How EU Law became Supreme: the making of Costa v. ENEL

This talk examined the making of the European Court of Justice’s landmark ruling in Costa v. ENEL. It placed that ruling in the context of the nuclear deterrence dynamics of the Cold War and the political developments that occurred in Italy between the 1950s and the 1960s, leading to the nationalization of electricity and the establishment of the public electricity monopolist ENEL. The presentation also underscored how this judgment affirmed the primacy of European law over national laws, fundamentally changing the landscape of European legal integration.