Starting up from Directive 99/70 on Fixed-Term work: in search of a "European model" for temporary work available and useful for the national legislator and judges

With Directive 1999/70 on Fixed-Term Work - and more generally through European directives on flexible work - the European legislator tried to strike a balance between the demands for flexibility coming from employers and the needs to safeguard the rights of flexible workers. This balance has been carried out through various provisions of the Directive, as the EU Court of Justice explained through the years: by placing side by side "hard" rules, considered by the European judges as directly effective (like the principle of equal treatment between fixed-term workers and comparable permanent workers), and "softer" provisions (like the ones directed to prevent abuse of successive fixed-term contracts) which leave a significant margin of appreciation to the Member States about how to implement them, favouring the need to adapt the rules to the specific national situations. Fifteen years after the adoption of Directive 1999/70, and in the light of the interpretation of the EUCJ, the present study aims to start from its purposes, in order to identify the basic components of a possible "European model" for Fixed-Term Work by following the combined and mandatory instructions coming from the EUCJ's case-law, which has established, "in the name" of the principle of effectiveness, some important restrictions to Member States' discretion in implementing the Directive: a model that may prove useful for evaluating the European consistency of the relevant national laws.