A guillotine clause is a stipulation that an adoption of a

contract A contract is an agreement that specifies certain legally enforceable rights and obligations pertaining to two or more parties. A contract typically involves consent to transfer of goods, services, money, or promise to transfer any of thos ...

package depends on the adoption of all of the individual treaties or contracts included. Under the guillotine clause, if only one treaty or contract is either not accepted by an involved party or canceled later, all treaties or contracts are then deemed not accepted or terminated. That prevents a party from cherry-picking the treaties of the contract package that it supports if the other party considers it to be essential for all of the contract package to be enforced. The guillotine clause in treaties of the European Union with other countries is the most notable case of its use.

Switzerland

An example of the guillotine clause is found in the body of bilateral treaties between the European Union to Switzerland. The treaties give Switzerland access to the

internal market The European single market, also known as the European internal market or the European common market, is the single market comprising mainly the member states of the European Union (EU). With certain exceptions, it also comprises Iceland, ...

if Switzerland follows its rules. The clause states that if any of the seven treaties are to be terminated, all of the treaties are automatically terminated. Also, later changes in the underlying EU directives must be accepted by Switzerland. One reason for the creation of this clause is that the more cumbersome decision-making processes of the European Union would make it difficult for it to respond to the termination of other contracts if Switzerland terminated them. In 2009, Switzerland accepted a change to one of the treaties, the treaty on free movement, by extending it to the new EU countries. That was relatively controversial in Switzerland, but it was passed in a

referendum A referendum, plebiscite, or ballot measure is a Direct democracy, direct vote by the Constituency, electorate (rather than their Representative democracy, representatives) on a proposal, law, or political issue. A referendum may be either bin ...

and so the guillotine clause was not invoked. After the success of the 2014 Swiss referendum to limit EU immigration through quotas, the invocation of guillotine clause has been suggested to terminate all the other agreements signed since 1999. The EU has claimed that the bilateral treaties already give Switzerland more cherry-picking in its relation to the EU than any other country of which Switzerland should be allowed no more than now. Switzerland has a deadline in 2017 to achieve a negotiated solution.

European Economic Area

EU also has guillotine clauses in the

EEA The European Economic Area (EEA) was established via the ''Agreement on the European Economic Area'', an international agreement which enables the extension of the European Union's single market to member states of the European Free Trade Assoc ...

agreements with

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the archipelago of Svalbard also form part of the Kingdom of ...

(2001),

Iceland Iceland is a Nordic countries, Nordic island country between the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic and Arctic Oceans, on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge between North America and Europe. It is culturally and politically linked with Europe and is the regi ...

(2001), and

Liechtenstein Liechtenstein (, ; ; ), officially the Principality of Liechtenstein ( ), is a Landlocked country#Doubly landlocked, doubly landlocked Swiss Standard German, German-speaking microstate in the Central European Alps, between Austria in the east ...

(2008), which must directly accept both existing and added EU directives within several fields relating to trade (except food) free movement and the

. Refusing such directives would give the EU the right to terminate the entire EEA agreement and so the EEA countries have avoided doing so.

References

{{reflist Treaty law Contract law