Lo scritto riprende e amplia l’intervento svolto al convegno Diritti dei lavoratori nelle Carte europee dei diritti fondamentali, tenutosi a Ferrrara il 25-26 novembre 2011 ed è di prossima pubblicazione nel volume a cura di S. Borelli, A. Guazzarotti, S. Lorenzon, che ne raccoglie gli atti.

In the face of what looks like a real impasse  of the the line of European constitutionalism, partly due to an orientation of the Court of Justice which tends to favor the protection of economic freedoms over the protection of social rights, two opposing trends occurr. The first amounts to a new "constitutional patriotism"; the second entrusts the protection of fundamental social rights no longer to a single Chart  or to a single court but to a multi-level system of protection. A dialogue between the  European courts that truly valorizes fundamental rights, however,  might be hindered by what someone has seen as a resurgence of the dualist theories, evident in an ECJ’s decision as Kadi.