An oral history of the European Court of Justice

Research Project

This project traces the oral history of the European Court of Justice by collecting and storing testimonies of the Court’s members and staff. Oral history is a method originating in historical research to collect the insights of individuals into specific periods, events and experiences through interviews. By applying this method to the legal history of the European Union, this pilot project examines the European Court of Justice during its first 40 years of operation. Founded in 1952, the Court has grown into an unparalleled supranational body of adjudication of utmost importance for the Member States of the European Union.

The project ‘An oral history of the European Court of Justice’ collects the testimonies of those who worked at the Court as judges, advocates general or directors general of the institution. Semi-structured interviews have been conducted by teams consisting of a lawyer and a historian and focused on the foundation of the Court to the present. These individual stories are an important part of the Court’s institutional history and has permitted the access and declassification of a substantial part of the administrative archive of the ECJ. The aim of this project is to store individual memories and allow researchers to take a step back into history and to ‘see through the eyes’ of those who took part in the Court´s formation. The project is led by the mpilhlt in cooperation with the network ‘A New History of EU Law’ (Københavns Universitet) and the Historical Archives of the European Union (HAEU/Florence). The interviews will be deposited at the European Archives in Florence.