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This contribution explores Grotian Moments in the practice of the UN Security Council in three different but closely related subject areas. The three areas are, in turn, the way the Security Council interprets the concept of ‘threat to the peace’ or more generally ‘international peace and security’, the law-making by the Security Council, and the subjects – in the sense of legal or natural persons – that the Security Council chooses to address. It turns out that the interpretation by the Security Council of the UN Charter has been remarkably flexible, expanding the scope of action of the Council considerably. Whether its interpretation of the UN Charter also deserves to be labelled ‘Grotian’, however, is rather a matter of rhetoric than law.

This article investigates the Swedish constitutional framework for international military action. The constitutional provisions on self-defence and on the sending of armed forces to other countries are in focus. The provisions mainly concern the division of powers between the government and parliament and generally contain little substance. In the context of a relatively recent revision of the entire Swedish Constitution also the constitutional provisions on the government’s power to deploy the armed forces were subject to review. In the end not much was changed, but several suggestions for change were put forward by the official commission of inquiry on constitutional reform. Even though the suggestions for change were for the most part rejected, they are discussed in this article as a backdrop to the rules that remained. An ambition to tie the Swedish constitutional regulation even closer to international law was part of the suggested change which was eventually approved.

This contribution deals with the ability or not of the European Union (EU) to act in situations of serious systemic violations of the rule of law in a Member State. It does this by looking at the different available mechanisms including Article 7 in the Treaty on European Union (TEU) and the new Rule of Law Framework and excluding infringement procedures before the Court of Justice of the EU. The contribution also discusses whether as a result of a serious breach of the TEU a Member State could be expelled from the organisation. The TEU contains no provision on expulsion, but the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties potentially does. In conclusion, the contribution finds that neither mechanism can be likened to a weapon, nor are they probably dissuasive, but they might be persuasive thanks to a persistent and protracted dialogue. The EU has no realistic choice but to be a gentle civiliser of Member States.