A cassation court traditionally has two tasks: a unifying task and a corrective task. The unifying task consists of verifying the internal legality of a lower court’s decision (the correct application and interpretation of the law by the lower courts). The corrective task refers to verifying the external legality of the lower court’s decision. The cassation court must ensure that the decisions of the courts concerned are in conformity with the requirements of proper administration of justice. This article focuses on the following question: is it necessary that the Belgian Council of State, acting in the capacity of a cassation court, performs both traditional tasks (corrective and unifying)? This is by no means self-evident, given the specific judicial structure in which the Belgian Council of State operates.

The contribution assesses Germany’s better regulation system as quality assurance system. At first, the paper outlines the development of the system over the last years and describes its main characteristics. The introduction of the Nationaler Normenkontrollrat (National Regulatory Control Council) in 2006 can be seen as a cornerstone in this respect. The competency of the National Regulatory Control Council was extended in 2011 and a new concept of cost measurement of regulatory costs - compliance costs - was introduced. The new concept captures not only the costs arising from information obligations, but all compliance costs of a regulation. Secondly, the paper discusses the challenges to the better regulation system, in particular, those due to Germany’s federal structure providing in most legislative areas for a separation of actual law making at the federal level and execution of laws by the German Länder (and their municipalities).

In the theory, legislation and practice of regulation and conduct of administrative procedures, trends towards the concept of good administration can be detected at both supra- and national levels. Based on normative and comparative-legal analyses of Slovene (1999), Croatian (2009) and the EP Resolution (2013) administrative procedure acts (APAs), the article identifies user-oriented institutions that pursue the principles of good administration. Furthermore, it examines acceleration and braking mechanisms that influence the duration of procedures (e.g. setting and shortening time limits, positive fiction, preclusions, and enforcement of procedural errors, broader participation of affected parties, legal protection). Timely and efficient decision-making viewed as a human right with balanced protection of public and private legal interests is in fact crucial for achieving good administration. Hence, in conclusion, the authors propose selected changes de lege ferenda for the reregulation of APAs in Slovenia and beyond, in support of less excessive length of procedures.

Given the rise of mediation in other legal disciplines and the influence of the EU, the call for mediation is increasing in Belgian administrative practice. Several years ago, the legislature took the first steps towards mediation in the judicial administrative procedure. This contribution is a study of the existing forms of mediation with its limitations and possibilities. Taking these findings into account, a possible mediation framework, applicable in the Belgian legal system, is proposed.

In judicial review of decisions of administrative authorities courts generally aim towards grounding a judgment on substantively true facts. Such a substantive truth is usually understood as meaning ’that which happened’. But how can true facts be established if the facts have not yet occurred and what implications does this have for judicial review in administrative procedures? In this article this question will be analysed by taking the Dutch Administrative Court’s review of merger decisions of the Dutch Competition Authority - using a substantively close copy of the European merger control assessment framework - as subject of analysis. Judicial review of the substantive assessment in merger control, including the prospective analysis involved and taking into account complexities of economic evidence, will be analyzed and set against the general aim of establishing substantive truth of facts.

This contribution scrutinizes the effect of the General Administrative Act (Algemene wet bestuursrecht) on the doctrine of administrative supervision (bestuurlijk toezicht), especially on the (governmental) power of spontaneous annulment (spontane vernietigingsrecht) towards local authorities. In 1998 the legal provisions concerning administrative supervision have been transferred from the Local Government Act (Gemeentewet) to the General Administrative Act. Since then the doctrine was subject to several major changes, from which the 2006 Policy document on spontaneous annulment (Beleidskader spontane vernietiging) and the 2012 Act on re-vitalizing general supervision (Wet revitalisering generiek toezicht) are the most important. The provisions from the General Administrative Act concerning administrative supervision have hardly been changed; case law concerning spontaneous annulment mainly concerned the interpretation of the Policy documents. The provisions regarding administrative supervision and laid down in the General Administrative Act, can therefore be seen as of constant value of administrative supervision.

If two or more educational institutions intend to merge, such institutions must obtain approval from the Minister of Education prior to merging in accordance with the “Educational Merger test Act” (Wet fusietoets onderwijs) which came into force on 1 October 2011. Since then, further to the implementation of the Educational Merger test Act, the Minister of Education has taken several decisions on merger requests from educational institutions. Prior to delivering a decision on a merger request the Minister of Education is advised by its advisory committee ("Adviescommissie fusietoets onderwijs"). This article describes and analyses the legal framework put into place be the Educational Merger test Act. It further analyses the functioning of the Act in its first year of existence and proposes solutions for problems found. The article in this respect focuses on the advice of the advisory committee.

The legislator deliberately created a more restrained compensation duty for the legal costs made in the objection procedure, than for the costs made in the appeal procedure. According to article 7:15 of the Dutch General Administrative Law Act, solely the legal costs made in the objection procedure are reimbursed at the request of the stakeholder, as far as the contested decision is revoked by reason of the tort due to the administration. The administration decides on this request when deciding on the objection. There are several disadvantages to this. That is particularly the case, when the stakeholder has lost his interest in the revocation of the contested decision during the procedure, and he solely wants his costs, made in the objection procedure, reimbursed. This raises the question of whether it would be better to regulate the legal costs made in the objection procedure in the same way as the legal costs made in the appeal procedure.

This article examines the actual application of European administrative soft law in light of the Dutch principle of legality. European administrative soft law is not legally binding. However, European administrative soft law can generate judicial binding effects for the Member States on the basis of the jurisprudence of the Court of Justice. Moreover, the research on the actual application of administratice soft law in the field of European subsidies shows that it can also have a 'de facto' binding effect for the Member Sates.

The (legal and actual) binding effects of European administrative soft law are problematic in light of the principle of legality, according to which binding norms must be laid down in hard law. The article argues that with the application of administrative soft law, three functions of the principle of legality (the principle provides legal certainty and legitimacy and serves as a safeguard against public authorities) are not sufficiently met. Several possible solutions that may resolve this tension are proposed.

Soft law is a necessity in modern public administration. On the verge of public bodies that execute administrative tasks various forms of soft law are applied. This article explores the many shapes of soft law in a continental European context. This results in the identification of a series of variables that are relevant for the legal effects of soft law. The article further focuses on the way policy rules, as a special form of soft law, are treated in the Dutch legislation.

In this contribution the history of Dutch administrative law and the General Administrative Law Act (GALA) has been described, with a strong focus on administrative procedures. It sets out the the scope and structure of the act and highlights the main debates on codification of administrative procedure. Finally, it describes the impact of international and European law on Dutch administrative procedures. In conclusion the authors appreciate the uniformity and systematization that the GALA has brought, but place some critical remarks on the strong focus on the procedural side of decision-making, which may be at the expense of the substantive review of orders.

The case law of the Court of Justice on revoking a national final administrative decision or judgement which is not compliant with EU law can illustrate the existing tension between the principle of primacy on the one hand, and the principle of national procedural autonomy on the other. Although the Court’s choice for one of the two principles as a starting point for solving a collision between EU law and national law may seem arbitrary at first glance, a system may be possible to a certain extent. This study discusses this system, hoping to provide a possible model of explanation which may be applicable to future case law.