Resumen de Constitutional Legitimacy and Credible Commitments in the European Union

Antonio Estella de Noriega

• The idea that the European Union must not adopt a constitution is gaining ground in current legal research on European constitutionalism. The N‐C (No Constitution) thesis is being forcefully defended, in particular, by authors in the ‘contextual’ or ‘law in context’ tradition. However, likewise using a ‘contextual’ methodology, in this article I argue that the N‐C thesis is in many regards misplaced. In this work, I defend the idea that Europe must adopt a constitution for reasons of credibility. I also try to show the main pitfalls of the N‐C thesis.