This book contributes towards EU studies and the growing discourse on law and
public health. It uses the EU ’ s governance of public health as a lens through which
to explore questions of legal competence and its development through policy
and concrete techniques, processes and practices, risk and security, human rights
and bioethics, accountability and legitimacy, democracy and citizenship, and the
nature, essence and ‘ future trajectory ’ of the European integration project. These
issues are explored fi rst by situating the EU ’ s public health strategy within the
overarching architecture of governance and subsequently by examining its operationalisation
in relation to the key public health problems of cancer, HIV/AIDS
and pandemic planning.
The book argues that the centrality and valorisation of scientifi c and technical
knowledge and expertise in the EU ’ s risk-based governance means that citizen
participation in decision-making is largely marginalised and underdeveloped —
and that this must change if public health and the quality, accountability and
legitimacy of EU governance and its regulation are to be improved. Subsequently
the book goes on to argue that the legitimating discourses of ethics and human
rights, and the developing notion of EU (supra-)stewardship responsibility, can
help to highlight the normative dimensions of governance and its interventions in
public health. These discourses and dimensions provide openings and possibilities
for citizens to power ‘ technologies of participation ’ and contribute important supplementary
knowledge to decision-making.