Limits of Tax Sovereignty
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Coordinator:
Name: Prof. dr. A.O. Lubbers
E-mail: a.o.lubbers@law.leidenuniv.nl
- This programme addresses the following themes:
1. Limitations to national tax sovereignty, as imposed by international and European (tax) law. The focus is less on the analysis of the interpretation and application of double tax conventions than on the effects of multilateral and supranational legal instruments. Important fields of research include the law of treaties and how it applies to DTCs, as well as the jurisdictional norms (or absence thereof) underlying the direct tax case law of the ECJ.
- 2. Limits to the use of national tax sovereignty: how should taxpayers’ rights and duties be balanced against the public interests involved in tax legislation? The aim of this research is to clarify how the quality of tax legislation can be evaluated and improved. Topics of research include the development of criteria for evaluation of tax legislation, retroactivity of tax legislation, accessibility and simplification of tax law, and assessment of economic effects of alternative options in tax legislation.
- The program encompasses two types of research questions:
1. How do tax treaties have to be explained and implemented, and what role does the supranational regulatory process play in this?
2. Which objectives are meant to be used in establishing tax regulations and to what extent are such legislative practices undertaken in a goal-oriented manner?
- Subprogram 1: Tax treaties
- Coordinator: Prof. Mr T. Bender
Specific Research Questions
* What problems are involved in the interpretation and implementation of tax treaties?
* What role does international public law play in the interpretation and implementation of tax treaties?
* What role does Community law play in the interpretation and implementation of tax treaties?
- Subprogram 2: Objectives of tax regulation
- Coordinators: Prof. Dr A. O. Lubbers
Specific research questions:
- How do such notions as the right to self-determination and distributive justice play a role in the regulator's choice and justification of objectives and bases for taxation?
- In which ways do these objectives influence the choice made among the alternative forms of tax policy and tax regulations, and vice versa? In which ways do these objectives influence the choice made among the alternative forms of financing, i.e. financing by means of tax expenditures or direct subsidies?
- Is the regulator constricted by the instrumental use made of tax legislation?
- Is the regulator constricted by the constant changeability of tax legislation and its instruments?
