Modelling norm types and their inter-relationships in EU directives

EU directives are deliberately imprecise to allow Member States to fulfill the objectives in their own way. It follows that deontic norms in EU directives cannot be properly understood without consideration of the motivation behind those norms, as well as consideration of how other provisions, or even other laws, may affect the scope or effectiveness of the norm in question. This paper seeks to model norm types and their inter-relationships. We envisage that this preliminary analysis may help to develop an automated system to find norms that are related in different ways in order to help legal professionals interpret laws for specific cases.