INTRODUCTION

With a view to concluding our discussion of EU Optional Instruments, it is useful at this point to recapitulate the main findings of our inquiry, and to reflect on what importance this could have in years to come. Accordingly, this final chapter is dedicated to summarizing the principal outcomes of the present study, as well as to offering some future perspectives on the matter of EU OIs. We shall start with the former, focusing on outcomes of particular relevance to academics, on the one hand, and to policymakers, on the other (section 1). Then we will proceed to consider the implications of this study both for future research on the subject, as well as for prospective Union OIs (section 2). Finally, the chapter ends with some concluding remarks and observations.

Outcomes of Study

The rise of Optional Instruments of the European Union is a phenomenon that provokes a multitude of profound and far-reaching questions, and the present study offers a response to the most pivotal of them. Of course, there is still much to be said about this important legislative trend happening with the EU, but this study aims to elucidate the main points and evaluate the key arguments and viewpoints on the subject. By way of recollection, three central questions are addressed in this study, from which a discussion of various others has followed. Put simply, they are: What are EU Optional Instruments, what (if anything) makes them desirable, and why are some EU OIs more successful than others?

In answer to the first of these questions, this study has offered a fundamental definition of EU Optional Instruments, and sought to differentiate EU legislation creating OIs from EU approximating measures, which has led to a proposal for a novel distinction between affiliation and similarization. In addition, the idea that EU OIs constitute approximation in the technical sense within the meaning of the EU treaties has also been disputed and, in connection with this, so has the notion of a dichotomy between 28th regimes and 2nd national regimes. Accordingly, the thesis has provided a solid basis for viewing EU OIs as a distinct form of EU legislation, while at the same time rejecting the assertion that there exist different types of EU OIs in this sense.