The evolution of European Union criminal law (1957-2012)

particularly those initiatives that lacked sufficient research around the possible impact of
border removal on criminality levels. 337
As Mitsilegas, Monar and Rees point out, although some data, such as that found in
Europol reports, suggested that organised crime did increase between 1985 and 1998,
the fact that organised crime was viewed as such a threat raised suspicion in the minds
of commentators. 338 Anderson et al. also commented that there were conflicting views as
to whether a border-free Europe Union would make crime control more difficult and
whether crime in general would rise in consequence of the abolition of internal borders.
Moreover, national statistics seldom included data beyond domestic borders. 339 In-depth
comparative analysis was also not possible during those years as data regarding
transnational and organised crime during the eighties was scarce. 340 The lack of such
data in relation to organised crime is evident in a Note from the K.4 to the Permanent
Representatives Committee of the Council on the ‘Situation report on organized crime in
the European Union in 1993’. 341 The K.4 Committee notes that in some Member States
it was not possible, at the time, to provide quantitative information on organised crime
because of the lack of agreed national definitions and of criteria for the identification of
such criminal phenomena (only Germany, Italy and the Netherlands were able to prepare
reports on the extent and trends in organised crime). 342 The Committee further goes on
to remark that reliable and valid results would not be obtained unless effective methods
for collection and analysis of such information were introduced. 343 It was only later, with
the setting up of Europol and the data sharing and policing cooperation it generated, that
a clearer picture of the threat of organised crime in the EU emerged. 344
Difficulties measuring such criminality are often related to the nature of organised crime
itself—a fluid phenomenon that takes different shapes in different societies and evolves
with the times. Approaches to it have been diverse – and are bound to be so -- in
different legal systems. In addition, because of its flexibility as a legal concept,
337 Council of the European Union, Note on “Scientific and Technical Research – Research
projects on criminology and criminal matters”, Doc. 8740/94, Brussels, 26 July 1994.
338 Mitsilegas, Monar and Rees, The European Union and Internal Security, supra note 91 , 62-
63.
339 M. Anderson., et al., Policing the European Union (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995) 16-18.
340 See chapter 1.
341 Council of the European Union, K.4 Committee, Note to the Permanent Representatives
Commitee/ Council on the Situation report on organized crime in the European Union in 1993,
Document Nº 10166/4/94, Brussels, 27 February 1995.
342 Ibid., 2, 6.
343 Ibid., 4.
344 See, inter alia, Europol, “EU Organised Crime Situation Report – 1998 – Open Version”, The
Hague, 8 December 1998, File 2530-50. Interestingly, during this period many countries
continued to see a significant increase in crime at domestic level, namely in relation to property
and violent crime, the latter being the greatly responsible for public and political anxieties; R.
Reiner, Law and Order, supra note 122, 65-73.
93