When Luxembourg Speaks: How National Judges Experience the Court of Justice’s Rule of Law Jurisprudence

Over the past decade, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has become an increasingly central actor in the European Union’s struggle with rule of law backsliding. As political institutions have hesitated or failed to act decisively, national courts have often stepped into the breach. Judges across the EU have turned to Luxembourg through the preliminary ruling procedure enshrined in Article 267 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, asking the Court to clarify whether domestic judicial reforms, imposed disciplinary regimes, or cooperation mechanisms comply with EU law, the rule of law and fundamental values. Much has been written about what the CJEU has said in response. However, far less attention has been paid to how those responses are actually received by the judges who asked the questions in the first place. Do national judges feel supported by the Court? Do they experience its rulings as helpful, frustrating, or politically evasive? And does their satisfaction, or lack thereof, matter for the functioning of judicial dialogue in the EU?

This blog post draws entirely on the author’s recent article, Luxembourg Has Spoken: Polish and Dutch Judges’ Satisfaction With Rule of Law Judgements of the Court of Justice of the EU, co-authored with Jasper Krommendijk and published in the Journal of Common Market Studies in October 2025. The legal empirical study examined how Polish and Dutch judges perceive and evaluate CJEU judgments addressing rule of law and fundamental rights issues. This post highlights and reflects on the main findings of that study.

Why Judges’ Satisfaction Matters

At first sight, asking whether judges are “satisfied” with CJEU judgments may appear odd. After all, national courts are legally obliged to follow the Court’s interpretations of EU law. Preliminary rulings under Article 267 TFEU are binding on the referring court as regards the interpretation of EU law, and that interpretation must be applied not only in the case at hand but also by other national courts faced with the same legal issue, in order to ensure the uniform application of EU law across the Union. Hence, from a formal perspective, personal or professional satisfaction should be irrelevant. Yet this formal view overlooks how judicial dialogue actually works in practice. The preliminary ruling procedure depends on cooperation, trust, and willingness of national judges to engage. If judges feel repeatedly misunderstood, ignored, or exposed, this may affect how (enthusiastically) they refer questions in the future, or how creatively and confidently they apply the Court’s guidance provided in the respective judgments. Satisfaction, in other words, is not about emotions alone as it is about the perceived quality and credibility of judicial interaction in the EU legal order.

Studying Judicial Dialogue from the Inside

To explore these dynamics, our study combines two methods. First, we conducted a doctrinal analysis of 25 preliminary ruling cases concerning the rule of law and fundamental rights, originating from courts in Poland and the Netherlands (15 Dutch and 10 Polish referrals). Eventually, 15 Dutch cases and 6 Polish cases were used in the analysis. We examined the full “chain” of decisions: the order for reference, the CJEU judgment, and, the national follow-up ruling although such follow-up judgments were not always available due to withdrawn cases, inadmissibility decisions, or missing national records. To complement this legal analysis, we conducted semi-structured interviews with judges and law clerks involved in the analyzed cases: nine judges and two law clerks from the Netherlands which covered all but one of the selected case and five judges from Poland which covered all six cases. This mixed-method approach allowed us not only to analyse the legal follow-up to CJEU judgments but also to understand how the judges themselves perceived and evaluated those rulings capturing perceptions, possible frustrations, and pragmatic considerations that are rarely visible in written judgments. To illustrate our methodology, one of the cases we examined is AK vs Krajowa Rada Sądownictwa (joined Cases C-585/18, C-624/18 and C-625/18) referred by the Polish Supreme Court. We analysed the full sequence of decisions in the case, from the national court’s order for reference, to the CJEU’s judgment, and the subsequent national follow-up decision. This legal analysis was complemented by interviews with two judges involved in the proceedings, allowing us to better understand both the judicial follow-up to the ruling and the perspectives of the referring judges.

Three Patterns of Judicial Experience

Our analysis revealed three recurring patterns in how the Court of Justice responded to these national references and how national judges experienced and perceived those responses. First, there are cases in which the Court rejected the preliminary questions altogether, often leaving referring judges disappointed. Second, some judgments prioritised the principle of mutual trust over rule of law concerns, prompting largely pragmatic reactions from national judges. Third, in a number of cases the Court strongly defended fundamental rights, which also tended to be received more positively by the referring judges.

1. Rejected Referrals and Disillusionment

The first category consists of Polish references regarding the issue of judicial independence and deteriorating rule of law, in which the CJEU declared the questions inadmissible, often on the grounds that the questions were hypothetical or insufficiently linked to the national dispute. From a doctrinal standpoint, these decisions align with established requirements established by the CJEU in cases such as Foglia vs Novello ( Case 104/79).

From the perspective of the referring judges, however, they were often experienced as deeply frustrating, or even painful. Many judges described these referrals as acts of last resort, made in a context of constitutional and institutional crisis in Poland and personal vulnerability. When the Court declined to engage, some judges felt abandoned or misunderstood, and in several cases the rejection was later used domestically to undermine judicial resistance to controversial reforms. Importantly, reactions were not uniform. A few judges expressed pragmatic acceptance, recognising the limits of Article 267 TFEU and the Court’s institutional constraints. But overall, rejected referrals stood out as the one category in which dissatisfaction was both strong and widespread.

2. Mutual Trust, Criminal Cooperation, and Pragmatism

The second category concerns Dutch references in the field of European Arrest Warrants and mutual trust. Here, national courts repeatedly questioned whether surrender obligations should continue to apply in light of systemic deficiencies in judicial independence in other Member States. Doctrinally, the CJEU has consistently prioritised the effectiveness of mutual trust, allowing exceptions only under a strict two-step test. Commentary by scholars such as Bard (2023) has often criticised this approach as insufficiently protective of fundamental rights. Yet the interviews revealed a striking degree of pragmatism among Dutch judges and law clerks. While some expressed unease with the high evidentiary threshold imposed by the Court, most emphasised that the CJEU’s judgments brought legal clarity, internal consistency, and procedural efficiency. In a chamber dealing with large caseloads and internal disagreement on the issue, Luxembourg’s guidance helped “calm things down” and standardise decision-making. In other words, even where judges did not fully agree with the Court’s normative stance, they largely appreciated the operational usefulness of its rulings.

3. Strong Rights Protection and Judicial Gratification

The third category includes cases in which the CJEU adopted a robust stance on effective judicial protection and fundamental rights, closely aligning with the concerns expressed by the referring courts. This was particularly evident in asylum law cases from the Netherlands and in several landmark Polish cases on judicial independence. Here, satisfaction levels were generally high. Judges described these judgments as clear, empowering, and professionally affirming. In the Polish context especially, some judges emphasised not only the legal impact of such rulings but also their symbolic and psychological significance: they conveyed that someone in Europe was listening and taking the rule of law seriously. The comparison of operational context between Poland and the Netherlands is however necessary for deeper understanding of those responses. Polish judges have been operating in a context of acute rule of law deterioration, often under personal and professional pressure. Dutch judges, by contrast, are largely shielded from such direct threats but increasingly confronted with the cross-border effects of backsliding, especially in criminal cooperation and asylum law. This difference in contextual setting, may partly explain the slightly more emotional response of the Polish judges.

Beyond Legal Formalism

One of the interesting findings of our study is how often judges framed their reactions in pragmatic rather than emotional terms, and how this translated into greater satisfaction with CJEU judgments than we initially expected. Even in highly charged contexts, many of the interviewed judges assessed CJEU judgments primarily by asking: Does this give me a workable legal tool? Can I decide my case responsibly and coherently? This pragmatic orientation helps explain why overall satisfaction was higher than we initially predicted based on doctrinal critique of the selected judgments alone. It also underscores the limits of purely text-based analyses of compliance and follow-up. Without speaking to judges themselves, much of this lived judicial experience would remain invisible.

What This Means for the EU Legal Order

The findings have broader implications for debates about the rule of law crisis and the role of courts in addressing it. They suggest that judicial dialogue remains resilient, even under strain, but also that it has breaking points. When courts repeatedly decline to engage with urgent preliminary ruling referrals, the legitimacy costs can be substantial, particularly for judges operating in hostile domestic environments. At the same time, the study shows that clarity, usability, and institutional sensitivity matter at least as much as doctrinal boldness. For many judges, a clear, even if restrictive, answer is preferable to ambiguity.

Finally, when Luxembourg speaks, national judges listen. However, how they listen depends on what is said, how it is said, and in what context. By foregrounding judges’ own perspectives, this study adds a human and institutional dimension to discussions that too often remain invisible and abstract. Understanding judicial satisfaction is not about measuring approval ratings. It is about grasping how legal authority, trust, and cooperation are built, or eroded, within the EU’s judicial architecture. In times of rule of law crisis, that understanding is more important than ever.