Law Commons^™

Charting A Progressive International Financial Agenda, Daniel Bradlow

Working Papers

This paper argues that the current financial crisis offers the best opportunity for progressive reform in international financial governance in many years. It cautions that developing countries and civil society will only be able to fully exploit this opportunity if they are well prepared and realistic in their expectations. It concludes with a set of recommendations on what reforms developing countries and civil society should promote in the current negotiations about international financial governance.

Book Review: Stephen Hopgood, 'Keepers Of The Flame: Understanding Amnesty International', Kenneth Anderson

Book Reviews

American University, WCL Research Paper No. 2008-66Abstract:This brief review (1100 words) examines Stephen Hopgood's half journalism-half anthropological journey inside the world of Amnesty International. The book is an outstanding piece of both reportage and analysis, and the review discusses the various pressures, political and ideological and social, on AI and those that work in its International Secretariat. As the review notes, AI is more like a religious order than anything else, and that observation has ramifications for the NGO world beyond AI.

International Financial Reform And Africa: What Is To Be Done?, Daniel Bradlow

Working Papers

This paper discusses the likely implications of the financial crisis on Africa and considers what Africa can do to position itself to extract some benefit from the negotiations on international financial governance reform.

A Requiem For My New York Times Home Subscription, Kenneth Anderson

Popular Media

This very short (2000 words) online opinion piece addresses the question of why the author gave up home delivery of the New York Times. It argues that, quite apart from issues of political bias, the New York Times has successively moved to turn itself from a newspaper into a magazine, and, in facing the pressures of the Internet economic model, into a device for creating, caring for, and feeding the newspaper's "online communities" - a business model increasingly based on selling cultural participation in shared-bias-communities. The Times is moving toward a content model that presumes that its readers read it …

A Requiem For My New York Times Home Subscription, Kenneth Anderson

Popular Media

This very short (2000 words) online opinion piece addresses the question of why the author gave up home delivery of the New York Times. It argues that, quite apart from issues of political bias, the New York Times has successively moved to turn itself from a newspaper into a magazine, and, in facing the pressures of the Internet economic model, into a device for creating, caring for, and feeding the newspaper's "online communities" - a business model increasingly based on selling cultural participation in shared-bias-communities. The Times is moving toward a content model that presumes that its readers read it …

The Past, Present, And Future Of The United Nations: A Comment On Paul Kennedy And The Parliament Of Man, Kenneth Anderson

Book Reviews

The Parliament of Man: The Past, Present, and Future of the United Nations (ISBN 978-84-8306-737-6) American University, WCL Research Paper No. 2008-70AbstractThis is the English language version of an essay (10,000 words) appearing in the Revista de Libros (Madrid), considering the history and future of the United Nations and global governance through the lens of Paul Kennedy's recent work, The Parliament of Man. The essay is highly skeptical of what it describes as platonism about the future of the UN as the seat of global governance. It offers an alternative view of how to consider the work of the UN, …

Overvaluing Uniformity, Amanda Frost

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

"E NSURING the uniform interpretation of federal law has long been considered one of the federal courts' primary objectives, and uniformity is regularly cited in some of the most intractable debates about the structure and function of the federal court system. For example, specialized courts are lauded for their ability to ensure uniformity in the areas of law over which they have jurisdic- tion. Similarly, proponents of exclusive federal jurisdiction contend that the federal courts provide greater consistency in the interpre- tation of federal law than could fifty different state courts. Some commentators claim that Congress' power to create exceptions …

The Past, Present, And Future Of The United Nations: A Comment On Paul Kennedy And The Parliament Of Man (El Pasado Como Prologo: El Futuro Glorioso Y El Turbio Presente De Las Naciones Unidas (Revista De Paul Kennedy, El Parlamento De La Humanidad)), Kenneth Anderson

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

American University, WCL Research Paper No. 2008-72Abstract:This is the original Spanish language version of an essay (10,000 words) appearing in the Revista de Libros (Madrid), considering the history and future of the United Nations and global governance through the lens of Paul Kennedy's recent work, The Parliament of Man. The essay is highly skeptical of what it describes as platonism about the future of the UN as the seat of global governance. It offers an alternative view of how to consider the work of the UN, in three areas: security, economic development, and values. The essay argues that, particularly with …

'Dynamic Competition' Does Not Excuse Monopolization, Jonathan Baker

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

This comment on a forthcoming article by Keith Hylton and David Evans explains why considerations of "dynamic competition" do not argue against antitrust enforcement. While the prospect of achieving monopoly may foster innovation, that observation misleads as to appropriate antitrust policy unless qualified by the observation that the push of competition generally spurs innovation more than the pull of monopoly. Moreover, the longstanding doctrinal rule that mere monopoly pricing is not illegal should not be read as demonstrating that antitrust law values monopolies for their role in promoting innovation.

The Inter-American System Of Human Rights: Challenges For The Future, Claudio Grossman

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

The Inter-American system is a combination of human rights norms and supervisory institutions within the Americas. The applicable rules consist primarily of the American Declaration on the Rights and Duties of Man ("American Declaration") and the American Convention on Human Rights ("American Convention"). The institutions involved are the organs responsible for supervising compliance with the established rules: the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights ("the Commission") and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights ("the Court"). The system performs supervisory functions basically through country reports adopted by the Commission which describe the overall human rights situation in a country and decisions in …

Banding Together: Reflections On The Role Of The Women's Bar Association Of The District Of Columbia And The Washington College Of Law In Promoting Women's Rights, Jamie Abrams, Daniela Kraiem

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

The Washington College of Law and the Women's Bar Association of the District of Columbia share an important historical connection; Ellen Spencer Mussey and Emma Gillett founded both institutions together, in 1898 and 1917, respectively. Mussey and Gillett were pioneers in legal education, legal reform, and the development of women lawyers. 2 More significant than the work they performed during their lives, however, is the legacy of activism, reform, and support that they ignited by founding two institutions that advance women in the law. These institutions have trained and supported generations of women lawyers through world wars and depressions, through …

Patient-Tailored Medicine, Part One: The Impact Of Race And Genetics On Medicine, Corrine Parver

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

One of the more controversial elements of advancing technology is the use of race and genetics to help create more specific types of medicines that will help combat diseases and conditions that appear to be more prevalent within certain races or ethnic groups than in others. Considering the history of discrimination and inadequate treatment of individuals on the bases of race and gender in the United States, there is justifiable concern that race or gender-based treatment could be used to legitimate discrimination. On the other hand, there is substantial proof that the current method of creating medicines for the general …

A Sovereign Wealth Turn, Anna Gelpern

Working Papers

On September 2, 2008, a group of leading sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) agreed on generally accepted principles and practices. The process that created the so-called Santiago Principles is important in its own right, as a milestone on the way to what might become international financial architecture. Since SWFs rose to prominence two years ago, they have been trapped in sterile domestic arguments between national security and open investment. These have obscured SWFs' significance and the governance challenge they present. The challenge reflects the power shifts and culture clashes of financial integration, which, thanks to capital flow reversals, no longer looks …

Integrating Comparative Criminal Law: Criminal Law And Procedure, At Home And Abroad, Roger Fairfax

Presentations

No abstract provided.

States Of Terror, States Of Consent: Philip Bobbitt's Strategic Transnational Politics For The Twenty-First Century, Kenneth Anderson

Book Reviews

American University, WCL Research Paper No. 2008-64Abstract:This essay is a book review from the Times Literary Supplement of Philip Bobbitt's widely remarked and admired Terror and Consent. The review compares Bobbitt's unabashedly strategic view of the response of democratic states to terrorism, and contrasts it with more narrowly cost-benefit analysis-driven approaches to responding to terrorism. The review criticizes 'tactical' approaches to terrorism as too focused upon 'event driven catastrophism'. The review considers Bobbitt's analysis of the changing nature of states, and the rise of what he calls the 'market-state'. The essay ends by querying whether the market-state, as Bobbitt conceives …

Paper Trail: Working Papers And Recent Scholarship, Jonathan Baker

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

Editor’s Note: In this edition we review two papers by leading government economists, past, present, and perhaps future. The first paper, by Dennis Carlton and Ken Heyer, takes a cautious policy approach to single-firm conduct based on theory, empirical evidence, and “considerations of administrability and consistency with general and widely held presumptions” and sets out four “underlying principles” that should govern policy toward single-firm conduct. The second paper, on the role of market concentration in modern economic analysis of horizontal mergers, is by Jonathan Baker, in which he explains how market concentration can sensibly be used for merger analysis. Send …

Shrinking The Space For Denial: The Impact Of The Icty In Serbia, Diane Orentlicher

Reports

This groundbreaking report published by the Open Society Justice Initiative examines the impact in Serbia of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY).Shrinking the Space for Denial: The Impact of the ICTY in Serbia is the most comprehensive analysis to date of the court's impact in a country directly affected by its work. The report by Diane Orentlicher, professor of international law at American University's Washington College of Law and special counsel to the Justice Initiative, is published in conjunction with the 15th anniversary of the ICTY's founding.The 134-page report provides a detailed look at the ICTY's role …

Prosecuting Sexual Violence In Correctional Settings: Examining Prosecutors’ Perceptions, Brenda V. Smith, Jaime Yarussi

Project on Addressing Prison Rape - Articles

The Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003 (PREA) is the first piece of federal legislation that expressly and exclusively addresses sexual abuse of persons in custody. Notwithstanding passage of the Act, there is a clear belief, echoed by correctional leaders, that prosecutors are reluctant at best, and unwilling at worst, to prosecute cases of sexual violence in correctional settings. In order to gather information on the prosecutor interest in and capacity to prosecute these cases, the National Institute of Corrections Project on Addressing Prison Rape at the Washington College of Law (the NIC/WCL Project) collected data from state and federal …

The Prison Rape Elimination Act: Implementation And Unresolved Issues, Brenda V. Smith

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

In September 2003, the United States Congress unanimously passed the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA). The Act was the culmination of a collaborative effort between human rights, faith-based, and prison rape advocacy. The aim of the Act is to create zero tolerance for prison rape by using a variety of tools or mechanisms including data collection; grants to the states; technical assistance to the states to improve their practices; research; the development of national standards; and the diminution of federal criminal justice assistance to states who fail to comply with the standards. This article aims to provide a brief background …

Tribute To The Honorable Irma Raker Upon Her Retirement, Barlow Burke

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

In this article the author pays tribute to Judge Raker’s pre-law school tour de force citizen testimony in Eger v. Stone, 253 A.2d 372 (Md. 1969), which established the standard for credibility of lay witnesses in zoning cases, acceptance of citizen testimony as establishing the basis for an application’s denial, and acceptance of hearsay in an administrative forum in Maryland.

Judge Raker was a student of the author, who taught a course in modern land law at the Washington College of Law during Judge Raker’s tenure in law school. The article discusses two of Judge Raker’s real estate transaction opinions, …

The Prison Rape Elimination Act: Implementation And Unresolved Issues, Brenda V. Smith

Project on Addressing Prison Rape - Articles

This article aims to provide a brief background of the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA) and the important political forces that shaped its passing, the current status on implementation of the Act, including progress made with each of the tools, and a prediction about issues that will arise in the enactment and implementation of the standards required by PREA.

Digitus Impudicus: The Middle Finger And The Law, Ira Robbins

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

The middle finger is one of the most commonly used insulting gestures in the United States. The finger, which is used to convey a wide range of emotions, is visible on streets and highways, in schools, shopping malls, and sporting events, in courts and execution chambers, in advertisements and on magazine covers, and even on the hallowed floor of the United States Senate. Despite its ubiquity, however, as a number of recent cases demonstrate, those who use the middle finger in public run the risk of being stopped, arrested, prosecuted, fined, and even incarcerated under disorderly conduct or breach of …

Reflections: The Honorable Irma S. Raker – Judge, Teacher, And Role Model, David E. Aaronson

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

This article is a sketch of Judge Irma S. Raker’s career from her days as a law student at Washington College of Law to her distinguished career as a jurist and teacher. Judge Raker’s first legal job was as an Assistant State’s Attorney in Montgomery County, Maryland, where her appointment as the first woman litigator was a milestone in the local legal community. She was appointed in 1980 to serve as a judge on the District Court for Montgomery County and, in 1982, to serve on the Circuit Court for Montgomery County. Judge Raker decided a number of seminal cases, …

Reflections: The Honorable Irma S. Raker – Judge, Teacher, And Role Model, Elizabeth I. Boals

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

This article is a sketch of Judge Irma S. Raker’s career from her days as a law student at Washington College of Law to her distinguished career as a jurist and teacher. Judge Raker’s first legal job was as an Assistant State’s Attorney in Montgomery County, Maryland, where her appointment as the first woman litigator was a milestone in the local legal community. She was appointed in 1980 to serve as a judge on the District Court for Montgomery County and, in 1982, to serve on the Circuit Court for Montgomery County. Judge Raker decided a number of seminal cases, …

Reflections: The Honorable Irma S. Raker – Judge, Teacher, And Role Model, Anthony C. Morella

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

This article is a sketch of Judge Irma S. Raker’s career from her days as a law student at Washington College of Law to her distinguished career as a jurist and teacher. Judge Raker’s first legal job was as an Assistant State’s Attorney in Montgomery County, Maryland, where her appointment as the first woman litigator was a milestone in the local legal community. She was appointed in 1980 to serve as a judge on the District Court for Montgomery County and, in 1982, to serve on the Circuit Court for Montgomery County. Judge Raker decided a number of seminal cases, …

The Role Of Market Definition In Unilateral Effects Analysis And In The Litigation Of Unilateral Effects Cases, Jonathan Baker, Kathryn Fenton, Richard Parker, Daniel Wall, Jeffrey Schmidt

Presentations

The Federal Trade Commission is planning to host a public workshop on February 12, 2008 to examine the application of unilateral effects theory to mergers of firms that sell competing, but differentiated products. ”Unilateral effects” as a formal theory of competitive harm was added to the joint FTC/DOJ Horizontal Merger Guidelines in 1992. The theory recognizes that, in some instances, mergers may create or enhance market power by allowing the merged firm to profitably raise prices, without accommodation of other rival market incumbents. While section 2.2 of the Guidelines explains that unilateral competitive effects can arise in a variety of …

Progressive Lawyering In Politically Depressing Times: Can New Models For Institutional Self-Reform Achieve More Effective Structural Change?, Susan D. Carle

Working Papers

This Essay examines both the promise and the drawbacks of new models of achieving institutional self-reform through voluntary, self-designed processes, such as those undertaken in a case study Susan Sturm presents of the National Science Foundation's (NSF's) ADVANCE initiative, a program designed to encourage universities to make progress in eliminating the severe under-representation of women in academic positions in the sciences.

The promise of such models is multi-faceted. Most important, they offer paths for bringing about institutional reform without extensive management from legislatures or courts. They bring together affected interests to find win-win solutions. Law supports the achievement of consensus …

Complying With The National Institutes Of Health Public Access Policy: Copyright Considerations And Options, Michael Carroll

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

This White Paper is written primarily for policymaking staff in universities and other institutional recipients of NIH support responsible for ensuring compliance with the Public Access Policy. The January 11, 2008, Public Access Policy imposes two new compliance mandates. First, the grantee must ensure proper manuscript submission. The version of the article to be submitted is the final version over which the author has control, which must include all revisions made after peer review. The statutory command directs that the manuscript be submitted to PMC “upon acceptance for publication.” That is, the author’s final manuscript should be submitted to PMC …

Code Of Best Practices In Fair Use For Online Video, Peter A. Jaszi, Patricia Aufderheide

Copyright, Fair Use & Open Access

Until the release of these best practices, anyone uploading a video ran the risk of becoming inadvertently entangled in an industry skirmish, as media companies struggle to keep their programs from circulating on the internet. This document is a code of best practices created by a collaborative team of media scholars and lawyers, to help creators, online providers, copyright holders, and others interested in the making of online video, interpret the copyright doctrine of fair use in online video. The code identifies, among other things, six kinds of unlicensed uses of copyrighted material that may be considered fair, under certain …

The Changing International Business Context And The Challenge It Poses For The Education Of International Business Lawyers, Daniel Bradlow

Working Papers

This article looks at 3 factors affecting international business - increasing transnational business, environment, and human rights - and their implications for both the practice of and education of international business lawyers.