Digital Commons Network^™

Hurricane Katrina: When A Crisis Is An Opportunity In Government Innovation For Migration Solutions, Camilo Mantilla

Refugee Law & Migration Studies Brief

No abstract provided.

Facing Up To Internet Giants, Shai Dothan

Duke Journal of Comparative & International Law

Mancur Olson claimed that concentrated interests win against diffuse interests even in advanced democracies. Multinational companies, for example, work well in unison to suit their interests. The rest of the public is not motivated or informed enough to resist them. In contrast, other scholars argued that diffuse interests may be able to fight back, but only when certain conditions prevail. One of the conditions for the success of diffuse interests is the intervention of national and international courts. Courts are able to fix problems affecting diffuse interests. Courts can also indirectly empower diffuse interests by initiating deliberation to inform the …

The Right To Resistance And The Western Sahara: A Twail Analysis Of The International Legal Order And Its Constraints On Decolonization, Christina Wrapp

Duke Journal of Comparative & International Law

"The Western Sahara is often called the "Last Colony in the World," in reference to its anachronistic status as a territory deemed to have self-determination by the United Nations and ICJ, but still under the rule of another country. Scholarship on the Western Sahara tends to concentrate on the protracted stalemate in their war of independence against Morocco, highlighting the roles of several individual actors, such as France, the United States, the United Nations, and the Polisario, and how these actors create a particular structure to the conflict. This Note focuses on the role of the International Legal Order, as …

International Criminal Law And The Role Of Narrative In The War In Ukraine, Jonathan Hafetz

Pace International Law Review

This article examines the multiple ways that international criminal law (ICL)—the body of international law that seeks to impose criminal responsibility on individuals for international crimes—has impacted the conflict in Ukraine. Most violations remain unpunished, and ICL’s legal accountability mechanisms continue to face significant obstacles. But even absent prosecutions and trials, which remain contingent on an array of shifting factors, ICL has affected the Ukraine conflict in multiple ways.

The article focuses on how ICL has helped shape narratives about the war in Ukraine. In doing so, the article cautions against a strict law/politics dichotomy and instead focuses on the …

A Global Puzzle: Integrating Iot Jurisprudential Approaches, Colin Savino

Pace International Law Review

While devices in the Internet of Things (hereinafter “IoT”) such as smart appliances, smart watches, and pacemakers are intended to make life easier and safer, they sometimes complicate users’ lives with system failures and expose them to new risks instead. Users suffer the risks stemming from hastily developed cybersecurity in IoT devices, sometimes with serious consequences and without recourse against manufacturers or cybercriminals. Cybercriminals’ ability to exploit gaps in cybersecurity from anywhere makes the IoT especially risk-prone to transnational crime and may make tort claims against multinational manufacturers tenuous on issues of causation and actual harm suffered. Most problematically, the …

Building Climate Resilience With Local Tools, Shelley Saxer

Georgia Law Review

The first Earth Day on April 22, 1970, celebrated the grassroots environmental movement that began in the ‘60s and early ‘70s and ushered in the creation of a new legal framework for controlling pollution and addressing environmental concerns in the United States. However, more than fifty years later, some experts fear that the environmental progress achieved during the ‘70s and ‘80s has begun to stall as the United States and other nations experience broad economic hardship and must shift their focus to more immediate concerns. Therefore, even as the damaging effects of climate change threaten communities across the globe, the …

Rebuilding Trust In A Divided Community: An Integrated Approach, Shaphan Roberts

Pepperdine Dispute Resolution Law Journal

Metropolitan cities face a myriad of social challenges, including increased crime, homelessness, and declining business vitality. These issues are interrelated, demanding solutions that are multifaceted and systemic. Solutions backstopped by law enforcement are needed to foster an environment conducive to business growth, job creation, and reducing homelessness. However, a widespread lack of trust in local law enforcement complicates addressing these challenges, highlighting the importance of community engagement and cooperation for effective policing and crime prevention. A comprehensive approach is necessary to address these social challenges. Integrating the stakeholder and sectors models with insights from literature focusing on community policing, economic …

In The Shadow Of The Law: Applying Therapeutic Approaches To Sexual Harassment Conflicts In The Context Of #Metoo, Michal Alberstein, Shira Rosenberg-Lavi

Pepperdine Dispute Resolution Law Journal

This article comprises a firsthand account of working as a university Sexual Harassment Commissioner (SHC), a role that manifests a combination of law and advanced conflict resolution practice. It offers a working model grounded in alternative justice principles to address sexual harassment and other, similar types of conflict. The resultant therapeutic and conflict resolution approach may apply to other institutions and other areas of law and society as well. Moreover, it fits in well during the era of #MeToo, where women raised their voices to challenge grave offenses such as rape, as well as attitudes, patterns, and allegedly “small” and …

Eldercaring Coordination: The New Dispute Resolution Process To Address The Age-Old Problem Of Old-Age, Fran L. Tetunic

Pepperdine Dispute Resolution Law Journal

Eldercaring Coordination refers to a dispute resolution process which seeks to address the needs of senior family members. This new process aims to solve conflicts concerning the lives and finances of aging family members. It arises from the need to provide elders a voice in important decisions concerning their lives and guide families in high conflict disputes towards productive decision-making focused on the best interests of the elderly. The eldercaring coordinator works with legally-authorized decision-makers and other participants to resolve disputes related to an elderly person’s safety and autonomy. The United Nations recognizes eldercaring coordination as an Action Model for …

Fitting The Communication Forum To The Mediation Fuss: Choosing The Appropriate Communication Mode For Mediation In The Post-Pandemic World, Dorcas Quek Anderson

Pepperdine Dispute Resolution Law Journal

Since the COVID-19 pandemic, mediations have shifted dramatically from face-to-face settings to the virtual realm, resulting in the widespread acceptance of using virtual communication channels, including videoconferencing, audio calls, and text messaging. With the waning of the pandemic, mediators and parties presently face a plethora of choices in fitting their mediation to the appropriate communication channel. Thus, having an accurate, evidence-based understanding of different communication modes’ impact on mediation is necessary to design an optimal mediation process. Some decades ago, Sander and Goldberg formulated the phrase “fitting the forum to the fuss” to describe the process of choosing the most …

Who Should Be Liable? Examining The Corporate Liability Regime For Cybersecurity Risks, Angel R. Gardner

Student Journal of Information Privacy Law

The growth of the Internet of Things (IoT) poses new and substantial security risks for individual and national security. The IoT leaves networks susceptible to hacking, a form of unauthorized access into another person’s system or device. All devices that use the IoT are at risk of unauthorized access—a few examples include vehicles or medical devices. Currently, there are no regulations requiring corporations to protect their software from unauthorized intrusions. However, the current tort landscape does not allow for individuals to recover when there are unauthorized network intrusions where there is no tangible harm. This paper discusses why cybersecurity intrusions …

An Inadequate Band-Aid: Existing Privacy Law Has Uncertain Application To Web-Scraped Personal Information Used To Train Ai, Jody L. Eckman

Student Journal of Information Privacy Law

To legislate high-growth technology requires fine-tuned balance, but the current state of AI legislation swings in favor of AI providers given U.S. lawmakers near non-existent response. From healthcare to education, the financial industry to the legal field, AI has gained a grip stronger than any legal band-aid lawmakers might believe to be in place and protecting consumers. I argue that based on a survey of current U.S. legislation, AI providers are being given the chance to have their cake and eat it too at the expense of consumers’ rights. Such a perfectly permissible feast is why lawmakers must promptly and …

Nickel Mining In New Caledonia And The Inflation Reduction Act, Hannah Jellema

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

The passage of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) marked a step forward for the United States in incentivizing clean energy and reducing national reliance on fossil fuels. However, the IRA’s critical mineral requirement restricts the eligibility of electric vehicles for tax credits based on the origin or processing location of minerals used in electric vehicle batteries. The French territory of New Caledonia contains nickel reserves that would be invaluable to the production of electric vehicle batteries in the U.S. However, under the Inflation Reduction Act’s critical mineral requirement, the use of New Caledonian nickel in electric vehicle batteries may inhibit …

Stimulating Fraud: Comparing The Effectiveness Of Fraud Recovery Mechanisms Between The United States And The United Kingdom Through The Lens Of Public Covid-19 Expenditures, James G. Bozza

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

Fraud committed against the U.S. government is one of the largest costs that taxpayers must bear. The False Claims Act has been the most effective monetary fraud recovery mechanism in history. The question remains, however, of if it will continue to be as useful given modern trends of increased spending. An analysis of the U.S. fraud recovery model compared to the United Kingdom through the lens of Covid-19 expenditures demonstrates both the strengths and weaknesses of the U.S. model and provides reasoning for legislative alteration.

Untouchable Sovereign Debts: Towards A New Model Of Transitional Justice And Global Finance, Cosmas Emeziem

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

Who bears the cost of peace in societies transitioning from oppressive regimes? Who is responsible for paying back the debts incurred by dictators? These questions are crucial in transitional justice situations, yet the discipline discusses debts and transitional justice separately. While sovereign debts are viewed within markets and global economic frameworks, transitional justice is considered within citizens and human rights frameworks. This approach is flawed as it marginalizes human dignity and social justice considerations.

To rectify this schism, this Article brings these two legal spheres together in an epistemic dialogue using sovereign debt as the point of intersection. In transitional …

Granting Legal Personality To Artificial Intelligences In Brazil’S Legal Context: A Possible Solution To The Copyright Limbo, Victor Habib Lantyer

University of Miami International and Comparative Law Review

This Article investigates the feasibility and consequences of granting legal personality to Artificial Intelligences (AIs) in the context of Brazilian law, with a special focus on copyright law. It conducts a thorough analysis of how such a grant can enhance legal security and encourage innovation in AI technologies. Through an integrative review of the literature and a comparative analysis of national and international legislation and jurisprudence, the study explores the implications of this legislative innovation. This Article highlights the importance of legal clarity for companies and investors in the AI sector, emphasizing that granting legal personality to AIs can simplify …

Coming Full Circle: The International Legal Status Of The International Olympic Committee, William Thomas Worster

University of Miami International and Comparative Law Review

No abstract provided.

Democracy, Chevron Deference, And Major Questions Anti-Deference, Richard W. Murphy

Georgia Law Review

In 1984, the Supreme Court in its Chevron opinion invoked democratic values to help justify holding that courts should defer to an agency’s reasonable construction of a statute that it administers. In 2022, in West Virginia v. EPA, the Court invoked democratic values to help justify the major questions doctrine (MQD), which requires clear congressional authorization for agency claims of major regulatory power. Democracy, it seems, requires deference and anti-deference for agency statutory interpretations.

Or maybe not. This Article submits that the democracy talk of Chevron and West Virginia is implausible, misleading, and may have caused the law to evolve …

Do Elections Really Have Consequences?: Presidential Indifference, Attenuated Accountability, And Policy Paralysis Within The Administrative State, Ronald J. Krotoszynski Jr.

Georgia Law Review

In theory, the Constitution vests all, not “some” or “most,” of the executive power in the President; the buck supposedly stops at the Resolute Desk. Yet current practice falls well short of this constitutional ideal. The conjunction of fixed terms of office, good cause removal limits, and partisan balance requirements for the heads of multi-member independent federal agencies, boards, and commissions can and does leave critically important federal agencies effectively unaccountable to the President. Such a state of affairs existed at the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) from January 20, 2021, until September 25, 2023—over half of President Biden’s fouryear term …

2024 Commencement Exercises, Benjamin N. Cardozo School Of Law

Commencement Programs

Order of Exercises

Processional:

Felix Wu, JD, PhD, Vice Dean, Professor of Law, Herald

Presiding:

Selma Botman, PhD, Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs, Yeshiva University, Chief Marshal

Rabbi Dr. Ari Berman, President, Yeshiva University

National Anthem:

Cantor Ira W. Heller, JD, Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, Class of 2008

Remarks:

Melanie Leslie, JD, Dean, Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, Class of 1991

Commencement Address:

Hon. Ronnie Abrams, U.S. District Judge for the Southern District of New York

Student Remarks:

Meriem Sennoussi, LL.M. Class Speaker, Class of 2024

Polina Pittell, J.D. Class …

Reflections On Purpose And Professional Identity Formation, Harmony Decosimo

Mercer Law Review

I am very grateful to Professor Daisy Floyd for starting this important conversation about the role of purpose in professional identity formation, and for inviting me to participate in it. As I know my co-panelists agree, this is an important conversation not simply to us as lawyers, but as humans, trying to help each other figure out how to live good, meaningful lives.

I think what might be most useful in my response to Professor Floyd is to turn at least initially from the theoretical to the personal and practical by offering some insight into my own experience with purpose …

What About Us? How Law Schools Can Help Historically Underrepresented Law Students Develop Their Professional Identities, David A. Grenardo

Mercer Law Review

Talking about race, gender, and sexual orientation can be painful, messy, and difficult. This country’s history of discrimination and violence against historically underrepresented, marginalized, excluded individuals—racial and ethnic minorities, women, LGBTQIA+, those living with disabilities, the socioeconomically disadvantaged/lower class—makes these topics fraught with controversy and risk. We can easily offend someone accidentally when we try to address these topics even with the best of intentions. For example, some people may get nervous trying to figure out whether to use the words African-American, Black, BIPOC, person of color, or all of the above when discussing these topics and referring to someone …

Bridging The Paradigmatic Crevasse Between Lawyers And Scientists: The Need For New Institutional Models, Stanley P. Kowalski

The University of New Hampshire Law Review

The professions of science and law have traditionally been siloed paradigms, operating often in tandem with each other but rarely intersecting in the interdisciplinary pasture which separates them, a pasture from which an abundance of synergistic collaboration and ensuing creative concepts might sprout. However, the erstwhile never the twain shall meet situation is neither realistic nor even tenable in the current century, a century increasingly dominated by science, technology, invention, innovation, and intellectual property. Simply put, whereas lawyers are risk averse and build constructed realities to argue points and serve clients, scientists seek an objective assessment of truth and accept …

Criminal Legal Reform In New Hampshire: One Law Professor's Activism, Albert E. Scherr

The University of New Hampshire Law Review

Criminal legal reform is a perpetual work in progress. The system itself is, at best, maddeningly imperfect. It too often fails to produce anything close to justice. Structural problems afflict the system in a way that incarcerates too many people, particularly people of color. For example, over the last thirty years, the Innocence Project has demonstrated imperfections in the system caused by faulty eyewitness identification procedures by ineffective assistance of counsel, by prosecutorial misconduct, by shoddy forensic practices and by police behavior that produced false confessions.

That the United States has well over fifty-one independent criminal legal systems frustrates efforts …

A Drug's Life: The Untapped Potential Of Secondary Pharmacology Studies In Drug Development, Christina Scott

The University of New Hampshire Law Review

The United States Food and Drug Administration has evolved over the past century to regulate new medicine and protect the public from harmful or ineffective drugs. Drug development and testing science have advanced rapidly alongside the FDA’s increased regulation, enabling pharmaceutical companies to assess a drug's potential adverse reactions by studying its reactivity with various proteins called "off-target receptors." Off-target proteins are often screened and reported in the Investigational New Drug Application as a percentage indicating the drug's binding strength to each protein, which suggests the strength of a particular adverse drug effect. Adverse drug effects often lead to unfavorable …

Symposium Introduction: Challenge And Hope, Frank A. Fritz, Kyle-Matthew Taylor

Nevada Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Struggle Against The Water: Connecting Fair Housing Law And Climatejustice, Jade A. Craig

Nevada Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Military Climate Emissions, Nadia B. Ahmad

Nevada Law Journal

No abstract provided.

New And Useful Improvements: The Role Of Institutional Culture, Leadership, Incentives, And Regulation In 30 Years Of Legal Education Since The Maccrate Report, Greg Brandes

The University of New Hampshire Law Review

New and useful improvements – in the words of the patent statute – have emerged from legal education’s pursuit of seamlessly developing contributing members of the legal profession, as the 1992 MacCrate Report advocated. These include the widespread adoption of distance learning techniques for better teaching and assessment, course pedagogy that is more inclusive for students with diverse learning needs, and a new subset of the academy schooled and interested in the science of teaching and learning. But it has not been easy.

Efforts to improve legal education have sometimes foundered and other times flourished because of varying faculty and …

Purpose, Practical Wisdom, And The Formation Of Trustworthy Lawyers, Kenneth Townsend

Mercer Law Review

Lawyers have a “special responsibility for the quality of justice” in our nation and are expected to “further the public’s understanding of and confidence in the rule of law and the justice system” since “legal institutions in a constitutional democracy depend on popular participation and support to maintain their authority.” Upholding these and other commitments enables the profession to promote the “public interest,” according to the Preamble to the Model Rules of Professional Conduct.