The reaction to the Lisbon Treaty ratification was not homogenous. Representatives of the official groups exhaled with relief as the reformation process got a logic end. The debates on the issue of the Constitutional Treaty were too tiresome. The non-official reaction was mixed: participants of the discussion discordantly claimed that the Treaty was too federal, general, inter-governmental (Craig & Burca, 2011). However, the novelties unavoidably affected the entire European institutional network including the major executive and legislative bodies. According to the article 13 of the Treaty on European Union the EU institutional system consists of the European Parliament, the European Council, the Council, the European Commission, the Court of Justice of the European Union, the European Central Bank and the Court of Auditors, 7 principle institutions that organize the frame of the EU construction (Consolidated versions of the Treaty on European Union and the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, 2012). In the case of the Union the principle of separation of powers as the base of the system with a division of powers realized by each institution into legislative, executive and judicial is absent (Craig & Burca, 2011). Most of the duties distributed between the EU supranational institutions do not have a clear nature (for instance, the legislative function is shared between the Council and the Parliament). The pattern of the institutional competence in the EU has not remained static; the two factors can be a reason for that. One of them is the Treaty revisions described above, the second is the process of change in the power balance between the institutions over time which gives birth to the innovative institutional actors going beyond the traditional borders (Craig & Burca, 2011; Curtin, 2009). The Court of Justice is one of them. The vision of the judiciary's role (defined in the past by the theorist of check-and-balances system Montesquieu as the passive role expressed in the simple implementing of the rules) has been revised into the innovative and significant direction (Dehousse, 1998).

The original Community system of competences was based on the so-called functionalistic approach. The first founding Treaties only contained the information about the goals of the established European Community and some areas of policy where these goals must be achieved. The main principle of that time determined that the institutions are allowed to adopt any measures `necessary to achieve one of the aims of the Community (for instance, Common Market) in cases where this Treaty has not provided for the requisite powers of action” (Article 235 EEC Treaty, 1957). The system of competences was too flexible without appropriate legal basis and regulative mechanisms. Against this background the birth of the new Community needs, new policies and pillars (the Maastricht Treaty) has become the reason of the inter-institutional conflicts. In accordance with the circumstances and specificity of functions (dispute resolution and law making (Sweet, 2004)) The European Court of Justice has assumed the role to define the borders of the EU competences, to interpret the statements of the Treaties creating new rules in the case-law practices where there was no corresponding legal basis for its actions and actions of other European institutions (Rossi, 2012). The Court stated that every validate legislation act had to contain the information about its legal basis (the substantiation `having regard to the Treaty' was not recognized as legally acceptable); the double legal basis had to be avoided, the Community pillar had to be prioritized before the other ones due to the article 47 TEU (Rossi, 2012). The existence of the legal gaps in the European law made the Court intervene into the spheres of the external relations, relationship between the EU and Member States as only the Court had an authority to use the specific legal instruments such as analogy of law. Based on the case law of ECJ as a source for reform borrowings, the Lisbon Treaty introduced the principal of referral (limitation of Union competence), principles of subsidiarity and proportionality (usage of Union competence or when and how it can be used by European institutions) (Article 5 TEU). The idea of the competences catalogue (in parallel with the idea of human rights catalogue contained in the Charter) was realized in the Reform Treaty, which presented the system of exclusive, shared, specific competence within the EU and Member States relationship (Articles 2-6 TFEU). The institutional system of the EU with a more supranational structure that the original one was placed under a strict control. However, the Court of Justice preserved its interpretative function and even strengthened the capacities to influence on the power balance within the Union. From the very start the positions of the Court was quite week, the Treaty of Rome did not foresee the future perspectives of this institution. At the present European arena ECJ is an authoritative legal and political actor, whose actions had to be taken into consideration by Member States and other supranational institutions. Moreover, the actorness of the Court is growing. What is the modern position of the Court among other European institutions, which procedures it can initiate and exercise, what are the roots of the Court's transformation into a meaningful European figure and who gave it such a power?

The European Union is not an ordinary political organization that can be squeezed into the traditional typologies of political systems. It is a mix of different governance elements having an inter-governmental or supranational nature that varies across time. Heretofore we presented 7 principle institutions that are considered to be the engine of the EU. This moment we pay attention to 5 of them which role in the European governance is the most significant. The Commission is the “supranational nerve center of the Community system” (Sweet, 2004). This body combines 4 types of power: legislative (i.e. legislative initiative), executive (i.e. establishment of the budget, expenditures), judicial (i.e. infringement procedure) and administrative (i.e. managing programs). In the general sense the existence of this body is subjected to the promotion of the general interest of the Union (Article 17 TEU). Due to the multiplicity of tasks some of the Commission powers are delegated to the 36 European Regulatory Agencies. The influence of the Commission is growing day-to-day; it is a strong political force that moves the EU straight ahead. However, the actions of this body are resonance from time to time that boosts the interest of various researchers, who claim that the Commission is in a weak or in contrast strong position in periods of the treaty revisions (Hooghe & Nugent, 2006; Nugent, 2001). This institution has interconnections of different closeness with all the rest we are going to speak about. The Council of Ministers (the Council of the European Union) or the Council is an inter-governmental center of the EU, which represents the national interests and has the right of the final decision in most of the European policy areas (Chalmers, Davies & Monti, 2014). Working groups and COREPER (Committee of Permanent Representatives) support its work activity. The places in the Council are distributed among the representatives of each Member State at ministerial level (Article 16 TEU). Obviously, the real tensions between the pro-integration Commission and intergovernmental Council were unavoidable. Nevertheless, the Council cannot work alone; it needs to communicate with other institutions of supranational character. Together with the European Parliament it realizes the budgetary and legislative functions, participates in policy-making. Thus, De Burca marks out 7 ways of how the Council can exercise the decision-making processes (Craig & Burca, 2011, p. 45). The European Council, former ad hoc organ, has been formalized by the Lisbon Treaty and become the political manager of the organization. Consisting of the Heads of State or Government, it is responsible for shaping the political directions of EU. Though the European Union is quite a young official body (in comparison with other institutions) its importance is not questionable. The main function of the European Council is to be a mediator between national governments and the EU institutions. It establishes the policy frames within which the European institutions can act (Schoutheete, 2006). In the sphere of its interests are the constitutional development, European economy, policy strategies, external and internal relations. Thus, its implementation into the institutional system of EU was not accidental. Moreover, the President of the European Council is another powerful figure within the European political field. Together with the President of the Commission and the holder of the Presidency post in the Council it organizes the triangle of political players whose consensus and balance of opinions preserve the EU as a united political organization. The European Parliament is the only institution in the European Union, which members (now the amount is equal to 751 delegates) are directly elected. The election procedure is based on the proportional quotas for each Member State. The Parliament's transformation from the powerless body (in accordance with the Treaty of Rome) to a public arena for political debates is remarkable. Today the Parliament is a central authority with legislative, budgetary and supervisory competences (Article 14 TEU). It has a right of veto in relation to the budget. The co-equal status with the Council allows it to shape the European legislative field (i.e. ordinary legislative procedures). The power to appoint the members of the Commission and to monitor the activities of other Institutions forces to regard the European Parliament is a strong forth. However, the extreme quantity size of this body can serve as a barrier to react and take decisions quickly. The fifths `headliner' of the united Europe is the Court of Justice, the central issue of the presented research. There were a lot of talk about this institution and its functions above. In order to avoid the unnecessary repeats, we will return to ECJ later. In this part of work it is a necessity to speak about the institutional system of the EU as an integral mechanism.

Although the European institutional framework is the obvious example of an unusual combination of traditional or semi-traditional elements, in the base of it the orthodox principle of separation of powers still can be seen (Hatzopoulos, 2013). It was adapted to the European reality and transformed into the so-called principle of `institutional balance' in accordance to which every institution should act within strict limits and in the mutual respect to the competences of other institutions Article 4 EEC (Treaty of Rome). See also Rossi L.S. (2012). Does the Lisbon Treaty Provide a Clearer Separation of Competences between EU and Member States. In Biondi, A., Eeckhout, P., & Ripley, S. EU law after Lisbon. Oxford: Oxford University Press; Craig, P. (2011). Institutions, Power and Institutional Balance. In P. Craig & G. D. Burca (Authors), The Evolution of EU Law (2nd ed., pp. 41-84). New York: Oxford University Press. . Simply put, render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's: each body should fulfill its own task, the legislative body should legislate, the executive body should execute and so on. Whatever the picture should be, there are always some exceptions from the established rule. The European Union and its governance structure have some striking features that could not be ignored. Whether we can speak about the limitations of public powers, when Article 13 TEU contents a loophole for the institutions - the aim of the first priority they should promote - values, interests and objectives of Members States and European citizens. This gap allows institutions to receive additional powers. The question of cooperation is another issue. Without doubts, the EU institutions exist independently from each other. But the mixed competences (i.e. co-legislation of Parliament and Council) oblige them to communicate with each other in the process of the decision search. Unfortunately, there are situations of conflicts and tense dialogues. The principle of conferral of powers, which is proclaimed in the Lisbon Treaty is not a panacea, it cannot give the overall guarantee of institutional balance. The political imbalances of the Treaty provisions have lead to the possibility of imbalances among areas of power where the European institutions operate (the most visible among them is the a skew between legal and judicial spheres as ECJ fulfill the role of legislator) (Dawson, 2013). Greater institutionalization of the Union resulted in unexpected variations. The European Council broke the institutional triangle of the Parliament, the Council and the Commission that has been constructed through years. This body has drawn different functions of the other institutions and has become a threat to the institutional balance as necessary networks could not been constructed in one day. The understanding of the institutional balance as an abscence of any institution in the system that gains fundamentally more power, weight, influence than others is retrieved from Christiansen T. (2012). The European Union after the Lisbon Treaty: An Elusive `Institutional Balance?' In Biondi, A., Eeckhout, P., & Ripley, S. EU law after Lisbon. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Installed improvements have provoked the growing complexity of `sincere cooperation' (Article 13 TEU). The channels for negotiation and communication are only building, and there is no guarantee that the finish of this process will be in the nearest future. The increase in the amount of players (we should take into consideration the new posts of the President of the European Council, the High Representative, EEAS, various working groups and agencies with which some institutions share their power) has changed the institutional landscape where the illusiveness of possible balance seems to be a reality. Every actor (supranational or intergovernmental) has tried to take all the credits, as competition for sharing the political influence in the newly established political organization was unavoidable (Hцreth, 2013). The permanent enlargement of the Union was an additional factor. Against that advantageous background (unique type of separation of powers, non-stability) ECJ has received all the chances to become a powerful Supreme Court with authority of policy influence. Summarizing, what are the causality factors that have lead the Court of Justice on its transformation way to actorness? Among the sources of the judicial discretion we can mention the following. It is commonly recognized that the legitimacy of the courts is based on the notions of independence and impersonality. The courts should be politically neutral. They operate in the legal environment where there is no place for personal interests and for politics as well. When the court takes the decision that is obligatory for the parties the main characteristic of it is trustworthiness and neutral nature (Hцreth, 2013). In the dispute between political actors who represent the different authority branches (i.e. executive and legislative) the Court has to be impartial and stand, first of all, on the defense of law. Otherwise, its reputation of the final authority will be an empty sound. However, as we discussed above, the EU has some sui generis elements that distinguish this political organization from others (Hix, 1994). Member States have delegated to the Court too much of real judicial power to the Court without the appropriate control mechanisms. Thus, the Court was authorized to resolve disputes between supranational institutions such as the Parliament and the Commission (Article 173, 175 Treaty EEC), between Member States (Article 170 Treaty EEC), between Commission and Member States on the issue of fulfilling obligations under the Treaty (Article 169 Treaty of EEC). Area of discretion was too wide and did not remind the jurisdiction of the usual constitutional federal court. The Court also deals with the problems of non-compliance and incomplete-contracting; the precedents of the Court due to the lack of regulation in the legal system have become the base of the European law together with the founding Treaties. However, the functions of the case law were not fixed stable. The methods of control form the side of Member States were weak and could not restrain the dominant development of the Court's status and subjective evolution of the legal sphere (Sweet, 2004). The governments have lost the opportunity to preserve the scheme of principal (Member States) - agent (Court of Justice) as they used the Court in order to resolve the multiple momentary problems with an accent on the short-term preferences ignoring the logic of their own institutional design. Brand of intergovernmentalism is an interest of Moravcsik research. See: Moravcsik, A. (1993). Preferences and Power in the European Community: A Liberal Intergovernmentalist Approach. JCMS: Journal of Common Market Studies JCMS: J Common Market Studies, 31(4), 473-524. The functionality of the Court is also a reason of the growing influence. The incomplete-contracting mentioned above and dispute resolutions in salient cases are the priority functions of the Court the realization of which has initiated the process of the `judicialization of politics' or expansion of the judicial power within the Union (Hirschel, 2008). The role of the Court in the process of constitutionalisation (see the sub-chapter 1.1.) and ambitions of the Court lay in the integration of the European Community is a factor of no small importance (Dehousse, 1998). The principle of law to which the Court had to be subordinated to, the ideology of `new legal order' that was proclaimed for strengthening the cooperation between the Members of EU and had several undoubted characteristics: autonomy, authority (exclusivity), dynamic nature, consistency and incommensurability (Itzcovich, 2012), practical implications are another preconditions of the Court's modification. The power of the Court as an actor is a non-intended consequence of the separation of powers within the supranational framework on the Union and established by founders but modified by the Lisbon Treaty the following `check and balance' system.

The aims of this system are not only to protect citizens from abuse of human rights by authorities but also to regulate the situations of power struggles between European institutions (Hцreth, 2013). One of the main specific features of the European institutional system is not only horizontal division of balancing powers between judicial, legislative and executive branches but also the internal division of powers and `relative' balance within each branch. Below, there is a scheme representing the ladder of power's separation between main EU institutions (Hцreth, 2013).

The questions of cooperation have become the most controversial among the others. Concerning the executive branch, there is a supranational Commission that shares the power with the Member States and its governments. The Commission executes its supervisory functions while the intergovernmental bodies fulfill the administration of EU legal acts. The Comitology procedure thus is a cooperation bridge between two branches that allow two levels of governance to negotiate on the questions of the strategic and well-timed implementation of policy programs. The European Council guides the legislative branch. The Commission with a right of a legislative initiative in most of the cases starts the process of decision-making. Further the Council and the European Parliament have to act together in order to adopt the necessary act (i.e. co-decision procedure). In the circumstances of disagreement the article 294 TFEU provides the Council and the Parliament with an authority to announce veto. The co-decision procedure is the central decision-making procedure that is based on the principles of parity. The rules of the procedure bound actions of the supranational and intergovernmental institutions in order to balance the system. The Commission and the Parliament representing the supranational side of the Union can organize a tandem in some policy areas where they have own interests in order to rush a profitable law (Hix, 2005). However, the veto from the Council of Ministers keeps actions of two bodies in strict frames. The vertical dimension of the branch is represented by the national legislative assemblies. Summarizing, the European governance system is multilevel combining the horizontal and vertical counterbalancing elements. Concerning the judicial branch of the Community, the situation is extremely different. The European institutional system does not provide the Court with the balance mechanism, which can put in equilibrium the Court's power and self-interests. What is more, the national courts have become the providers of the ECJ decisions conformed with the EU law principles of supremacy and direct effect (Alter, 2009, p. 106). The transformation of the national judiciaries into Community Courts was a logic effect of the preliminary rulings procedures. The unique features of the Court described above allow to make a substantiated declaration that Court of Justice is an actor in the policy field of the European Union. The nature of the Court is quite specific but actors can be very different as between species as within each one. In accordance with the typology created by N. Belyeva (2011) (criteria - degree of the independence of conduct) the Court is a full-fledged actor with an ability to influence the behavior of other actors. ECJ corresponds with other criteria of an actor: global issues the Court deals with (i.e. human rights defense), resources of the actor, specific type of power, structure and institutional format, global strategic goal (European legal field) and agenda, collective will, influence and international recognition. It is true, that the Court cannot initiate the litigation process, but the Court is the last instance where the parties bring the matter. In addition, the decisions of the Court are obligatory for implementation. Concerning resources, expertise and delegated authority are on the first plan (Moe, 1990). As well, the Court has around 2000 employees, half of which work in translation offices (23 official languages of the Court); each judge has a couple of rйfйrendaires or judicial assistants who deal with preparation of the cases. The image of the Court as a court of Economic Community has been transformed in parallel with the EU development. Apart from the common market, the ECJ has participated in the adjudication of the domestic policy cases. The Court has used its power in order to resolve the questions of the common trade space without barriers and tariffs, to enforce equality of positions between third country nationals with permanent residence and European citizens, to control the implementation of EU directives and regulations in the sphere of the environmental and social policy universally in all member states. The dynamic of the Court's influence is moving in a positive key. The Court of Justice has made a long way on its road to success, worldwide recognition, independence, and responsibility. ECtHR has recognized ECJ as an equal judicial instance by accepting the doctrine of equivalent protection. This doctrine presumes that legal order of European Union provides protection, which is equivalent to the protection under ECHR, that means that claims against EU, Members of the EU concerning the issues of European Law cannot be accepted by ECtHR. Thus, the ECJ satisfies all the required criteria of the actorness capacity.

Nevertheless, the Court participates on all the stages of the policy process. As Dehousse marks out the ECJ can suggest new topics of exploration, legitimate a choice or make it illegal, effect the relationship between two or more policy actors, participate in the implementation of the common decisions. Summarizing, the author defines 4 ways of interaction between the Court and other political institutions Dehousse, R. (1998). The European Court of Justice: The politics of judicial integration (p. 213). New York: St. Martin's Press.: agenda setter, policy innovator, performer of a legitimating function, catalyst for EU legislation. In the practical part of this research work (Chapter 3) with case studies we are going to test the hypothesis proclaimed in the introduction (policy cycle) and check the roles of the Court in the policy sphere.

2. Arena of decision-making processes within EU: internal and external levels of interaction between ECJ and other actors

In order to become the House for all Europeans and to achieve the goal of constructing the unified Europe the Union has to keep its institutional structure in balance (Piattoni, 2015). The future of the EU as a prosperous community and political organization of new kind, the possibility to make common decisions to common problems can be organized only on the conditions of effective interdependent governance. However, it is not a simple task, as the institutional architecture of the European Union is overcomplicated and asymmetrical. In the European space we have the phenomenon of principle of separation of powers in an unusual vision: the same function can be fulfilled by different institutions while various functions can be prescribed to the same body. The original idea of check-and-balance system when any institution can check the “behavior” of others was poor designed that only added difficulty in getting the equilibrium result in the end of the game. Thus, the role of the ECJ is twofold. From the one-side, the political institutions of the European Union in parallel with private actors always try to use the judicial means (including ECJ) to achieve the welcomed result and pursue own interests. From another side, the influence of the Court and its position as an institution makes the other elements of the European system, national authorities and private actors to reckon with his power. In the competence of the Court is to suggest new topics of exploration, legitimate a choice or make it illegal, effect the relationship between two or more policy actors, participate in the implementation of the common decisions (Dehousse, 1998). Without doubts, the European Court of Justice is a political actor participating in the advanced dialogs with stakeholders at supranational and national levels. In order to define the role of the ECJ in the decision-making processes within the EU we are going to define the networks between ECJ and other actors on the internal and external levels of interaction taking into consideration the powers, competence and interests of each actor in the framework of the preliminary rulings procedure.

2.1 The rules of the game in the internal level of interaction: special roles of General Advocates and Judges-Rapporteurs

At the present time the judicial system of the EU consists of the Court of Justice of the European Union (composed of the Court of Justice, the General Court, the Civil Service Tribunal) and the national courts of Member States. Due to the stated research question and being bound by the volume of the work we concentrate on the Court of Justice as a subject of our research interests. The main tasks of the Court are the following: examination of the acts of the EU institutions and Member States within the framework of the European legal order, interpretation of the Treaties, guaranteeing the direct effect and primacy of the EU law. In order to fulfill the tasks the Court can initiate and exercise the various types of procedures. Among them are the references for preliminary ruling, infringement procedure, annulment actions, appeals, and reviews. As you can see from the table 2 the cases of giving preliminary rulings and direct actions are the most frequent e aimed to ensure that the EU law is respected by Member States and implemented in the `right way' defined by the Court (Annual report of the Court of Justice of the European Union, 2014). In this research paper we do not go beyond the procedure of the preliminary ruling, as it is the “central nervous system of the EC polity” (Sweet, 2004, p. 97).

At first look, the preliminary rulings procedure is a mechanism of judicial control, instrument of political integration in the European region and a means of a dialog between ECJ and national courts. In the case of the ECJ preliminary rulings procedure we observe the effect of power-distributional approach when the drawing of the judicial litigation depends on the actors participated in it and their rational behavior, the balance of power, applied strategies, coordination facilities. The arena of the judicial procedure is a game where all the players know the rules and try to reach the equilibrium with a benefit for them. However, before reaching the transformation point of being recognized as an enforcement mechanism, the preliminary reference procedure has come a long way. Specifying in advance, this procedure and the decisions of the Court made in the framework of it are not the equivalent to the doctrines of precedents and stare decisis which formally do not exist in the legal order of the European Union (Koopmans, 1982). The question of the precedents is not a simple one for the European Court of Human Rights as well. In the case Cossey v. the United Kingdom(1990) ECtHR directly announces that it is not bound by its previous judgments. At the same time, the Court usually follows or applies its precedents for establishment of legal certainty and the development of the case-law. However, cogent reasons always leave an opportunity for ECtHR to depart from an earlier decision. Thus, the so-called precedent in the European legal system does not concern the third parties; in parallel it has a hole for the Court itself to avoid its own decision. However, the judgments given by the Court of Justice have the binding effect on the behavior of the national courts. In the judicial system of the EU the ECJ is an exclusive instance to secure the unified application of the Union law by national courts as in most of the cases they do not only need to ask for the preliminary ruling but must. This procedure was firstly introduced to the European legal society by the article 177 of the Treaty of Rome. According to this article, in the case of the dispute on the question concerning the Community law (i.e. interpretation of the Treaties, interpretation of the acts of the European institutions), the national judge could make a request for a preliminary ruling. However, the essence of this mechanism was not typical in comparison with the judicial systems worldwide. Neither the Court gives a national judge a total decision with instructions how to act, nor the parties are told who wins the case. European citizens do not have an open access to the Court, as well they are deprived of the appeal actions in the ECJ as it is not an appeal instance for the lower courts. Instead, the Court of Justice prepares the formal answer to the judge (or judicial structure) who initiates the process with clarification remarks on the question raised above it. Nevertheless, in the base of the original idea of this procedure the authors of the Treaty project could not predict the future effect of this norm on the development of the EU as a political body. Initially, the procedure was not designed to challenge the national law or to make an examination of national law compliance with the European order. Step-to-step the case-law practices of the Court, the developed doctrine of the supremacy and direct effect, revision of the founding treaties has lead the Court to the higher position on the ladder of power distribution between the EU institutions and member States. The acquired status of the Court makes it impossible for the Member States to ignore the unwanted or unsatisfying judicial decisions (Alter, 1998). In addition, the participation of the national courts in this transformation of the ECJ played a great role. The direct link “the domestic courts - ECJ”, equal possibilities granted to each court have become a big support brick for the modern judicial construction of the EU. The following data witnesses the tendency of the increasing amount of the preliminary reference cases since the Costa (1961) times (Sweet, 2004, p. 99).

Nowadays, the article 267 TFEU regulates the rules of the preliminary reference procedure. The content of the procedure is not strictly defined. The address of the judge has a form of a question or set of questions on the issue of the European law with legal remarks and facts of the case. Due to the Recommendations, the judge's paper usually includes 10 pages with a summary of parties' arguments if it is necessary. From the one side, national judges decide when to make a reference, which questions to ask and how to implement the received answer; so the zone of the judicial discretion is quite wide. From another side in most of the cases the courts are obliged to make a reference to the Court of Justice in order to receive the interpretation of the EU law in the judicial case or to check the validity of EU act thus to avoid ineffective and uncoordinated application of the norms. The cases of the must reference are numerous: when national courts act as a final instance (no further remedy is possible), in any case when there are doubts on the validity and interpretations aspects concerning law of EU. The last point means, that practically there is no chance to avoid the reference if a judge did not want his decision to be in dissonance with European law. De facto, whatever the Court concludes about the act of the European institution or whatever interpretation of the law it gives to the national court, the ruling becomes obligatory and there is no chance to avoid it. The functions of the preliminary reference procedure are not strictly defined in the Treaties, however we can mark out the following: development of the European law, judicial review of actions (non-actions) of EU institutions, preservation of EU law uniformity, resolution of disputes (Chalmers, Davies, & Monti, 2014, Chapter 4). The most significant one is the first. Through this procedure the Court has established new principles-foundations of European law, worked out the doctrines in the base of the EU order, created categories and norms being implemented into the national legal orders. The preliminary rulings are the keys to the ECJ power and judicial monopoly. To be sincere, this situation gives birth to some apprehensions on the case of the Court of Justice. The first one is the too wide frame of its judicial activity - interpretation of the Treaties' norms in some aspects is subjective going against any understanding of the legal texts. For the second, the personal interests of the judges are on the foremost place. Thirdly, teleological reasoning in the Court's decision which is as a synonym to the usage of too general concepts and `universal' values. However, there are also several critical topics we should address. One of them is the complex relationship between the principle of autonomy of national legal order and European legal order based on the primacy and direct effect principles. The minus of this procedure is that the citizens do not have locus standi, a right to access the Court. ECJ gives his verdict only to the referring court. What is more, the variation in the frequency of references among Member States is particular different. We can distinguish structural reasonable factors such as population size, willingness to litigate and Members State compliance with EU law that influence the frequency (Broberg & Fenger, 2013). However, there is another - behavioral factor defining the willingness of the Members State to refer to the higher instance which becomes the major. As we can see from the table 4 among the leading referencing states are the `biggest' states of the EU: Germany, Italy, France, UK, while Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia have the lowest ranks of appeals (Broberg & Fenger, 2013). As a food for thought, D. Chalmers offered to replace this procedure with an alternative - database of judgments that will become a guide source for all local judges and will put into a certain order the judicial corpus of EU (Chalmers, Davies, & Monti, 2014, Chapter 4). Due to our opinion this measure could be a substitute only and serve as an additional technical support for the judges.

Talking about the internal structure of the European Court of Justice, it is composed of 28 judges and 11 Advocates General that are appointed on the common ground by the national governments after consultation with a panel that reports on the suitability of candidates to perform the function of a judge of the ECJ (Article 253 of Consolidated versions of the TEU and TFEU, 2012). The criteria of the selection are quite strict, still there is a possibility for the countries to decide freely whom they want to be represented by in the Court: a national judge, a scholar, an advocate, etc. The candidates must be chosen from persons whose independence is beyond doubt and who possess the qualifications required for appointment to the highest judicial offices in their respective countries or who are jurisconsults of recognized competence (Article 253 of Consolidated versions of the TEU and TFEU, 2012). Among other important attributes are the knowledge of European law and language skills, experience of legal practice, ability to write an excellent juridical document quickly (Solanke, 2009). The role of the panel or COPERER (at first look) is aimed on the prevention of over-politicization of the process. Appointing authorities (national governments of Member States) have an indisputable power to choose a future member of the Court. Due to rationality (and all actors are rational) by appointing the judge the Member State defends its own interests, preferences and values, which have to be shared by the person. Otherwise, probably the reappointment procedure will be not successful for the chosen member of ECJ. However, the personal preferences of the judge can correct the pattern of the outcome (Sweet, 2004). In addition, there is no a confidence that the degree of the panel's credibility is higher than the Governments'. The term of the appointment is 6 years with partial replacement every three years. The ECJ may sit as a full Court (in the cases prescribed by the Stature of the Court, in the cases of exceptional importance) and a Grand Chamber (13 judges) (for instance, in particular complex or important cases), in Chambers of three of five judges. The principle of collegiate decision-making allows the Court (not universally) to avoid the pressure form the domestic governments, to preserve uniformity and personal anonymity. The diversity of the judicial corpus (racial and ethnic) can also be a guarantee of the fair decision-making processes, which are crucial for the legal system (Solanke, 2009). Public confidence in the judicial impartiality and institutional independence logically leads to the increase in the power status of the ECJ.

Thus, in this part of the research paper there is a necessity to talk about the judges and the judicial behavior as well as about their motivation in question of decision-making process. This is what we have called the internal level of the analysis we make on the ECJ issue observing the judges as actors in the institutional framework of the Court implementing the actors-centered approach. Judges do not operate in a vacuum. Moreover, their decisions are addressed to the audience and the political supporters of their position (any institution, the national government, etc.), who are not going to be passive in the decision-making process. Interaction between judge and representatives of his political background can be a parameter for observing the judicial behavior and its motivation (Zarbiyev, 2012). From the other side, in the cases of dispute resolution, for instance, the judge is in the balancing situation between parties that both have a right, an interest, and legal proofs. In order to solve the dispute with small loses the judge is obliged to act as a policymaker and to use the law as a flexible policy means of maneuver (Sweet, 2004, p. 10). Judges are rational as any individual in general sense. This statement is an essence of the strategic approach to the judicial behaviour, which explores the role of politics in the judicial decision-making processes. Rational judges know the legislative process from inside, understand, how it works and behave as politicians having the strategy and trying to satisfy the preferences in their field of interests (Spiller, Gely, 2008). As figures with common sense and authority they will try to put maximum facilities into reaching not only their private interests but corporate as well. Corporate interests, due to Sweet's opinion, can be divided into 2 groups: rise of the judicial legitimacy and strengthen of the argumentation and reasoning in the dispute framework (Sweet, 2004, p.37). For Richard Posner (1993), rationality is a reason to explain the judicial behavior in economic sense defining the judicial utility function through income, leisure facilities, etc. What is more, he prescribes judges 3 roles of rational maximizer in the game field: manager of the nonprofit enterprise, voter and theatrical spectator. However, he also takes into consideration some other components of the judicial utility such as popularity, prestige, public interest, reputation (that can be a dominated criteria for the judges of the higher courts). All an all, he concludes that, in the judicial game the value of the institution the judge represents and the efficiency can be a determinative factor. From the presented scheme it follows that the judicial behavior can be explained through different variables, as it is multifarious. Jeffrey Segal also made an attempt to explain the judicial behavior. Excluding the factor of public opinion he stated the question “What do judges do and why do they do it?” and as an answer worked out 4 models of judicial decision-making (Table 5): stare decisis, attitude (influence from judicial side); text and intent, separation of powers (influence from legislator's side) (Segal, 2008). However, being impacted by two sources, judicial politics is a mixture of law and politics dependent on the case. The first model represents the idea of the direct link between the behaviour of low courts and the decisions of the higher courts. The second model `text and intent' obviously means that the judicial behaviour must be changed in accordance with the law changes. The third model shows that in the decision-making process the judge can give the preference to his ideological values against the fact sheets of the case. The `separation of powers' model puts the actions of the judge into dependence with the strategy of other actors in the game field.

In contrast to Segal, Baum (2006) develops another conception of interdependence between the audience and judicial behavior. He picks out three ideal types of judicial behavior - legal, attitudinal, and strategic. In the first model judges exercise the function of law interpretation, in the second - the aim of the judge is to make a pure good policy on the basis of their policy understandings, in the strategic model of behavior the judges also look for the realization of good policy but in the aspect of benefits for the court as a whole institution. Baum claims that achieving the good public policy is the only goal the judges follow. In order to reach it, they use different means including the attention of the audience. His main argument is that judges' interest in what the audience thinks of them and judges' self-presentation has the main effect on their behavior as a decision-maker. As a remark, the author mentions the perspective of audience has a greater influence on the judges in higher courts. To be precise, in the notion of audience the researcher includes, at first, the court colleagues, the public and the governmental bodies, and only in the second order he talks about the social, professional groups and media.

However, the internal structure of the Court is not unified; the position the judge occupying as well influences the field of the decision-making process. Some judges have a special status with additional rights and duties.

Among them we can mention the President of the Court who is selected among judges every three years and has a priority to direct the Court; the Advocate General who assists the Court by introducing his opinion in the cases where he is asked for it, the Registrar who fulfills the work of the secretary and directs the Administration with 2000 of people staff. The time of the President's appointment is only three years. However, during that time this figure is responsible for formation of the cases' list, distribution of the cases between judicial chambers. Being responsible for the ordinary activity of the Court, the President is the Head of the Grand Chamber at the same time. The Judge-Rapporteur is selected by the President to present the facts of the case, the remarks of the parties, the draft version of the judgment on which in most of the cases the final decision is based. The position of the Judge-rapporteur thus has a possibility of a direct influence on the case; the principle of the impartiality is under question. The non-written rule of the ECJ dictates that the case from the Member State could not be given to the judge form the same Member State (Dehousse, 1998). However, this statement is not a very strong guarantee. The correspondence between the principle of independence, impartiality and representative character of the judges' selection is another weak element in the institutional system of the ECJ itself as the representativeness base of the judges selection can put independence of the whole judicial structure under question. Without doubts, the judge nominated by the national government will preserve the links with his country. The question is what will overweight: the status of the impartial judge or the connection with the national authorities who may realize the control function from the preserved link. The `Advocate General' is a unique institution in the judicial system of the European Court of Justice, which was established by the Treaty of Paris in 1951. In the first chapter we partly touched the history of its creation and development through the enlargement of the EU, so there is no necessity to start from the beginning of time. Today the figures of the Advocates General are in the center of the research interest, which takes the roots from the power of these political figures and influence they exert on the judges of the ECJ and on the directions of case-law reformations (Burrows, & Greaves, 2007). The amount of the Advocates General has been increased from to 2 till 11; still the general task is the same - to assist the judges during the decision-making processes. The Advocates General obtain the same status as the judges in the ECJ though they do not make decisions. Instead, they present to the judicial corpus the opinion, which becomes the base of the final collective outcome (Solanke, 2009). The content of the Opinion is not so strictly defined. It must include the information on the question of facts, legal norms, arguments of the parties and third faces, analysis of the situation and the required outcome of the case. The opinions of these members of the Court are individual expressing the personal vision of Advocate General on the presented issue and results. Due to their functions the researches prescribe to the figure of the `Advocate General' the position of a privileged relationship with the judges (Kostakopoulou, 2005). At the same time, the Opinions of the Advocates General do not bind the Court of Justice and its judges. Moreover, the participation of the Advocate General in the case is reduced by the founding Treaties of EU, these actors do not participate in all cases of ECJ. Nevertheless, it is not possible to deny the significant influence of the actions of the Advocates General on the policy of the court. It is widely accepted that there is a direct network between their acts and judicial decisions: 70 % of correlation between the judicial decisions and opinions of the Advocates General (Arrebola, Mauricio & Portilla, 2016). Quantitative analysis cannot be used in a fully meaning when we try to measure the influence of the GA on the case-law practices of the ECJ, however qualitative research also demonstrates the key roles of the behavior of the General Advocates (Mortelmans, 2005). These findings raise some questions; including the independence and impartiality of the GA whose number is only 11 and whose names are published on the opinions in comparison with the anonymous decisions of the Court. There are even some provocative proposals to exclude the institute of the Advocate General due to its the ambuguity and formulated judicial order (Burrows & Greaves, 2007). We regard this idea is as premature as this suggestion is too radical. As an alternative, there is enough to change the focus of the role of the Advocate General: from the assistant of the Court to the specialist-expert in the case-law of ECJ and legal order of the European Union whose point of view can be defined in a special act required in the unclear and important cases by the President, heads of the Chambers. All in all, after a brief observation of scientific positions on the question of judicial behavior and its motivation, we should agree values, interests, preferences, as well as audience could become the decisive factor in the process of final judicial decision adoption. That means, in the process of the case study, analysis of institutional change the scholar has to take into account the individual rationality of judges.