La Jurisprudencia del Tribunal de Justicia de la UE vs el reconocimiento del nombre en el Espacio Europeo

Abstract

This study focuses on the analysis of the Court of Justice of the European Union’s case law related to the recognition of European citizens’ name. This case law begins with a decision in 1993, in the case Konstantinidis; follows by the case García Avello (2003); and which has been recently developed, opening new lines of study, in the case Grunkin-Paul (2008), Sayn Wittgestein (2010) and Malgožata Runevič-Vardyn y Łukasz Wardyn (2011). The Court of Justice has faced the obstacles to Community freedoms given by the non-recognition by States of the citizens’ name, when it had validly granted by another Member State. From these decisions we can observe the progressive extension of personal and material scope of the EU Treaties and the importance that the Court has given the right to name, connected to fundamental right to personal identity and the right to privacy. These cases also allow us to observe how the European Court has given a mediated protection of fundamental rights at EU level and laid the groundwork for the creation of a common personal status within the framework of European citizenship. This recognition will then present an exceptional impact on Private International Law and calls upon Member States to make progress on arrangements for mutual recognition and confidence in the respective orders so as to ensure that personal status.