Resilient societies are based on participative inclusion – but achieving and maintaining participative inclusion is complex once societies transcend national borders through international economic integration. Yet the European Union seems to hold out a promise for maintaining participative inclusion through guaranteeing social and labour rights alongside equality rights, while basing its Internal Market and Economic and Monetary Union on legal guarantees at the same time. Traditional perceptions suggest that social and labour rights will be restricted by these legal guarantees. Alternative perspectives are possible though: the EU Internal Market law is premised on equal treatment of persons, which again may function as a guarantee of aligning economic openness with social fairness. Also, the legally binding Charter of Fundamental rights demands a constitutional conditioning of the Internal Market and Economic and Monetary Union. Considering frictions between EU economic law and participative inclusion as perceived by social actors, and their reaction to those frictions may demonstrate whether rights guarantees can become a medium through which changes in the institutions of economic integration can be achieved.

This panel offers a forum for discussing the opportunities and pitfalls offered by constitutional conditioning of European economic integration. The four papers demonstrate and question in how far constitutional conditioning of the Internal Market through rights guarantees may contribute to meeting new challenges for the EU’s resilience to global crisis.