Digital Commons Network^™

Assessing Legal Advocacy To Advance Roma Health In Macedonia, Romania, And Serbia, Tamar Ezer

Articles

Across Europe, Roma suffer extreme marginalisation, negatively impacting their health. Many cannot access healthcare at all. For others, the health system is a hostile place. At the same time, good legal frameworks are in place to protect health rights, and there is increasing recognition of systemic violations experienced by Roma. Essential to building on this momentum and closing the gap between standards and implementation is Roma ability to conduct legal advocacy. Since 2010, the Open Society Foundations has supported Roma engagement in Macedonia, Romania and Serbia in the following advocacy strategies: i) legal empowerment, ii) documentation and advocacy, iii) media …

Integrated Scenarios For Energy: A Methodology For The Short Term, Tadhg O'Mahony

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Quantitative point forecasts of energy and emissions have experienced difficulty with responding to uncertainty. Accuracy issues arise even in the short term with consequences for policy. The technique of scenario analysis is increasingly applied in scientific inquiry on the long term but it also has utility in the short term. This paper presents a discussion of the use of forecasts for prediction and proposes integrated or ´hybrid´ exploratory qualitative and quantitative scenarios in its stead. Various methodological issues are explored towards formulation of a scenario development process. Integrated scenarios structure thinking on the future, bound uncertainty, document important assumptions, aid …

Using Weigh-In-Motion Data To Determine Aggressiveness Of Traffic For Bridge Loading, Eugene J. Obrien, Bernard Enright

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This paper presents results based on the analysis of an extensive database of weigh-in-motion (WIM) data collected at five European highway sites in recent years. The data are used as the basis for a Monte Carlo simulation of bridge loading by two lane traffic, both bidirectional and same-direction. Long runs of the simulation model are used to calculate characteristic bridge load effects (bending moments and shear forces), and these characteristic values are compared with design values for bridges of different length as specified by the Eurocode for bridge traffic loading. Various indicators are tested as possible bases for a “Bridge …

Copyright And Technology: Deja Vu All Over Again, Randal C. Picker

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No abstract provided.

The Capstone Course In Labor And Employment Law: A Comprehensive Immersion Simulation Integrating Law, Lawyering Skills, And Professionalism, Laura J. Cooper

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The twenty-first century challenge for law schools in general, and for labor and employment law professors in particular, is truly to prepare students for the practice of law. Diverse voices have criticized the legal academy for how far it has fallen short of meeting that challenge.1 The most detailed and comprehensive critique of law schools’ failure adequately to prepare students for the practice of law was presented by The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching in its 2007 study generally known as the “Carnegie Report.”2

What's "Different" (Enough) In Eighth Amendment Law?, Richard Frase

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In Miller v. Alabama1 and Jackson v. Hobbs2 the Supreme Court reaffirmed its conclusions in two earlier cases, Roper v. Simmons3 and Graham v. Florida,4 that “children are constitutionally different from adults for purposes of sentencing”5 in ways that justify greater Eighth Amendment protection from severe sentences. Miller and Jackson (hereafter referred to for most purposes as Miller) also reaffirmed the Court’s conclusion in Graham that, although “death is different” for purposes of Eighth Amendment law, some of the substantive and analytic principles previously applied only in death penalty cases can also be applied to the most severe prison sentence, …

Unpacking The Force Of Law, Kristin Hickman

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No abstract provided.

Dampening Financial Regulatory Cycles, Brett Mcdonnell

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No abstract provided.

Patent Prudential Standing, Xuan-Thao Nguyen

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This Article is the first to focus on patent prudential standing. Patent prudential standing, a creation of the Federal Circuit, wastes precious resources and serves no sound policy goal. Under patent prudential standing, after many resources have been expended on the merits of a patent infringement case, parties face a reversal of course by the Federal Circuit’s ruling that the plaintiff, typically the exclusive licensee in a patent transaction, lacked standing to bring the case in the first place. Regardless that the plaintiff satisfies constitutional standing, the Federal Circuit propounds that the plaintiff must still meet patent prudential standing. The …

Rethinking U.S. Investment Adviser Regulation, Anita K. Krug

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Although the U.S. Investment Advisers Act of 1940 (the “Advisers Act”) was not at the center of the post-financial crisis regulatory reform that culminated in the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (“Dodd-Frank” or “Dodd-Frank Act”), it was certainly part of the reform effort. In particular, Dodd-Frank amended the Advisers Act--the federal statute that regulates investment advisers and their activities--in a manner intended to address the ways in which privately-offered funds, particularly hedge funds, may have exacerbated the financial crisis. The primary regulatory concern, whether valid or not, was that, given the magnitude of assets invested in hedge …

Judges And Their Papers, Kathryn A. Watts

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Who should own a federal judge’s papers?

This question has rarely been asked. Instead, it has generally been accepted that the Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court and other federal judges own their working papers, which include papers created by judges relating to their official duties, such as internal draft opinions, confidential vote sheets, and case-related correspondence. This longstanding tradition of private ownership has led to tremendous inconsistency. For example, Justice Thurgood Marshall’s papers were released just two years after he left the bench, revealing behind-the-scenes details about major cases involving issues such as abortion and flag burning. In contrast, …

Against Notice Skepticism In Privacy (And Elsewhere), M. Ryan Calo

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What follows is an exploration of innovative new ways to deliver privacy notice. Unlike traditional notice that relies upon text or symbols to convey information, emerging strategies of “visceral” notice leverage a consumer’s very experience of a product or service to warn or inform. A regulation might require that a cell phone camera make a shutter sound so people know their photo is being taken. Or a law could incentivize websites to be more formal (as opposed to casual) wherever they collect personal information, as formality tends to place people on greater guard about what they disclose. The thesis of …

Governance Of Global Mobile Money Networks: The Role Of Technical Standards In Mobile Money In Developing Countries, Jane K. Winn

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Mobile money has the potential to be an effective policy instrument for financial inclusion in developing countries, but it also has the potential to fuel money laundering and terrorist financing. The 2012 revised Financial Action Task Force standards attempt to strike a workable balance between the goals of financial inclusion and financial integrity in developing countries. Mobile money schemes are mostly based in national markets, however, and are not normally designed to address the need of poor migrants for cheap, effective cross-border remittance services.

Demand for such cross-border remittance services may drive the development of technical standards to build global …

Introduction To Mobile Money In Developing Countries: Financial Inclusion And Financial Integrity Conference Special Issue, Jane K. Winn, Louis De Koker

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This special issue of the Washington Journal of Law, Technology & Arts contains papers contributed to a conference held at the University of Washington School of Law on April 20, 2012. The conference, entitled Mobile Money in Developing Countries: Financial Inclusion and Financial Integrity, was organized by the University of Washington School of Law with the support of the Linden Rhoads Dean’s Innovation Fund, Deakin University School of Law, Australia, and the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL).

The conference provided an early opportunity to analyze the impact of the newly-released revised 2012 Financial Action Task Force (FATF) …

Only Part Of The Picture: A Response To Professor Tushnet's Worth A Thousand Words, Zahr Kassim Said

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Professor Rebecca Tushnet’s recent article Worth a Thousand Words: The Image of Copyright elucidates a number of difficulties in copyright that flow from judicial failures to treat images consistently and rigorously. She argues that courts both assess copyrightability and evaluate potential infringement in ways that rely on a naïve understanding of the way artists create, and indeed, the way viewers receive works of art. The problem is particularly pronounced with respect to what Tushnet calls non-textual works because copyright law’s default to textuality means that the tools and methods that judges use misalign with the objects of their examination.

In …

Mandated Disclosure In Literary Hybrid Speech, Zahr K. Said

Articles

This Article, written for the Washington Law Review’s 2013 Symposium, The Disclosure Crisis, argues that hidden sponsorship creates a form of non-actionable influence rather than causing legally cognizable deception that mandatory disclosure can and should cure.

The Article identifies and calls into question three widely held assumptions underpinning much of the regulation of embedded advertising, or hidden sponsorship, in artistic communications. The first assumption is that advertising can be meaningfully discerned and separated from communicative content for the purposes of mandating disclosure, even when such advertising occurs in “hybrid speech.” The second assumption is that the hidden promotional aspects …

The Psychotherapist Privilege: Privacy And "Garden Variety" Emotional Distress, Helen A. Anderson

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Surprisingly, there is no clear authority on implied waiver of the psychotherapist-patient privilege in federal courts. There is binding authority from the Supreme Court establishing the privilege, but the bold outlines of that decision have been blurred in the confusion about implied waiver.

This Article explores one aspect of that confusion: the popular "garden variety" approach, which favors plaintiffs with what the court deems garden variety, or "normal," mental distress. Although a few other scholars have written on the confusion in the law of implied waiver, this is the first article to look closely at the garden variety approach, which …

Confusion Isn't Everything, William Mcgeveran, Mark P. Mckenna

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The typical shorthand justification for trademark rights centers on avoiding consumer confusion. But in truth, this encapsulation mistakes a method for a purpose: confusion merely serves as an indicator of the underlying problems that trademark law seeks to prevent. Other areas of law accept confusion or mistake of all kinds, intervening only when those errors lead to more serious harms. Likewise, every theory of trademark rights considers confusion troubling solely because it threatens more fundamental values such as fair competition or informative communication. In other words, when it comes to the deep purposes of trademark law, confusion isn’t everything. Yet …

Free Speech Aboard The Leaky Ship Of State: Calibrating First Amendment Protections For Leakers Of Classified Information, Heidi Kitrosser

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The Obama Administration has initiated six prosecutions of government employees for leaking classified information. This is double the number of prosecutions brought by all previous administrations combined. The rise in prosecutions, coupled with other developments – most notably a series of disclosures from the website wikileaks – has brought a renewed focus to the first amendment status of classified information and those who disseminate it. Most of the attention and concern, however, has centered on the protections due non-governmental third parties who publish information that is leaked to them. When their attention turns to leakers, commentators most often argue or …

An Empirical Analysis Of Case Outcomes Under The Ada Amendments Act, Stephen F. Befort

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Congress enacted the ADA Amendments Act (ADAAA) in order to override four Supreme Court decisions that had narrowly restricted the scope of those protected by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and to provide "a national mandate for the elimination of discrimination." This article undertakes an empirical examination of the impact of the ADAA on case outcomes. The recent reported cases provide a unique opportunity for such an examination since, with the ADAAA not retroactively applicable to cases pending prior to its effective date, courts have been simultaneously deciding cases under both the pre-amendment and post-amendment standards. This study examines …

Who's The Father?, Naomi Cahn, June Carbone

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As this brief online essay observes, the litigation that produced the Supreme Court 2013 decision in Adoptive Couple v. Baby Girl demonstrates why we are no closer to a definitive resolution of what to do when parents do not share assumptions about how to raise their child. The case illustrates the national lack of agreement on what makes someone a parent. At the core of these differences is the question of how to align parental behavior with the promotion of the child’s interest in stable and secure relationships.

Reining In Remedies In Patent Litigation: Three (Increasingly Immodest) Proposals, Thomas F. Cotter

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This essay, which builds on my recent work on the law and economics of comparative patent remedies, presents three proposals relating to the enforcement of domestic patent rights. The first, which may be close to being adopted in the United States, is for the courts and the International Trade Commission (ITC) to adopt a general presumption, grounded in patent law and policy, that patent owners who have committed to license their standard essential patents (SEPs) on fair, reasonable, and nondiscriminatory terms are not entitled to permanent injunctions or exclusion orders, but rather only to a damages in the form of …

Online Reading Informs Classroom Instruction And Promotes Collaborative Learning, Leslie Kate Wright, Sacha Zyto, David R. Karger, Dina L. Newman

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Web-based collaborative annotation tools can facilitate communication among students and their instructors through online reading and communication. Collaborative reading fosters peer interaction and is an innovative way to facilitate discussion and participation in larger enrollment courses. It can be especially powerful as it creates an environment where all students are able to ask questions and contribute to a discussion about science. An online annotation tool, Nota Bene (NB), was tested in two biology courses: intermediate-level Molecular Biology (89 students) and upper level Cancer Biology (26 students). Student participation in these graded reading assignments ranged from 79% to 93%. A typical …

Appraisal Theory: Old And New Questions, Phoebe C. Ellsworth

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I describe my current thinking on two old questions—the causal role of appraisals and the relationship of appraisal theories to basic emotions theories and constructivist theories, and three (sort of) new questions—the completeness of appraisals, the role of language, and the development of automaticity in emotional responses.

A Presumptively Better Approach To Arbitrability, John A. E. Pottow, Jacob Brege, Tara J. Hawley

Articles

One of the most complex problems in the arbitration field is the question of who decides disputes over the scope of an arbitrator's purported authority. Courts in Canada and the United States have taken different approaches to this fundamental question of "arbitrability" that necessarily arises when one party disputes the contractual validity of the underlying "container" contract carrying the arbitration clause. If arbitration is a creature of contract, and contract is a product of consensual agreement, then any dispute that impugns the underlying consent of the parties to the container contract implicates the arbitration agreement itself (i.e., no contract, no …

Child Welfare Cases Involving Parents With Disabilities, Joshua Kay

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Many families include at least one parent with a disability. These parents become involved in the child welfare system more frequently than nondisabled parents, and their child protection cases are more likely to end in termination of parental rights. Parents with cognitive and/or psychiatric disabilities are particularly at risk of child welfare involvement. Cases involving parents with disabilities present special challenges and opportunities in child protection litigation, and strong advocacy is needed to ensure that these parents’ needs are met by the child welfare system and their rights are fully protected. With appropriate services, many parents with disabilities can provide …

Modern Multivariate Methods For Accurate Dialect Classification, Ernest Fokoue, Zichen Ma

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We perform discriminant analysis together with principal component analysis on dialect and accent recognition. Since the data matrix exhibits high dimension low sample size feature, we calculate the principal components and the score matrix based on the dual space. Given the transformed score matrix, linear discriminant model does not fit the data well, while quadratic discriminant model, the superior model comparing to LDA, may fail sometimes when large number of principal components are required. Using the Gaussian radial basis function kernel, we calculate the kernel matrix and perform LDA directly on it. Comparing the LDA-PCA method, the in-sample prediction error …

The President's Enforcement Power, Kate Andrias

Articles

Enforcement of law is at the core of the President’s constitutional duty to “take Care” that the laws are faithfully executed, and it is a primary mechanism for effecting national regulatory policy. Yet questions about how presidents oversee agency enforcement activity have received surprisingly little scholarly attention. This Article provides a positive account of the President’s role in administrative enforcement, explores why presidential enforcement has taken the shape it has, and examines the bounds of the President’s enforcement power. It demonstrates that presidential involvement in agency enforcement, though extensive, has been ad hoc, crisis-driven, and frequently opaque. The Article thus …

A Novel Dual Mode Gateway For Wireless Sensor Network And Lte-A Network Convergence, Garth Crosby, Farzam Vafa

Articles

In recent years, the number of machine-to-machine (M2M) networks, which do not require direct human intervention, has been increasing at a rapid pace. Meanwhile, the need for a wireless platform to control and monitor these M2M networks, one with both a vast coverage area and a low network deployment cost, continues to be unmet. Mobile cellular networks (MCNs) and wireless sensor networks (WSNs) are emerging as two heterogeneous networks that can meet the challenges of M2M communication through network convergence. In this paper, a model for network convergence between a Long Term Evolution-Advance (LTE-A) cellular network and a WSN is …

Reflections On A Decade Of Global Rankings: What We've Learned And Outstanding Issues, Ellen Hazelkorn

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Ten years after the first global rankings appeared, it is clear that they have had an extraordinary impact on higher education. While there are fundamental questions about whether rankings measure either quality or what’s meaningful, they have succeeded in exposing higher education to international comparison. Moreso, because of the important role higher education plays as a driver of economic development, rankings have exposed both an information deficit and national competitiveness. Accordingly, both nations and institutions have sought to maximise their position vis-á-vis global rankings with positive and perverse effects. Their legacy is evident in the way rankings have become an …