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This U.S. Government Publishing Office (GPO) database provides access to information legal, legislative, and regulatory information produced on multiple subjects by the U.S. Government. Content includes congressional bills, congressional committee hearings and prints (studies), reports on legislation, the text of laws, regulations, and executive orders and multiple U.S. Government information resources covering subjects from accounting to zoology.

Global Issues In A Globalized World: The Unescapable Dialogue Between SharīʿA And The Constitution, Paolo Davide Farah

Book Chapters

In an increasingly globalized world, a world in flux, which is constantly subject to rapid circulation of information, change is a dimension that we all experience in our lives with ever increasing frequency. Change, be it that of customs and fashion or that of laws and systems of government, is something which now seems impossible to escape. Change is an integral part of our unstable contemporaneity.

This is not only a continuous change but also a rapid one. In such a social and political environment, at a global and local level, it is more and more difficult to find a …

The Torrens System In Singapore: 75 Years From Conception To Commencement, Alvin W. L. See

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

This article tells the story of how the Torrens system of land titles registration came to be adopted in Singapore. From conception to commencement, the entire process took over 75 years, far longer than any other law reform the country has experienced. Particular attention is paid to why the Australian model was preferred despite the significant influence of English law in colonial Singapore. Although as with anything, much of what happened could be attributed to chance, a great deal can be learned from this story, which details the socio-economic and political forces that have shaped the law into what it …

A Reader’S Guide To Legal Orientalism, Teemu Ruskola

All Faculty Scholarship

My book Legal Orientalism: China, the United States, and Modern Law (Harvard University Press 2013) was published in translation in China in 2016. This essay analyzes the Chinese reception of this book. Originally addressed to a North American readership, Legal Orientalism examines critically the asymmetric relationship in which Euro-American law and Chinese law stand to one another, the former regarding itself as an embodiment of universal values while viewing the latter’s as culturally particular ones. The essay explores what happens when a “Western” work of self-criticism is transmitted to an “Eastern” audience. In this context, it analyzes the politics of …

Undersea Cables: The Ultimate Geopolitical Chokepoint, Bert Chapman

FORCES Initiative: Strategy, Security, and Social Systems

This work provides historical and contemporary overviews of this critical geopolitical problem, describes the policy actors addressing this in the U.S. and selected other countries, and provides maps and information on many undersea cable work routes. These cables are chokepoints with one dictionary defining chokepoints as “a strategic narrow route providing passage through or to another region."

Singapore Company Law And The Economy: Reciprocal Influence Over 50 Years, Vincent Ooi, Cheng Han Tan

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

A strong reciprocal relationship has existed between Singapore Company Law (SCL) and the economy since Independence in 1965. Swift Parliamentary responses to economic events and successful implementation of Government policies has made it possible to clearly attribute cause and effect to statutory amendments and economic events in turn, proving the reciprocal relationship between the two. The first theme of this article seeks to explain the fundamental characteristics of SCL that have resulted in such an unusually strong reciprocal relationship: (1) Autochthonous nature of SCL; (2) Responsive nature of legislation; and (3) Government control at multiple levels of implementation. The second …

An Empirical Study On The Singapore Court Of Appeal’S Citation Of Academic Works: Reflections On The Relationship Between Singapore’S Judiciary And Academia, Wui Ling Cheah, Yihan Goh

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

In the light of Singapore’s aspiration to be a centre of legal ideas in the region, it is opportune to examine the Singapore courts’ use of legal scholarship. This article provides a preliminary map of the Singapore Court of Appeal’s citation practices. It provides an overview of the Singapore Court of Appeal’s use or citation of legal scholarship in its decisions over the past 50 years. It identifies and evaluates trends in the Singapore Court of Appeal’s citations of academic material and the types of academic material cited.

South African Marriage In Policy And Practice: A Dynamic Story, Michael W. Yarbrough

Publications and Research

Law forms one of the major structural contexts within which family lives play out, yet the precise dynamics connecting these two foundational institutions are still poorly understood. This article attempts to help bridge this gap by applying sociolegal concepts to empirical findings about state law's role in family, and especially in marriage, drawn from across several decades and disciplines of South Africanist scholarly research. I sketch the broad outlines of a nuanced theoretical approach for analysing the law-family relationship, which insists that the relationship entails a contingent and dynamic interplay between relatively powerful regulating institutions and relatively powerless regulated populations. …

The Singapore Legal System, Eugene K. B. Tan, Gary Kok Yew Chan

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The Singapore legal system is a rich tapestry of laws, institutions, values, history and culture. Like the Singapore-made quilt, each strand of the legal system is woven together to form a jurisprudential kaleidoscope bounded by a unique national identity.

The legal system will inevitably undergo tension as socio-economic and politico-legal changes unfold with increased globalisation and regionalisation. Thus, Singapore has to respond swiftly and deftly in creating new laws and institutions or adapting existing ones.

In this regard, Singapore is and has been ready and willing to learn from the legal developments taking place in foreign jurisdictions with similar aspirations. …

No Alternative: Resolving Disputes Japanese Style, Eric Feldman

All Faculty Scholarship

This article critiques the simple black/white categorisation of mainstream versus alternative dispute resolution, and argues that what is needed is a cartography of dispute resolution institutions that maps the full range of approaches and traces their interaction. It sketches the first lines of such a map by describing two examples of conflict resolution in Japan. Neither can justly be called “alternative”, yet neither fits the mould of what might be called mainstream or classical dispute resolution. One, judicial settlement, focuses on process; the other, compensating victims of the Fukushima disaster, engages a specific event. Together, they help to illustrate why …

Which Road To The Past? - Some Reflections On Legal History, Andrew B.L. Phang

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

It is not customary to commence a keynote address with caveats and disclaimers. However, this is the rare occasion when such qualifications are necessary because—if I may be permitted a crude pun—of the lack of qualifications of the speaker himself. This is not false modesty. It is very real. I know that I have often been referred to in the Singapore context as a legal historian.

Globalization And Law: Law Beyond The State, Ralf Michaels

Faculty Scholarship

The chapter provides an introduction into law and globalization for sociolegal studies. Instead of treating globalization as an external factor that impacts the law, globalization and law are here viewed as intertwined. I suggest that three types of globalization should be distinguished—globalization as empirical phenomenon, globalization as theory, and globalization as ideology. I go on to discuss one central theme of globalization, namely in what way society, and therefore law, move beyond the state. This is done along the three classical elements of the state—territory, population/citizenship, and government. The role of all of these elements is shifting, suggesting we need …

The Future Of International Law Is Domestic (Or, The European Way Of Law), William W. Burke-White, Anne-Marie Slaughter

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Jurisdictional Conflict And Jurisdictional Equilibration: Paths To A Via Media, Stephen B. Burbank

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Human Rights And National Security: The Strategic Correlation, William W. Burke-White

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Regionalization Of International Criminal Law Enforcement: A Preliminary Exploration, William W. Burke-White

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

An International Constitutional Moment, William W. Burke-White, Anne-Marie Slaughter

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Conflicting Rights And The Outbreak Of The First World War, Leo Katz

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Singapore Legal System – History, Theory And Practice, Andrew B.L. Phang

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Law is central to order and stability and, without order and stability, societal as well as economic viability (let alone progress) are impossible The alternative is 'rule of man', and all the dangers of fallibility and (consequently) despotism that that entails. One central difficulty has, of course, been the maintenance of the argument that law is consonant with objective truth for if the law does not in fact possess this quality, then the 'rule of law' turns out to be the 'rule of man' after all. However, it is difficult, on rational grounds at least, to reject the concept of …

Introduction: Hong Kong After The Reversion: In Search Of A Post‐Colonial Order, Tuck Hong James Tang

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

The political handover of Hong Kong on 1 July 1997 turned out to be a non-eventwith little political drama. Emotions ran high when the Union Jack was loweredand was replaced by the Chinese national flag (wuxing hongqi), peacefully endingover one and a half centuries of British colonial rule in Hong Kong. The handovertook place smoothly, despite the heavy rain, without political and social turbulence.The Sino-British disagreement over the abolition of the Legislative Council marredthe occasion, but the swearing-in of a pro-Beijing Provisional Legislative Councilwas largely accepted as a fait accompli.

Disquiet On The Eastern Front: Liberal Agendas, Domestic Legal Orders, And The Role Of International Law After The Cold War And Amid Resurgent Cultural Identities, Jacques Delisle

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Reception Of English Law In Singapore: Problems And Proposed Solutions, Andrew B.L. Phang

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The problems pertaining to the reception of English law in Singapore are both numerous and complex. The academic literature generated in the local sphere alone is relatively large. It must, however, be conceded that, from apractical point of view, there has been very little interest or at least discussion. One cannot, of course, be sure about this observation, save for the very strong indication that takes the form of the overwhelming lack of litigation in the area, thus rendering it merely (so it appears) an academic monopoly. It should, however, be pointed out that this rather phlegmatic approach in practice …

Of Generality And Specificity – A Suggested Approach Toward The Development Of An Autochthonous Singapore Legal System, Andrew B.L. Phang

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

This very brief essay seeks to sketch out as well as consider an approach toward legal analysis and reasoning that would aid in the development of an autochthonous Singapore legal system, ' and that, in any event, would probably also be relevant even in more generalized ad hoc situations. It is assumed that many, if not most, of those involved in the discipline of Singapore law desire the construction of an autochthonous legal system, although the skeptic might find - as just mentioned - the approach suggested here of some utility as well.

Of ‘Cut-Off’ Dates And Domination: Some Problematic Aspects Of The General Reception Of English Law In Singapore, Andrew B.L. Phang

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

This article deals with some problematic aspects of the general reception of English law in Singapore. It examines, first, the concept of the 'cut-off' date for statutes and the common law. The second substantive part deals with the concepts of suitability and modification, analysing their theoretical cogency as well as their application in the local context. The third and final part of the article examines the relationship between reception and stare decisis, indicating and examining potential contradictions as well as other allied issues.

Jury Trial In Singapore And Malaysia: The Unmaking Of A Legal Institution, Andrew B.L. Phang

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

THE main task of this article is to inquire into the reasons for the general decline and final abolition of the jury system 1 in Singapore.2 It also seeks to discover why the decline and fall of a major legal institution aroused so little public debate, let alone outcry. To this end, the focus must necessarily be historical, but, in the context of a nation still in the process of discovering its legal heritage, it is hoped that the account which follows will contribute in some small way towards the development of our legal

Stare Decisis In Singapore And Malaysia: A Sad Tale Of The Use And Abuse Of Statutes, Andrew B.L. Phang

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

A study of the cases and literature with regard to stare decisis in Singapore and Malaysia will reveal at least one salient characteristic - the propensity, primarily of the Courts, to misread statutes and twist them (whether inadvertently or otherwise) in order to justify a particular conclusion. Ironically enough, at the end of the day, similar (though not identical) conclusions could have been reached without the need to resort to any particular statutory provision. In this short article, I shall not endeavour to retrace ground already well covered by others, but will set out, in rather summary form, further reflections …