Integrera eller konkurrera? En rättsvetenskaplig studie om EU:s möjligheter att använda differentierad integration för att åstadkomma samarbete på området för digital beskattning

Sammanfattning: National and international tax systems face significant challenges due to the digitalisation of the economy. The European Union (EU) argues that these challenges must be met with solutions at union level that involve all Member States. If no harmonisation is achieved, there is a risk that the Member States will compete with each other through regulatory competition. The European Commission has made several extensive legislative attempts to harmonise areas of the taxation of the digital economy, however without success. This indicates that harmonisation might not be achievable through traditional routes of integration. An option is to use differentiated integration to achieve a cooperation between the Member States. The aim of this thesis is to analyse what constitutional tools are available to the EU to use differentiated integration, in the shape of minimum harmonisation or enhanced cooperation, and to put these tools in the context of the taxation of the digital economy. The aim is further to examine which variation of differentiated integration is most appropriate to use to prevent regulatory competition between the Member States. Through analysing EU law and EU tax law by using an EU law method and a legal dogmatic method, several conclusions can be made. The Treaties allow for the use of minimum harmonisation and enhanced cooperation in tax matters. Both variations of differentiated integration offer an alternative to traditional routes of integration and may possibly make harmonisation more realistically achievable. In the context of the taxation of the digital economy however, minimum harmonisation is more appropriate if the purpose of the harmonisation is to prevent regulatory competition. This due to minimum harmonisation setting a minimum level of regulation for all Member States, which means there is a minimum level of harmonisation across the whole Union. A use of enhanced cooperation would result in some Member States having identical regulations whereas others would be able to shape their tax rules relatively freely. This creates a risk that Member States that do not participate in the enhanced cooperation will adjust their tax rules with the purpose of competing with the Member States that do participate in the enhanced cooperation. Minimum harmonisation guarantees a certain amount of regulation across all Member States. Even though they can introduce differentiated legislation above this level, the regulatory competition between the Member States is limited.