Adaptation of national legislation to EU law: experience of member states and candidate states for Ukraine
Authors: Ryndiuk V. I. , Kuchynska O. Yu. 
Published: May 2024

The article is analyzed the experience of EU member states and candidate states for EU accession in the sphere of adaptation of national legislation to EU law. The relevance of the topic is due to the fact that on June 23, 2022, Ukraine received the status of a candidate state for EU membership, and today it is very close to the beginning of the negotiation process on joining the EU. Negotiations on accession to the EU provide for the screening of the compliance of the national legislation of the candidate state with EU law in order to identify differences between them in each part of the negotiations. After the screening, direct negotiations begin on the conditions under which the candidate state accepts and applies EU law. Each candidate country operates according to a separate schedule and can be accepted into the EU as quickly as it can adapt its national legislation to EU law (a decisive criterion for EU membership). Adaptation of the national legislation of the candidate country to EU law is a long-term process that continues even after the state has acquired full membership in the EU. It is not only about the formal adaptation of legislation, but also about the creation of institutions that ensure its compliance and implementation in practice. Ukraine, which is at the beginning of the negotiation stage, will be helped to speed up its path to the EU by using the positive and taking into account the negative experience of other states in adapting national legislation to the EU acquis.
The experience of the EU member states shows that they overcame the process of joining the EU and the related adaptation of national legislation through various legal and institutional mechanisms, but always in one form or another, success depended on the coordination of the actions of the parliament and the government. In particular, it is the development and implementation of programs for the adaptation of national legislation to EU law; establishment of special institutions responsible for European integration; consultative, methodical and financial assistance of the EU and member states; control of projects of normative legal acts for compliance with EU law; a high level of coordination of the activities of state authorities involved in the process of adapting legislation to EU law, etc. At the same time, the main guarantee of successful European integration is the presence of the political will to carry out the necessary reforms in the state, a quick transition from declaring intentions to become a full member of the EU to concrete actions along the way, as well as the support of civil society. The adaptation of national legislation to EU law as a process of bringing the laws of Ukraine and other normative legal acts into compliance with the EU acquis is, first of all, a separate direction of law-making activity that requires proper legal, institutional, methodological, organizational and personnel support. However, the experience of other countries shows that the approximation of the national legal system to the EU law should also include the application and interpretation of the law in the spirit of the EU legal standards.