Law Commons^™

A Destination-Based Cash Flow Tax Can Be Structured To Comply With World Trade Organization Rules, Itai Grinberg

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This paper briefly outlines alternative approaches to enacting a destination-based cash flow tax that are more clearly compatible with the World Trade Organization rules than the approach that has previously been described in the literature. The first structural alternative involves expanding the universe of businesses subject to the tax by clearly defining both the base of the new U.S. business tax and its tax nexus requirement as domestic consumption, and thereafter treating foreign importers and other sellers equivalently, rather than imposing a deduction disallowance or an import tax. The second alternative involves adopting a business activities tax, and then enacting …

Regional Disputes: It Is Not Just Ground Beef, Nicholas W. Laneville

Sustainable Development Law & Policy

No abstract provided.

Never For-Gatt: What Recent Tbt Decisions Reveal About The Appellate Body’S Analysis Of Environmental Regulation Under The Wto Agreements, Ravi Soopramanien

Sustainable Development Law & Policy

Few environmentalists have positive things to say on the impact of the World Trade Organization (WTO) on the environment. WTO legal obligations are frequently cited as the most significant impediment to a range of environmental initiatives, including notably meaningful international coordination to combat climate change, particularly through carbon tax initiatives, and imposition of electronic waste disposal export bans. In this vein, adverse findings of WTO dispute panels on environmental conservation measures tend to attract the ire of international civil society. The tensions between liberal trade and environmental protection can be traced back to the days of the General Agreement on …

Communitizing Transnational Regulatory Concerns, Sungjoon Cho, Cecilia Suh, Jacob Radecki

All Faculty Scholarship

The conventional, rationalist view explains that a state will only assent to international regulation if such regulation directly serves the state’s interest. In contrast, nascent transnational regulatory intermediaries, such as the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) Committee, seek to ameliorate such parochial state interests through a broader interstate dialogue. This Article addresses the challenging question of whether these intermediaries have any meaningful effect on the resolution of interstate trade disputes. To examine this question, this Article utilizes data from over 400 examples of “specific trade concerns” (STCs) raised by WTO members in the TBT Committee. Our …

Communitizing Transnational Regulatory Concerns, Sungjoon Cho, Cecilia M. Suh, Jacob Radecki

Sungjoon Cho

Strength In Intellectual Property Protection And Foreign Direct Investment Flows In Least Developed Countries, James Thuo Gathii

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Great Expectations: The Treatment Of Expectations In Wto And International Investment Law, Chios Carmody, Chios Carmody

Law Publications

A continuing issue in many areas of law is the treatment of “reasonable” or “legitimate” expectations. This contribution posits that a doctrine of expectations is vital to both the law’s stability and flexibility, functioning as a kind of ‘shock absorber’ that accommodates divergent pressures within a legal system. Expectations may arise subjectively, but what the law protects in most instances is determined objectively. This contribution goes on to examine the treatment of expectations in WTO and international investment law. Their treatment in WTO law has been to read them out as a matter of pleading in WTO dispute settlement, apart …

The Wto Agreements And The Regulation Of Energy Markets: Is There A Good Fit?, Ravi Soopramanien

Pace Environmental Law Review

This paper focuses on this second wave of WTO RE disputes. It will assess whether or to what extent policy instruments requiring increased use of RE in national electricity grids, notably FiT, RPS and EA regulations, are consistent with WTO legal obligations. Part II of this paper will discuss energy markets, and the issues that are presented through incorporation of RE into national grids. Part III will shift focus to the WTO. It will introduce the WTO and relevant WTO law, with a particular emphasis on the Appellate Body’s conclusion in its Canada – RE/FiT report. Part IV will assess …

Follow The Leader: Eliminating Perverse Global Fishing Subsidies Through Unilateral Domestic Trade Measures, Anastasia Telesetsky

Maine Law Review

Perverse subsidies including fuel tax rebates lead to overfishing though a combination of overcapacity and excess fishing effort. The current overfishing trend has depleted certain key commercial fisheries with implications for future food security, particularly in regions dependent on fish protein. Over the course of the past four decades, there have been a number of multilateral efforts to eliminate the subsidies including environmental treaties, environmental targets, and trade negotiations. None of these attempts and a global cooperative response have achieved a reduction in perverse subsidies. This Essay proposes the adoption of unilateral trade measures or a set of “Friends of …

Obligations Versus Rights: Substantive Difference Between Wto And International Investment Law, Chios Carmody

Law Publications

WTO law remains relatively uncontentious whereas international investment law elicits much more debate. This article posits that the differences in reception are attributable to deeper substantive differences about what is protected under each regime. In WTO law what is protected is the sum total of all commitments and concessions under the WTO Agreement, something that can be thought of as a “public” good. When a country injures that good, the remedy is for the country to cease the injury, a requirement that naturally places emphasis on obligation. In international investment law, by contrast, what is protected is individualized to a …

Regime Shifting Of Ip Law Making And Enforcement From The Wto To The International Investment Regime, James T. Gathii, Cynthia M. Ho

Faculty Publications & Other Works

No abstract provided.

The Trade System And Climate Action: Ways Forward Under The Paris Agreement, Susanne Droege, Harro Van Asselt, Kasturi Das, Michael Mehling

South Carolina Journal of International Law and Business

No abstract provided.

Risk And Regulatory Calibration: Wto Compliance Review Of The U.S. Dolphin-Safe Tuna Labeling Regime, Cary Coglianese, André Sapir

All Faculty Scholarship

In a series of recent disputes arising under the TBT Agreement, the Appellate Body has interpreted Article 2.1 to provide that discriminatory and trade-distortive regulation could be permissible if based upon a “legitimate regulatory distinction.” In its recent compliance decision in the US-Tuna II dispute, the AB reaffirmed its view that regulatory distinctions embedded in the U.S. dolphin-safe tuna labeling regime were not legitimate because they were not sufficiently calibrated to the risks to dolphins associated with different tuna fishing conditions. This paper analyzes the AB’s application of the notion of risk-based regulation in the US-Tuna II dispute and finds …

Free Markets, State Involvement, And The Wto: Chinese State Owned Enterprises (Soes) In The Ring, Petros C. Mavroidis, Merit E. Jano

Faculty Scholarship

The WTO has struggled with the treatment of nonmarket economies (NMEs). What was a nonissue in the original GATT (because of the homogeneity of participants) became quite an issue with the accession of formally centrally planned economies, which were not transformed to market economies, at least not in the eyes of the incumbents. Contracting this issue has proved to be so far always wanting, and leaving it to adjudicators has not produced good results either. With respect to Chinese SOEs this risks continuing to be an issue, since the contractually agreed deadline (2016) after which China should not be treated …