Law Commons^™

The Futility Of Walls: How Traveling Corporations Threaten State Sovereignty, Darren Rosenblum

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Inversions--mergers in which one firm merges with another abroad to avoid taxes in its home country--have spread as globalization has reduced many of the transactional costs associated with relocating. As firms acquire the power to choose the laws that govern them, they challenge the sovereignty of nation-states, who find their ability to tax and regulate firms depleted. States and firms compete in a game of cat and mouse to adapt to this new global reality. The subversion of state power by these firms reveals the futility of walls, both literal and regulatory. This Essay describes the phenomenon of these “traveling …

Foreign Assistance Complicity, Alexander K.A. Greenawalt

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

When does a government’s provision of assistance to foreign armed groups cross the line from legitimate foreign policy to criminal aiding and abetting of those who use the aid to commit atrocities? The question presents one of the most difficult dilemmas in criminal justice, one that has deep normative implications and has provoked sharp splits among the U.S. federal courts and international tribunals that have faced it.

In 2013, the Appeals Chamber of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) sent shockwaves through international legal circles when it acquitted former Yugoslav Army chief Momčilo Perišić of aiding and …

Dynamic Governance Innovation, Elizabeth Burleson

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

This article frames environmentally sound innovation in the context of transnational network theory with the goal of setting forth a preliminary framework for international legal policy coherence. I consider how network dynamics can facilitate broad diffusion of environmentally sound technologies, concluding that what appears to be fragmented trade, environment, and human rights regimes are indeed sustainable development building blocks with which to achieve dynamic governance. Collaborative environmentally sound innovation networking may be able to shepherd whole renewable energy sectors across the innovation valley of death and help turn a global responsibility to ramp up green technology into a global initiative …

The Rio+20 Process: Forward Movement For The Environment?, Ann Powers

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

This commentary summarizes the events at the recent UN Conference on Sustainable Development, commonly referred to as Rio+20, noting both the role of official national delegations and the diversity of non-state parties that were involved in a variety of venues at and around Rio+20. It sketches the background of sustainable development efforts, maps the road from the original 1992 Rio Earth Summit to the 20th anniversary gathering, and comments on the Conference’s outcomes and their implications for international law and legal institutions. In answer to the much debated question of whether the Rio+20 was a success or a failure, or …