Revisiting the asymmetry thesis: negative and positive integration in the EU
本文挑战欧盟法律与政治学中关于消极与积极一体化不对称的经典论题，通过内部市场案例证明消极一体化减弱、积极一体化增强，且两者共同推动欧盟法律与政策更关注非经济关切和市场矫正。
The ‘asymmetry thesis’, articulated by Fritz Scharpf, holds that EU governance is characterised by an asymmetry between positive and negative integration. The EU has well-developed capacities for negative integration but only limited capacities for positive integration. The present paper challenges the orthodoxy that this thesis has become in EU law and political science scholarship. It argues that the asymmetry thesis no longer accurately depicts European integration, revisiting its key legal and institutional assumptions. Taking the internal market as the most likely case to test the thesis, we show that negative integration has become weaker, positive integration has gained in strength, and both developments have had an impact on the substance of EU law and policymaking, which is promoting non-economic concerns and market-correcting policies to a greater extent than it used to. These shifts, so we contend, could be even more pronounced in other areas of European integration.