Abstract We, members of the European Law Department of the Legal Service of the Austrian Foreign Ministry (“Office of the Legal Adviser", “Völkerrechtsbüro"), have been invited by the editors of this distinguished journal to submit a report on Austria’s recent practice in the field of European Union (EU) law. The present report is meant to be a European law twin to the report on international law.1 It will deal with issues falling in the competence of our ministry, in particular with horizontal questions pertaining to the development and interpretation of the founding treaties of the EU. Among those questions, we concentrate in particular on the distribution of competences, the functioning of the institutions, the types and effects of legal acts and other cross-cutting issues of “constitutional" nature. We shall also address issues relating to the external representation of the EU and its Member States vis-à-vis third
