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7 - Managing Diversity I

Uncertainty and Experimentation in the Internal Market

from Part II - Unhealthy Lifestyles and the EU’s Internal Market Dilemmas

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 July 2026

Vincent Delhomme
Affiliation:
Leiden University
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Summary

Chapter 7 turns to the question of diversity from a health perspective, with a focus on scientific uncertainty and regulatory experimentation. This is about the effectiveness of EU intervention, the ability of the EU, as a functionally driven risk regulator, to select the best health intervention, in terms of reduced mortality and morbidity. It investigates how the principle of precaution is used by the Court to grant a certain leeway to the national and the EU legislature. Notably, the principle is applied not only to uncertainty about the existence of health risks, but also to uncertainty about the effects of policy interventions. The chapter then examines two legal devices designed to preserve the regulatory autonomy of Member States: subsidiarity and minimum harmonisation. Through three case studies – tobacco plain packaging, the ban on tobacco for oral use and front-of-pack nutrition labelling – the chapter highlights the contradiction between the need for regulatory diversity and the need for market uniformity, and the resultant tensions with the principles of conferral and subsidiarity.

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  • Managing Diversity I
  • Vincent Delhomme, Leiden University
  • Book: Regulating Unhealthy Lifestyles in the European Union
  • Online publication: 15 July 2026
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009746946.010
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  • Managing Diversity I
  • Vincent Delhomme, Leiden University
  • Book: Regulating Unhealthy Lifestyles in the European Union
  • Online publication: 15 July 2026
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009746946.010
Available formats
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Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Managing Diversity I
  • Vincent Delhomme, Leiden University
  • Book: Regulating Unhealthy Lifestyles in the European Union
  • Online publication: 15 July 2026
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009746946.010
Available formats
×