Law Commons^™

From Fedspeak To Forward Guidance: Regulatory Dimensions Of Central Bank Communications, Robert B. Ahdieh

Robert B. Ahdieh

In the face of the financial crisis that engulfed the globe beginning in 2007, the U.S. Federal Reserve quickly found itself without the key lever of monetary policy on which it had traditionally relied: short-term interest rate adjustments designed to move long-term rates, and thereby expected levels of lending, investment, and capital retention. By late 2008, short-term rates were already close to zero, yet unemployment remained strikingly high – with no sign of any likely renewal of bank lending or commercial investment.

Famously, the Fed embraced so-called quantitative easing – the purchase of massive volumes of public and private debt …

Coordination And Conflict: The Persistent Relevance Of Networks In International Financial Regulation, Robert B. Ahdieh

Robert B. Ahdieh

Over the last two decades, scholarly enthusiasm about transnational regulatory networks has seen something of a boom-and-bust cycle. Such networks – informal groupings of mid-level national officials, convened to develop nonbinding “soft law” norms of behavior in specialized fields of regulation – were identified as an important new phenomenon, were studied widely, and came to be seen as central pillars of the international legal order, especially in financial regulation. Yet today, regulatory networks go largely unmentioned in polite academic conversation: a kind of “he-who-must-not-be-named” of international law.

Among the many critiques of transnational networks that have contributed to this decline …

The "Common Word," Development, And Human Rights: African And Catholic Perspectives, Joseph M. Isanga

Joseph Isanga

Africa is the most conflict-ridden region of the world and has been since the end of the Cold War. The Continent's performance in both development and human rights continues to lag behind other regions in the world. Such condi­tions can cause religious differences to escalate into conflict, particularly where religious polarity is susceptible to being exploited. The sheer scale of such con­flicts underscores the urgency and significance of interreligious engagement and dialogue: 'Quantitative and qualitative analysis based on a ... database including 28 violent conflicts show that religion plays a role more frequently than is usually assumed.' This ambivalent character …

New Challenges To Southern Africa: From Regional Conflict To Internal Reconstruction, Makau Wa Mutua

Makau Mutua

With the possible exception of the Horn of Africa, arguably no other African region has been subject to multiple traumas such as those endured by Southern Africa. From the brutal Portuguese colonization to the vicious civil wars in Angola and Mozambique, not to mention the ravages of apartheid in South Africa and Namibia, the last four hundred years have seen sheer brutality of man over fellow man. Since 1990, however, there has been a steady reversal of the conditions that have historically caused violence in the region. In this article, the author examines this legacy and the struggle to construct …

Invisible Women: Syrian Victims Of Gender-Based Violence As A Particular Social Group In U.S. Asylum Law, Sarah Dávila-Ruhaak

Sarah Dávila-Ruhaak

In the midst of the worst humanitarian crisis of our time, in Syria, we have seen extreme suffering by millions who have been summarily executed, tortured, imprisoned, raped, starved, and bombed with chemical weapons. Specifically, we have seen that women have been the target of gender-based violence in the conflict by and with the acquiescence of the Assad regime forces and by opposition groups. Women have been human shields; hostages for the bargaining of prisoner release; and victims of sexual violence and exploitation, forced marriage, and other forms of violence such as honor killings. This gender-based violence has rendered women …

Breaking The Ice: The Canadian-American Dispute Over The Arctic's Northwest Passage, Nicholas Howson

Nicholas Howson

No abstract provided.

A Hydrogeological Approach To The Status Of Transboundary Ground Water Resources Under International Law [Abstract], Gabriel Eckstein, Yoram Eckstein

Gabriel Eckstein

2 pages. Contains footnotes.

Beginning With Yes: A Review Essay On Michael Wheeler's The Art Of Negotiation: How To Improvise Agreement In A Chaotic World, Leonard L. Riskin

Leonard L Riskin

Michael Wheeler's The Art of Negotiation: How to Improvise Agreement in a Chaotic World stands on the shoulders of a number of previous books on negotiation by Wheeler's colleagues in the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School (PON), and others, but not because it needs their support. Instead, The Art of Negotiation illuminates the principal models in such books, by showing why, when, and how to improvise in relation to them. Some standard models of negotiation seem static, Wheeler tells us, whereas negotiation mastery requires dealing with the ‘inherent uncertainty‘ of almost any negotiation, and that calls for improvisation, …

Eleven Big Ideas About Conflict: A Superficial Guide For The Thoughtful Journalist, Leonard L. Riskin

Leonard L Riskin

When Professor Richard Reuben asked me to speak about the most basic ideas in conflict resolution to a group that included renowned journalists and journalism scholars, I balked. Surely these notions would seem too obvious, mundane, or superficial. But Richard - a practicing journalist for many years as well as an expert on conflict - assured me that the audience would find most of them surprising and useful. I hope he is correct.I plan to present eleven ideas from the dispute resolution literature that I find particularly helpful in my work and life and which I think any journalist would …

Managing Inner And Outer Conflict: Selves, Subpersonalities, And Internal Family Systems, Leonard L. Riskin

Leonard L Riskin

This article describes potential benefits of considering certain processes within an individual that take place in connection with external conflict as if they might be negotiations or other processes that are routinely used to address external disputes, such as mediation or adjudication. In order to think about internal processes in this way, it is necessary to employ a model of the mind that includes entities capable of engaging in such processes. The Internal Family Systems (IFS) model, developed by Richard C. Schwartz, works well for this purpose. The IFS model is grounded on the construct that the mind is composed …

"Law And Justice Are Not Always The Same": Creating Community-Based Justice Forums For People Subjected To Intimate Partner Abuse, Leigh S. Goodmark

Leigh S. Goodmark

What constitutes justice in cases involving intimate partner abuse has historically been determined not by the person subjected to abuse, but rather an actor within the legal system—a police officer, a prosecutor, an advocate, or a judge—and those individuals most often define justice in terms of what the legal system has to offer. People subjected to abuse may conceive of justice quite differently, however, in ways that the legal system is not well suited to address. For people subjected to abuse who are interested in punishment, whose goals are congruent with the legal system’s goals of safety and accountability (as …

The Fearon Corollary: Private Property Rights As War, W. C. Bunting

W. C. Bunting

ABSTRACT: This Article models private property rights as a conflict resolution mechanism and shows that for the Coase Theorem to be consistent on its own terms, private property rights must generate the Pareto-optimal allocation of scarce resources among all feasible conflict resolution mechanisms. This conclusion is termed the Fearon Corollary. Equating the imposition of private property rights to conflict/war, the following question is considered: if pre-conflict common ownership is socially-optimal, under what conditions will disputing parties fail to bargain around the conflict? In addition to the explanations identified by Professor Fearon, the present article offers an additional behavioral explanation evidenced …

The Conflict Over Conflict Management, David B. Lipsky, Ariel C. Avgar

David B Lipsky

[Excerpt] In this article we look at the traditional approach to workplace conflict, the evolution of conflict management, criticism of this process by progressive and traditional critics, and then consider whether they can be reconciled by taking what we call a strategic view of conflict management in the workplace. This view calls for an alignment between the goals of the conflict management system and the overarching nature of the organization in which that system is implemented. The management of conflict, according to this approach, should complement the organization’s strategic posture and existing structures. We maintain that the level of fit …

Contemporary Issues In Employment Relations—A Roundtable, David Lewin, Adrienne E. Eaton, Thomas A. Kochan, David B. Lipsky, Daniel J. B. Mitchell, Paula B. Voos

David B Lipsky

For the 2006 LERA research volume, leading scholars were assembled in a roundtable for the purpose of eliciting their views on key contemporary industrial relations issues. The roundtable members were Adrienne E. Eaton, professor and director of labor extension in the Rutgers University School of Management and Labor Relations; Thomas A. Kochan, the George M. Bunker Professor of Management and director of the Institute for Work and Employment Research in the MIT Sloan School of Management; David B. Lipsky, the Anne Evans Estabrook Professor of Dispute Resolution and former dean of the School of Industrial and Labor Relations, Cornell University; …

Contemporary Issues In Employment Relations—A Roundtable, David Lewin, Adrienne Eaton, Thomas Kochan, David Lipsky, Daniel Mitchell, Paula Voos

David Lewin

For the 2006 LERA research volume, leading scholars were assembled in a roundtable for the purpose of eliciting their views on key contemporary industrial relations issues. The roundtable members were Adrienne E. Eaton, professor and director of labor extension in the Rutgers University School of Management and Labor Relations; Thomas A. Kochan, the George M. Bunker Professor of Management and director of the Institute for Work and Employment Research in the MIT Sloan School of Management; David B. Lipsky, the Anne Evans Estabrook Professor of Dispute Resolution and former dean of the School of Industrial and Labor Relations, Cornell University; …

Power And Tactics In Bargaining, Samuel B. Bacharach, Edward J. Lawler

Edward J Lawler

This paper develops and tests an analytical framework for analyzing the selection of tactics in bargaining. Using a variant of power-dependence theory, the authors propose that bargainers will use different dimensions of dependence, such as the availability of alternative outcomes from other sources and the value of the outcomes at stake, to select among different tactics. To test this model, the authors conducted two simulation experiments that portrayed an employee-employer conflict over a pay raise, manipulating four dimensions of dependence: employee's outcome alternatives, employee's outcome value, employer's outcome alternatives, and employer's outcome value. Within this context, respondents estimated the likelihood …

The Federal Protective Power And Targeted Killing Of U.S. Citizens, Greg Mcneal

Greg McNeal

In this responsive essay I argue that the Constitution envisions circumstances when the president may order U.S. citizens to be killed. It may be akin to the facts in al-Awlaki, where one is actively making war against the United States, or it may be in lesser circumstances that threaten the instruments of federal power. A settled example where a killing was authorized to protect the federal government was in Cunningham v. Neagle, 135 U.S. 1 (1890), there the Court addressed the killing of a U.S. citizen by Neagle, a federal marshal who was dispatched to protect Justice Field from an …

An Empirical Study Of Obstacle Preemption In The Supreme Court, Gregory M. Dickinson

Gregory M Dickinson

The Supreme Court’s federal preemption decisions are notoriously unpredictable. Traditional left-right voting alignments break down in the face of competing ideological pulls. The breakdown of predictable voting blocs leaves the business interests most affected by federal preemption uncertain of the scope of potential liability to injured third parties and unsure even of whether state or federal law will be applied to future claims.

This empirical analysis of the Court’s decisions over the last fifteen years sheds light on the Court’s unique voting alignments in obstacle preemption cases. A surprising anti–obstacle preemption coalition is forming as Justice Thomas gradually positions himself …

Teaching Negotiation To A Globally Diverse Audience: Ethics, Morality And Cultural Differences, David Allen Larson, Vanessa Seyman

David Allen Larson

"Teaching Negotiation to a Globally Diverse Audience: Ethics, Morality, and Cultural Differences" (by David Allen Larson and Vanessa Seyman) This is a short article discussing the challenges of teaching negotiation, and also the challenge of actually negotiating, in a globally diverse environment. Issues of ethics, morality and culture can surface quite quickly when teaching and negotiating in a multicultural environment. The article builds upon our recent experiences as participants in the Second Generation Global Negotiation conference held Istanbul, Turkey. The article provides examples of how cultural and language differences can impact both actual negotiations and negotiation teaching and provides suggestions …

Mediation Workshop: Basic Course Materials, Laurence Boulle, John Wade

John Wade

No abstract provided.

Matching Disputes And Responses: How To Diagnose Causes Of Conflict, And To Respond With Appropriate Interventions And/Or Referrals, John Wade

John Wade

This short paper will address three broad topics from an Australian perspective. Parts of this paper will be relevant to Canada and to other countries. First, where is the pressure coming from for dispute resolution professionals to improve the diagnosis of causes of conflict; and to improve the choice of intervention and/or referral to other skilled helpers? Secondly, what diagnostic dispute resolution services (problem defining) are currently “available”? What methods are used to make an initial diagnosis of causes of a conflict, and appropriate possible “interventions”? Thirdly, what dispute resolution assistance (problem solving) is “available” in each area of conflict? …

Reducing The Impact Of Ethnic Tensions On Economic Growth – Economic Or Political Institutions?, Atin Basu Choudhary, Jim Bang, Michael Reksulak

Atin Basu Choudhary

We use a standard growth regression model and show that ethnic tensions reduce per capita growth rates. We also find evidence that “good” economic and political institutions improve per capita growth rates. More importantly, good economic institutions mitigate the effect of ethnic tensions on per capita growth while good political institutions do not. Consequently, it is foremost capitalist freedom that promotes peace and development.

Attitudes, Advocacy And Polarization: The New Iron Triangle Of American Public Policy, Roger L. Conner, Patricia Jordan

Roger L Conner

Electoral politics in the U.S. have always been nasty and brutish. Pervasive polarization in public policy disputes is a new an worrisome trend that has attracted considerable attention recently. Using insights gleaned from social psychology, this article finds that “strong", negative "attitudes," once attached to an “attitude object” such as the “other side” in a policy conflict, will operate subconsciously to distort cognition in ways that generate extreme and polarized thinking. Scholars from a different field, public policy studies, find that conversations about public policy increasingly occur inside of “advocacy coalitions,” vast and networks of people and groups that are …

The Procedural Evolution Of Conflict Towards Litigation And Implications For Legal Publishers, John Wade

John Wade

This paper will summarise three topics found repetitively in the research of Professor Marc Galanter, namely – • The pyramids of conflict • The decline of “full-blown” trials • The increase of “law” The goal is to promote brainstorming about the consequences of these analyses for legal publishers.

Fighting With Faith: The Role Of Religion In Dealing With Modern Conflict, Sean P. Mcdonnell

Sean P. McDonnell

Though current modes of cultural and ethnic asymmetrical conflict may seem novel, they universally draw on something far older and far more ingrained in man’s ancient roots: his faith in and relationship with the divine. Perhaps uniquely among cultural factors, religion is a single consistent issue latent in almost all contemporary intractable conflicts. If properly deployed, the symbols, language, and meanings of religious traditions may prove as powerful in resolving conflict as they have been in fueling it. How can those interested in healing these wide cultural schisms employ the power of religion in a restorative resolution process? This essay …

The Status And Evolution Of Laws And Policies Regulating Privately Owned Tigers In The United States, Philip J. Nyhus, Michael Ambrogi, Caitlin Dufraine, Alan Shoemaker, Ronald L. Tilson

Philip J. Nyhus

No abstract provided.

Judgments Of The United States Supreme Court And The South African Constitutional Court As A Basis For A Universal Method To Resolve Conflicts Between Fundamental Rights, Daniel H. Erskine

Daniel H. Erskine

This article describes the methods utilized by the United States Supreme Court to resolve specific cases involving conflicts between federal constitutional rights, a federal constitutional right and a state constitutional or statutory right, and an international treaty right and a federal constitutional right. Consideration of particular decisions representative of the manner the Court resolves conflicts between rights in the three typologies described above, illustrates how the Court views such conflicts and the rationales employed to resolve apparent conflicting rights. The rationales used by the United States Supreme Court are compared to the South African Constitutional Court’s decisions in the Soobramoney, …

The Dirty War Index: A Public Health And Human Rights Tool For Examining And Monitoring Armed Conflict Outcomes., M Hicks, M Spagat

Madelyn Hsiao-Rei Hicks

War, a major public health problem, is a situation where the interests of public health, human rights, and humanitarian law intersect.

The DWI is a data-driven public health tool that identifies rates of particularly undesirable or prohibited, i.e., “dirty,” outcomes inflicted on populations during war (e.g., civilian death, child injury, or torture).

A DWI is calculated as: (Number of “dirty,” i.e., undesirable or prohibited cases/Total number of cases) × 100.

DWIs are designed for direct, easy translation of war's public health outcomes into the human rights, policy, and interdisciplinary work needed to address war's practice.

DWIs support monitoring, deterrence, and …

Property Rights And Resource Conflict In Sudan, Karol C. Boudreaux

Karol C. Boudreaux

The genocidal conflict in the western region of Sudan- Darfur-is often characterized as an ethnic and religious struggle. However, underlying the fighting between black African farmers against Arab janjaweed militia is a struggle over access to, and control of, increasingly scarce fertile land. This chapter presents a very brief history of the wars in Sudan. It also presents an economic analysis of property rights as it applies in this case. The chapter argues that efforts to resolve these conflicts will not be successful unless underlying property disputes are resolved and until the Sudanese government improves the institutional environment in which …

Adr And The 'Vanishing Trial': The Growth And Impact Of 'Alternative Dispute Resolution', Thomas J. Stipanowich

Thomas J. Stipanowich

In the past quarter-century, significant changes have occurred in the ways lawyers approach conflict. There have been unprecedented efforts to develop strategies aimed at more efficient, less costly, and more satisfying resolution of conflict, including more extensive and appropriate use of mediation and other “alternative dispute resolution” (ADR) approaches. This study examines what we know and do not know about the growth and impact of ADR in federal and state courts, in the business sector, and in employment and consumer settings. The analysis examines the relationship between ADR and court trial, but also underlines the broader uses of and rationale …