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More Than Mere Semantics: Why Virginia Cannot Force Preferred- Pronoun Mandates On Public School Teachers Under Virginia’S Religious Freedom Restoration Act, Isaac Rizkallah

Liberty University Law Review

Right now, school administrators and jurists across the nation are wondering how to address the legal implications of the transgender movement in public schools. In response, many public schools have adopted policies requiring teachers to identify transgender students by their preferred pronouns. These preferred-pronoun mandates have created face-offs between the personal preferences of transgender students and the religious tenets of teachers. As a result, school officials and courts around the United States find themselves wedged between this clash.

Unfortunately, the tension is often resolved at the teachers’ expense. But what are the consequences? Homogenization of thought and belief among public …

If You Want To Get Away With Indecent Exposure, Do It Online, Rebekah E. Bynum

Liberty University Law Review

If a person exposes his or her genitals to a minor in private or in public, that person would be guilty of indecent exposure. But if a person exposes his or her genitals to a minor over video chat, no harm, no foul. Similarly, if a person exposes his or her genitals to a minor via text message, there are no repercussions. Why is it that the same act—when done through a screen—functions like a loophole to a crime? The reason for this “loophole” is because of a misunderstanding of the crime of indecent exposure. The crime was developed, not …

The Cost Of Admission: Consent, Non-Waivability, And The Governance Of Migrant Labour, Hanny Ben-Israel, Hila Shamir

Comparative Labor Law & Policy Journal

This article examines how the principle of non-waivability in labour law is being systematically eroded for migrant workers. It argues that a fundamental tension exists between labour law — which seeks to protect and empower workers — and migration law — which prioritises the welfare of citizens, instrumentalises migrant labour, and seeks to limit redistribution of a nation’s resources, benefits, and opportunities to non-citizens. The article demonstrates how consent-based arguments, rooted in migration law, are used to justify the exclusion of non-citizens from otherwise non-waivable labour protections. By analysing legislative, judicial, and policy decisions, it reveals how these arguments contribute …

Outsourcing Legal Modernity: Late Colonial Constitutionalism In Muslim Northern Nigeria, Rabiat Akande

Articles & Book Chapters

The final years of British imperial rule in Northern Nigeria witnessed efforts to source appropriate models of legal modernization from the Muslim world. The models afloat in constitutional discourse, those of Libya, Sudan, Pakistan, and Egypt, were held up by respective proponents as ideal for resolving the long-fraught question of the relationship between Islam and public law in a modern state. Yet, the evocations of these foreign models were idealized imaginaries; by framing these models as settled facts, the Northern Nigerian evocations flattened the constitutional experience of these states and obscured unfolding struggles over the nature of legal modernity. Against …

Front Matter, Editors Of Comparative Labor Law & Policy Journal

Comparative Labor Law & Policy Journal

Volume 45, Issue 4

Relaxation Of Mandatory Rules Through Collective And Individual Agreements In Japanese Labour Law, Ryuichi Yamakawa

Comparative Labor Law & Policy Journal

This article analyses the legal situation in Japan regarding the relaxation of or deviation from mandatory regulations in labour law through collective and individual agreements. Although many statutory labour laws in Japan have a mandatory effect over individual employment contracts, several statutory provisions provide that such mandatory regulations can be relaxed through collective agreements under certain circumstances, as is the case in other industrialised countries. However, Japan’s situation is unique insofar as the relaxation is permissible through collective agreements concluded by non-union (individual) representatives of a majority of employees in the absence of union representatives who have been elected by …

Derogability By Collective Agreements In Germany And The Presumption, Eva Kocher

Comparative Labor Law & Policy Journal

The promotion of derogability clauses, which allow collective agreements to deviate from statutory protection to the detriment of employees, has been an issue in the political debate on German labour law for some 20 years. While such derogability clauses can effectively allow for flexibility at the company or sectoral level, there are differing views on their suitability for promoting collective bargaining. This article highlights the paradox of such derogability clauses: They are legitimised by the presumption of fairness that underpins collective autonomy; at the same time, they create incentives for employers that challenge the very presumption of fairness. All in …

Derogability From Swedish Statutory Labour Law, Birgitta Nyström

Comparative Labor Law & Policy Journal

The possibility for the social partners to derogate from statutory legislation in the area of labour and employment law is an important characteristic of the so-called “Swedish model” for industrial relations and labour market regulation. With a system built on collective bargaining and collective agreements, and where legislation in the labour law area was rather scarce until the 1970s, freedom for the social partners is a core element. The possibility to derogate from certain parts of statutory labour law by collective agreements also gives room to adapt rules for different kinds of businesses and trades. Sweden is a member of …

Communicative Legitimacy: The Supreme Court's Hidden Cultural Binaries In The U.S. Civil Sphere, Steven Arrigg Koh

Faculty Scholarship

How does the U.S. Supreme Court establish its legitimacy? Over the last two hundred years in U.S. society, the Court has interpreted the U.S. Constitution on watershed issues such as slavery, segregation, and marriage equality. And yet the Constitution is just 7,591 words. A puzzle thus emerges: how does the Court intelligibly interpret this short text for U.S. society? This article develops a new theoretical and empirical cultural sociological account of such Supreme Court decision-making, which it calls “communicative legitimacy.” According to this theory, which draws on Jeffrey Alexander’s civil sphere theory, the Court consistently and inevitably draws on a …

In Guns We Trust: Nfa Firearm Trusts And Silencing The Hazards Of Nfa Firearm Ownership, Carter Horton

Arkansas Law Review

Individual ownership of firearms has been one of the storied rights of our country. During the Founding Era, firearms were plentiful among the colonists, providing them with protection and the means to hunt for food to sustain their communities. With a rebellion brewing against Great Britain, the ill-equipped colonial governments primarily relied upon the personal arms of their people for defense. Arguably, this fundamental right to bear arms played an important role in sparking the American Revolutionary War at the Battles of Lexington and Concord, in which the British attempted to seize an arms cache from the colonists. The subsequent …

Law And The (Re)Production Of Class Hierarchies In Egypt, Ahmad Abdelnaby

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis investigates how Egypt’s legal system, structurally tilted toward the elite and constitutive of inequality, has interacted with the country’s entrenched culture of class-based discrimination to produce a legal culture uniquely comfortable with hierarchy. It contends that class-based discrimination in Egypt has evolved from a social prejudice into a juridical condition, one in which the law does not merely mirror inequality but actively constructs and rationalizes it. By examining the intersection between legal structure and Egypt’s entrenched moral order of class-based discrimination, the study reveals a legal culture that no longer hides its hierarchies behind the veil of neutrality …

What Are The Factors Affecting The Financial Sustainability Of Social Enterprises In Egypt?, Mina Atta Ghaly

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis investigates what factors affect the financial sustainability of social enterprises (SEs) in Egypt, situating them within a constrained MSME, legal and sectoral context marked by informality, weak innovation and recurrent shocks. Drawing on global and Egyptian literature, it identifies ten candidate factors—business model, financial management, founders’ skills and mindset, revenue structure, sector and mission, legal framework and innovative finance, capacity building, investment mechanisms and “the right investor”, adaptability to shocks, and ecosystem conditions—and integrates them into an extended Social Enterprise Model Canvas. Using a qualitative, exploratory design with semi‑structured interviews of social enterprise founders, incubators/accelerators, investors and experts, …

Navigating Radical Indeterminacy In The Struggle For A Global Collective Consciousness: The Question Of Eco-Justice And Law Or Universalize The Pluriverse: A Manifesto, More Or Less, Omar Auf

Theses and Dissertations

The processes of interpretation, communication, and re-interpretation leads to the emergence of an approximated collective consciousness, for which it may be struggled and contested by hegemonic. The dominant forces of this contest, capitalism and nationalism, lead to an interdivided world: one that possesses the tools to empathize with each other but is instead leading people to keep their heads down and focus on surviving their own contexts, perceived as existing within different historical times on the same timeline. This leads to legal and justice systems that fail their claim to universality and/or impartiality. Incorporating an ecological lens to justice within …

Emergency-Use Vaccine Mandates And Bodily Integrity: Assessing The Validity Of Proportionality Test In Legal Frameworks, Eman Hussien Khalil

Theses and Dissertations

Courts confronting emergency-use vaccine mandates during pandemics have revealed that existing legal frameworks are not equipped to handle the emergency context, as seen in their inconsistent description of government measures and their limited capacity to integrate evolving scientific developments on EUA vaccines into proportionality analysis. This thesis argues that when mandates concern Emergency Use Authorized COVID-19 vaccines, courts must abandon the formalistic distinction between “mandatory” and “compulsory” measures and instead focus on whether the practical consequences of non-compliance remove an individual’s genuine choice; where they do, the measure is coercive in substance and triggers the examination of proportionality. Drawing on …

Adversaries And Experts: Legal Tradition Versus Empirical Science, André M. Peñalver

Seattle University Law Review Online

The modern courtroom can become a battleground between two epistemologies: the adversarial logic of law and the empirical rigor of science. Using a case involving a neuropsychological exam under Washington Civil Rule 35, this Article explores the tension between these traditions. While medicine embraced the Scientific Revolution, law remains tethered to its medieval Scholastic roots. The Article argues for humility and integration of evidence-based reasoning within the adversarial process.

Proportionality And Theft, Christopher T. Wonnell

San Diego Law Review

Criminal law can serve a variety of utilitarian purposes including deterrence, incapacitation, and rehabilitation.  Nevertheless, there is broad agreement among criminal justice scholars that the pursuit of these purposes should be constrained by a requirement that punishment not be disproportionately severe relative to the offense charged.  The proportionality constraint is likely to be especially important when considering the less heinous predatory crimes such as nonviolent thefts.  Recent years have seen experiments by progressive prosecutors who deemphasize theft offenses as well as statutory schemes that treat many thefts as misdemeanors.  With some empirical support, critics charge that these experiments have increased …

Navigating Risk Factor Disclosures: A New, Outlier Ninth Circuit Approach Remains After The Supreme Court Declines To Resolve A Circuit Split In In Re Facebook Securities Litigation, Jessica K. Kocinski

San Diego Law Review

This Casenote examines the implications of the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Amalgamated Bank to dismiss Facebook’s writ of certiorari as improvidently granted, thereby allowing the shareholders’ securities fraud class action lawsuit to proceed in the lower courts.  Specifically, it focuses on whether Facebook shareholders adequately alleged securities fraud under Section 10(b) and Rule 10b-5 as to challenged risk factor disclosures in Facebook’s 2016 Form 10-K under the PSLRA’s heightened pleading standard.  Part II of this Casenote provides background on the Cambridge Analytica data breach, which Facebook allegedly failed to disclose in its 2016 Form 10-K risk factor disclosures.  Part …

Artificial Intelligence In The Prosecution Of International Crimes, Marta Bo

International Law Studies

International criminal prosecutions face growing evidentiary challenges due to the vast and heterogeneous digital material generated during conflicts, including user-generated videos, social media, and intercepted communications. This article examines the potential role of artificial intelligence (AI) in supporting investigations and trials before the International Criminal Court (ICC). Rather than replacing judicial decision-making, AI can assist with specific tasks, particularly in establishing contextual elements and linkage evidence central to international crimes. The article explores three main areas: AI-driven biometric tools for facial and speech recognition; AI techniques for detecting patterns of violence and mapping command structures; and applications during trial proceedings, …

Ethics Of Artificial Intelligence For Lawyers: That Is The Sound Of Inevitability: Legislatures And Regulators Step In, Cliff Mckinney

Arkansas Law Notes

In The Matrix, the evil artificial intelligence entity, Agent Smith, corners the human hero, Neo, on the subway tracks. Agent Smith says, “You hear that Mr. Anderson? . . . That is the sound of inevitability. . . .” And if there is one thing that is inevitable, it is that regulations will quickly develop around the way that we interact with and utilize artificial intelligence.

No matter how innovative or disruptive artificial intelligence may be, lawmakers and regulators will not allow it to operate unchecked. Congress recently elected not to impose a moratorium on state regulation, and California has …

The Second Amendment Right To Bear Arms, Or Lack Thereof: Assessing The Prohibition Of Unlawful Immigrants From Possessing Firearms, Anna Egensperger

Et Cetera

This Note looks at the hot button issue of whether unlawful immigrants should have the constitutional right to bear arms. Thus far, the Circuit Courts have come to different conclusions which require the input of the United States Supreme Court. Although intertwined with political views, this Note attempts to take a non-partisan stance which prioritizes the application of case law and a consistent reading of the Constitution. To provide the full context of this issue, this Note begins by describing the facts and holding of Columbia v. Heller which creates the first test for establishing a right protected under the …

Authentication Of Art, Herbert I. Lazerow

Cleveland State Law Review

The authentication of items permeates our law and our markets. While it is important for many consumer goods, authentication is crucial for artworks and artifacts where the value difference between the authentic and the inauthentic is huge. The question is raised most frequently in conflicts between buyer and seller of art where it is claimed that a warranty was breached, or between the owner of artwork and an authenticator where the claim sounds in tort. It also arises in any situation where the value of the art is important, such as tax or antitrust. Authentication of artwork can be difficult …

The Second Amendment, Illegal Aliens, And The Bruen Test: Defending The Constitutionality Of 18 U.S.C. § 922(G)(5), Ian Duncan

Cleveland State Law Review

This Note examines the constitutionality of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(5), which prohibits unlawful aliens from possessing firearms, under the Supreme Court’s text-and-history framework announced in New York State Rifle & Pistol Ass’n, Inc. v. Bruen and developed further in United States v. Rahimi. In the wake of Bruen, lower courts have fractured over how strictly to demand historical analogues and how to treat longstanding status-based restrictions in § 922, including prohibitions on possession by felons, domestic-violence offenders, and noncitizens. Against that backdrop, this Note argues that § 922(g)(5) is constitutionally sound.

Part I traces the development of Second …

The Politics Of Territorial Resistance To Federal Authority: Distinctiveness, Partisanship, And Outbidding In Texas And Alberta, André Lecours, Alexandre Couture Gagnon, Daniel Béland

School of Political Science, Public Affairs, Legal and Security Studies Faculty Publications

Federalism involves political struggles around the territorial division of powers. Typically, these struggles tend to occur when the federal government seeks to act in areas of constituent unit jurisdiction. Yet, recent political developments in Texas (Operation Lone Star) and Alberta (Alberta Sovereignty in a United Canada Act) have showcased state/provincial governments seeking to reject federal legislation within seemingly federal jurisdictions. This article develops an explanation for these initiatives that emphasizes regionalism as a form of territorial politics, the partisan dynamics between the state/provincial government and its federal counterpart, and the internal competition within the dominant political …

Testimony Of Professor Zalman Rothschild Before The House Subcommittee On Early Childhood, Elementary, And Secondary Education Regarding Mahmoud V. Taylor, Zalman Rothschild

Testimony

On February 10, 2026, Professor Zalman Rothschild, Horn Family Distinguished Research Scholar in Law and Religion at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, testified before the House Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary, and Secondary Education of the House Committee on Education and Workforce. His testimony addressed the Supreme Court’s decision in Mahmoud v. Taylor and its implications for parental rights, religious liberty, public education, vaccination mandates, and compulsory schooling.

Professor Rothschild situates Mahmoud within the broader constitutional tradition shaped by Pierce v. Society of Sisters, West Virginia Board of Education v. Barnette, and Wisconsin v. Yoder …

The Impact Of Central Bank Digital Currencies News On Bank Stability: Evidence From Asean-5 Countries, Firman Hidayat, Raditya Sukmana, Masrizal Masrizal, Rahmat Heru Setianto

Bulletin of Monetary Economics and Banking

This study constructs an index reflecting Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) news coverage and evaluates its impact on bank stability. The CBDC Attention Index (CBDCAI) is formulated based on more than 533 Reuters Digital News Report articles from 2019 to 2023. Employing the System Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) approach with data from 92 banks across ASEAN-5 nations, and implementing quantile regression for robustness checks, the findings demonstrate a significant relationship between the CBDCAI and bank stability, alongside variables such as bank size and capitalization. These results offer valuable guidance for central banks, especially within the ASEAN-5 region, as they …

In The Belly Of The Beast:The Struggle For Abortion Rights And Reproductive Freedom In El Salvador, Cho, Karen Hyunbee

Santa Clara Journal of International Law

El Salvador maintains one of the most restrictive abortion regimes globally. Abortion is prohibited in all circumstances, and women who undergo the procedure may face prosecution for aggravated homicide, punishable by sentences of up to fifty years’ imprisonment. Healthcare professionals who assist with such procedures can likewise face criminal liability, with penalties of up to twelve years of imprisonment. This article concerns the case of a woman named Beatriz (surname unlisted) in El Salvador who sought an abortion in 2013 when she was medically diagnosed with a high-risk condition and an anencephalic fetus during her pregnancy. She was denied her …

Seeing Beyond The Words: What Interdisciplinary Methodologies Reveal About International Law, Matthew S. Erie, Mark Pollack, Wolfgang Alschner, Beth Simmons, Katerina Linos

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

INTRODUCTION: On April 24, 2025, the International Law and Social Science Interest Group debuted at the ASIL Annual Meeting with a panel that posed a deceptively simple question: how can social science tools advance the work of international lawyers? Chaired by Chantal Thomas, the session brought together Matthew Erie, Wolfgang Alschner, Beth Simmons, and Katerina Linos— scholars who bridge doctrinal and empirical inquiry—to show how ethnography, computational text analysis, counterfactual inference, and mixed-method design can illuminate legal puzzles that doctrine alone cannot solve. The four short essays in this symposium provide parallel illustrations of this core theme: Erie’s ethnographic approach …

Doctrinal Intent Versus Institutional Reality: The Gulf Countries' Antitrust Objectives, Nora Memeti

Yearbook of Antitrust and Regulatory Studies

This paper examines the intriguing contrast between the ambitious goals of antitrust laws in the Gulf countries and the reality of their enforcement. While this region seeks to protect competition and curb monopolistic practices, only Kuwait and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) have made significant strides in achieving these ideals.

Through a comparative legal analysis, this paper examines how the statutory objectives of competition law in Qatar, Bahrain, Oman, and the UAE often remain more rhetorical than substantive, with enforcement primarily symbolic. In contrast, Saudi Arabia demonstrates some enforcement activity, although its alignment with legislative objectives remains uncertain. Kuwait's …

Mapping The Mechanism For Trade Dispute Resolution In The Bilateral Free Trade Agreement Between Indonesia And Partner Countries, Garuda Wiko, Fatma Muthia Kinanti

Indonesian Journal of International Law

Indonesia actively promotes international trade liberalization through various free trade agreements (FTAs) with partner nations. This study focuses on the dispute settlement mechanisms (DSM) within Indonesia’s bilateral FTAs, given that most partners are members of the World Trade Organization (WTO), making this relevant comparison. The research is divided into three main parts: explaining international trade dispute settlement mechanisms, mapping DSMs in Indonesia’s FTAs, and a comparative analysis. It aims to answer how dispute settlement mechanisms are structured in Indonesia’s bilateral FTAs. Based on the mapping, it is found that the majority of Indonesia’s bilateral FTAs align with WTO dispute resolution …

Divorce Of International Mixed Marriage And Marriage Held Abroad And Indonesian Private International Law, Tiurma M. Pitta Allagan

Indonesian Journal of International Law

The unstoppable tide of globalism not only brings an increasing commercial interconnectivity between nations, but also bonds of matrimony, and in turn, the chance of divorce. Indonesian courts entertaining international divorce cases is certainly not a rarity, neither divorce of the international mixed marriage nor the marriage that was held abroad. With two recent divorce cases having a foreign element, Indonesian courts declared having no jurisdiction under grounds of “litis pendentie” and forum non-convenience, including one by the Indonesian Supreme Court. In three other cases, the courts, after addressing the preliminary question of marriage, applied the “lex fori”, or Indonesian …