What is the hierarchy of EU law? I have created an interactive Genially infographic to summarise the principles governing this hierarchy. I have also created a PowerPoint presentation and a comprehension exercise.
Three resources on the hierarchy of EU law
As part of our partnership with Euroglocal Belgium, we provide training in European citizenship for secondary school teachers from the 27 member countries. This initiative is funded by the Erasmus+ Mobility programme. It includes theoretical courses and debates, as well as visits to the European Parliament, the House of European History and the Parlamentarium (Parliament museum).
To be a responsible citizen, you need to know your rights. So I included a section on the hierarchy of law in the European Union in the training course. This is particularly relevant given that this hierarchy has been challenged on several occasions, notably by Hungary and Germany.
I started with a PowerPoint presentation that you can find on the page Free resources in English. I have added an classifying exercise about sources of law according to this hierarchy, which you will find just below the presentation.
Three free resources thanks to Copilot's hallucinations!
I finished the PowerPoint presentation in French and Italian with an infographic created using Copilot. I asked Copilot to translate it into English, and what a surprise! Copilot went completely haywire and produced a magnificent pyramid, but with completely meaningless text. Probably great for a surrealist poetry contest. Much less relevant as an infographic in political science 😉
Faced with disaster, I decided to create this pyramid manually. I liked the English version so much that I decided to translate it into French and Italian and turn it into a resource in its own right.
A Genially infographic on the hierarchy of EU law
You probably already know that I am a big fan of Genially and its interactive educational materials. You can find a series of them at Creative Commons licences on our dedicated page.
Click on the image corresponding to the desired language: this will open the resource page.
La hiérarchie du droit en UE
The hierarchy of law in the EU
La gerarchia del dirito nella UE
This presentation, published under an Attribution – Share alike licence, is a reusable Genially. Simply log in to your account, click on ‘Reuse this Genially’ and it will be added to your collection.
The pyramid illustrates five levels of hierarchy in EU law.
The pyramid illustrates five levels of hierarchy in EU law:
- primary law
- secondary legislation
- general principles
- European case law
- domestic law
These are the levels that need to be reordered in order of importance in the H5P comprehension exercise.
By clicking on the ‘+’ signs in the presentation, you will open windows detailing each level. For the Derivative Law level, another pyramid appears in the window, which also has four buttons: simply hover your mouse pointer over these buttons to display an explanatory thumbnail for each item.
The flag at the top of the pyramid with the words ‘Applicable in all EU countries’ contains a link to an official EU page listing all member countries.
Finally, the Creative Commons icon on the left side of the pyramid takes you to a page explaining Creative Commons licences if you are not familiar with this tool. We use it for our free educational resources published on this website or in our online courses.
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