
	7 Checklist on the applicability of the Charter	49
	Choose the route that reflects your starting point 	49
	Route A: Cause of national legislative action is an EU act 	50
	Route B: Legislative proposals outside the process of transposing EU legal acts 	60
	8	Charter compliance check 	69
	Stage I: Identification of limitations on fundamental rights	70
	Stage II:  Assessment of whether or not limitations are at all allowed	72
	Stage III: Assessment of whether or not limitations can be justified	76
Annex: Overview of Charter rights	82
Index	95