Toothless European Citizenship / Šimon Uradnik

Unlike genuine link, the direct bond is in its very core a dualistic phenomenon which occurs in two dimensions — the bond thus comes into being on the basis of the existence of the autonomous form of citizenship; the directness emerges with the existence of the nonvicarious content of citizenship — rights and duties that are nonvicarious by any other, secondary, entity, and thus can exist without any intermediate subject. 160 And yet, only with their mutual and complemental existence, the direct bond emerges between an individual and an entity. 2.2.2 Bidirectional Nature of Direct Bond Furthermore, the direct bond can be defined as a bidirectional relation between an entity and an individual of the descending character and of the ascending character. To explain this concept, the descending character in terms of the nonvicarious content includes rights that an entity confers to an individual; whilst, from the perspective of the autonomous form, the descending character comprises a status that an entity provides to an individual. On the contrary, the ascending character concerning the nonvicarious content represents duties which an individual performs towards an entity; and, in terms of the autonomous form, it is a legitimacy that an individual provides directly to an entity. Therefore, there are rights and status, both of the descending character on the one hand and, on the other, duties and legitimacy of the ascending character. Whence it may be concluded that rights are intertwined with status, whereas duties are interlinked with legitimacy. 161 Hence, the whole concept would be outlined in this very sentence: 162, 163 160 On this principle, M. Svobodová finds that social rights enshrined by the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union are, on the one hand, legally granted on the basis of acquis communautaire ; however, on the other, they are vicarious by the Member States. To that effect, see Magdaléna Svobodová, Občanství Evropské Unie (Auditorium 2021) 86. 161 By performing duties towards an entity and, more importantly, by compliance with laws that an entity creates, individuals legitimise that entity; nevertheless, that applies also vice versa — without legitimacy, an entity could barely enforce performing duties and compliance with laws. To that effect, see Jonathan Jackson et al, ‘Why do People Comply with the Law?’ (2012) 52/6 The British Journal of Criminology 1051 accessed 18 th April 2023. In addition, J. Zemánek states that duties are identity-forming constituents; thus, it would also be worth exploring them in terms of (a lack of) common European identity; for this purpose, see Jiří Zemánek, ‘Unijní občanství a evropská identita’ (2015) 59/2 Acta Universitatis Carolinae Iuridica 84. 162 If the direct bond would be the essence of Union citizenship. 163 Paraphrase of the Latin phrase: ‘UBI ALLIUM IBI ROMA, UBI ROMA IBI ALLIUM’,

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