argomento: News del mese - Diritto Internazionale e Comunitario

Articoli Correlati: University - language taught - freedom of establishment

On 7 September 2022, the E.U. Court ruled in case C-391/20 that Member States can legitimately provide for university higher education to be taught in their own official language. But since this provision directly affects the freedom of establishment within the E.U., this must be considered a restriction on its exercise and must therefore be justified and proportional to the achievement of the objective of guaranteeing national identity. In practice, it has therefore established that the Latvian law that requires the use of only the official language in higher education is legitimate since it is not a violation of the freedom of establishment since it provides for exceptions that allow the use of the language of other Member States. Indeed, in Latvia the special laws that allow two universities to use other official languages ​​of the European Union determine the right balance between the legitimate objective of protecting national identity and compliance with the specific Union obligation to carry out a profitable and effective cooperation in the field of university teaching. In this way, the exercise of the fundamental freedom of establishment is limited only to the extent necessary to achieve the identity objective of the individual State participating in the European Union.