Jonas Bornemann is an Assistant Professor of European Law at the Faculty of Law. Below is a short interview, inquiring about his research and teaching role in the Faculty.

What is your specific academic background, and what are your research interests? Do you currently work on any specific research projects?

I have a background in European law, with an undergraduate in European Studies. Ever since I started my academic education, I was interested in the puzzling coexistence of unity and diversity that underpins the European project. It is curious to see how processes of integration exist side-by-side with disintegrative movements. While European integration interlinks legal systems and brings together people in Europe, national and regional specificities linger. In my research, I explore how law responds to the synchronicity of these developments and how unification and fragmentation correspond in Europe.

My research focuses primarily on the constitutional aspects of European integration and particularly those developments that have the potential of raising controversies between Member States and peoples in Europe. In my PhD, for instance, I have worked on national decision-making practices in the field of migration law following the so-called migration crisis of 2015/2016. Other research interests of mine relate to the rule of law crisis in Europe and the resurgence of internal border controls in the Schengen area. In the research project that I am currently developing, I will investigate how the EU has responded to a series of recent crises, especially the Covid 19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine. In this respect, I seek to explore how the increasing use of informal and soft law instruments in EU crisis governance affect the legal position of individuals and businesses.

What courses do you teach within the Faculty? 

After joining RUG this September, I had the chance to coordinate and teach a master level class on EU Constitutional and Institutional Law within the European Law in a Global Context LLM. Later into the current academic year, I will be teaching bachelor courses in the International and European and Law LLB programme.

What do you enjoy teaching about these courses?

The best moments in teaching are those that turn into engaging discussions, for instance, about the right way to tackle the rule of law crisis in some of the Member States of the EU or whether a housing policy in Groningen could be viewed as discriminatory. I am impressed by students’ ability to apply the materials and doctrinal arguments we discuss in class to real-life cases and to develop their own legal reasoning from there. Besides, teaching is a great way to keep up to date with a variety of different topics in European law. Many of these developments raise challenging legal questions and I think teaching is a great way to explore the legal dimension of these events together with students.

How are the (degree) programmes you teach in unique compared to similar programmes elsewhere? 

One of the key features of the courses offered by the Department of European and Economic Law is that it focuses on the interaction of legal systems. European law is a multi-levelled legal order that raises a plethora of intricate questions. In substance, the courses taught therefore often revolve around the question of how much latitude legal systems afford one another, or how actors across different levels cooperate. Another feature of the programmes offered is that we invite students to pursue their own research interests, allowing them to specialise in aspects that best reflect their own preferences.

What career prospects do you think there could be for students who pursue careers in your specific legal field of expertise?

As far as I can tell, the career prospects of students graduating from a European law curriculum are very good and allow for versatile career trajectories. Legal expertise is on high demand, and that applies at equal measure to expertise in European law. Graduates of our European law programmes will be well-equipped to find a position in public administration, both at EU,  national or municipality level, or in the field of advocacy, representing interest groups in Brussels or in Member State capitals. Moreover, graduates may use their expertise in European law to help companies navigate the often complex regulatory landscape that governs their actions in the common market. In addition, there is of course a surprising variety of other career trajectories for graduates of our programmes. Since we encourage students to pursue their own research interests and specialise accordingly, a plethora of individual opportunities may arise from their studies that cannot exhaustively be mentioned here.

Do you have any advice for students interested in pursuing your same field of legal expertise? (this doesn't mean academia specifically, but in your field overall)

I would strongly encourage students to keep an open mind vis-á-vis other disciplines. Legal studies do not exist in isolation, and a siloed understanding would ignore the important developments and phenomena that explain its function in practice. Also, I would recommend not underestimating the diversity that exists between regions in Europe and to understand this as something positive. We are happy to see that our programmes attract students from different regions of Europe and beyond and I believe that this diversity will make studying at our faculty an enriching experience, both academically but also personally.

- Interview by: Dr. Chris Brennan, Marketing Advisor, Faculty of Law

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