Law Commons^™

Sovereignty, Integration And Tax Avoidance In The European Union: Striking The Proper Balance, Lilian V. Faulhaber

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

As the need to raise revenue becomes more pressing and public opposition to tax avoidance increases, the European Court of Justice has made it more difficult for the twenty-seven Member States of the European Union to prevent tax avoidance and shape fiscal policy. This article introduces the new anti-avoidance doctrine of the European Court of Justice and analyzes it from the perspective of taxpayers, Member States and the European Union legal order as a whole. This doctrine is problematic becasue it has created a legislative vacuum in Europe. No European Union institution has the authority to regulate direct taxation without …

Book Reviews And Libel Proceedings, Lori Fisler Damrosch, Bernard H. Oxman, Richard B. Bilder, David D. Caron

Faculty Scholarship

The American journal of International Law has been informed of the initiation in France of penal proceedings against the editor in chief of the European journal of International Law (EJIL), by virtue of a complaint filed by an author of a book reviewed on a Web site affiliated with the Ejll.1 We share the concerns of other professional societies regarding the potential of such litigation for chilling academic discourse. 2 We also take this opportunity to explain the practice of the AJIL concerning communications from authors who object to book reviews published in our pages, and to state our position …

Louis Henkin: Courage And Convictions, Lori Fisler Damrosch

Faculty Scholarship

Louis Henkin was a man of courage and of convictions. His students at Columbia, who engaged with him inside and outside the classroom during the course of five decades, had many opportunities to learn of his convictions, which were manifest in his teaching, writing and activism. But Henkin would not have spoken in the classroom of his own acts of courage, exemplified by (but not limited to) his combat service in the Second World War, nor would he have drawn attention to other personal virtues. This brief tribute (complementary to others being written by colleagues at Columbia for publication here …

Embedded International Law And The Constitution Abroad, Sarah H. Cleveland

Faculty Scholarship

This Essay explores the role of "embedded" international law in U.S. constitutional interpretation, in the context of extraterritorial application of the Constitution. Traditional U.S. understandings of the Constitution's application abroad were informed by nineteenth-century international law principles of jurisdiction, which largely limited the authority of a sovereign state to its geographic territory. Both international law and constitutional law since have developed significantly away from strictly territorial understandings of governmental authority, however. Modern international law principles of jurisdiction and state responsibility now recognize that states legitimately may exercise power in a number of extraterritorial contexts, and that legal obligations may apply …

The U.S. Experience With Mandatory Copyright Formalities: A Love/Hate Relationship, Jane C. Ginsburg

Faculty Scholarship

Copyright formalities – conditions precedent to the existence or enforcement of copyright, such as provision of information about works of authorship that will put the public on notice as to a work’s protected status and its copyright ownership, or deposit of copies of the work for the national library or other central authority, or local manufacture of copies of works of foreign origin – have performed a variety of functions in US copyright history. Perhaps of most practical importance today, formalities predicate to the existence or enforcement of copyright can serve to shield large copyright owners who routinely comply with …

New Opportunities For Nongovernmental Actors In The International Law Commission, Steve Charnovitz

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

Four years ago, I wrote an essay for the Centennial celebration of the American Journal of International Law on the topic of “Nongovernmental Organizations and International Law.” In the section of that essay where I discussed whether, under international law, states and international organizations have a duty to consult nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), I surveyed some current practices of consultation in international organizations. My invitation to participate in this symposium has presented me an opportunity to revisit those thoughts, to conduct more research, and to update our scholarship on how the ILC processes use input from private actors. My presentation contains …

Al-Bihani, Not So Charming, Cara M. Walsh

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

In June 2008, the Supreme Court extended the Suspension Clause to foreign detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Since then, courts have struggled to define appropriate standards to govern detainee habeas corpus petitions. Until recently, no court questioned the relevance of international law to the development of these standards. But, in January 2010, a D.C. Circuit panel held that international law does not constrain executive detention power. That decision could devastate detainee habeas corpus petitions by preventing courts from examining the heart of the government's own claimed detention authority.

This Note evaluates the proper role of international law during ongoing Guantanamo …

Deconstructing Transnationalism: Conceptualizing Metanationalism As A Putative Model Of Evolving Jurisprudence, Paul Enriquez

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

This Article builds upon Philip C. Jessup's revolutionary scholarship to pave new pathways for interdisciplinary research and expand the normative constitutional framework of universal human problems. To that end, this Article ties American constitutional theory to the new era of international globalization and provides context that facilitates the discussion of racial and ethnic diversity in education from a domestic and international perspective. By arguing for compelling treatment of diversity in elementary and secondary learning institutions, this Article introduces a new theory of constitutional interpretation vis-&-vis international law. This theory, called metanationalism, rejects Harold Koh's theory of transnationalism and demonstrates that …

The Responsibility To Protect And The Decline Of Sovereignty: Free Speech Protection Under International Law, William Magnuson

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

State sovereignty has long held a revered post in international law, but it received a blow in the aftermath of World War II, when the world realized the full extent of atrocities perpetrated by the Nazis on their own citizens. In the postwar period, the idea that individuals possessed rights independent of their own states gained a foothold in world discussions, and a proliferation of human rights treaties guaranteeing fundamental rights followed. These rights were, for the most part, unenforceable, though, and in the 1990s, a number of humanitarian catastrophes (in Kosovo, Rwanda, and Somalia) galvanized the international community to …

Superior Responsibility Of Civilians For International Crimes Committed In Civilian Settings, Yael Ronen

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

This Article examines the notion of superior responsibility of civilians for international crimes committed in civilian settings. The doctrine of superior responsibility grew out of the military doctrine of command responsibility, and its evolution is informed by this origin. Jurisprudence and academic writers emphasize that the doctrine is applicable to civilian superiors of military or paramilitary organizations, but there has never been a detailed analysis of the doctrine's relevance and applicability in civilian settings. The Article argues that the claim that customary international law extends the doctrine of superior responsibility to civilians, let alone in civilian settings, is inaccurate. In …

Private Certification Versus Public Certification In The International Environmental Arena, Patricia A. Moye

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

In recent decades, the world's various fisheries have seen a number of problems, primarily depletion of fish stocks due to overfishing. While the UN has created some soft law, including sustainable fishing standards, to deal with the problem of fisheries depletion, no binding international laws currently exist. Several entities have decided to deal with the problem on their own, through eco-labeling programs. The Marine Stewardship Council, a private entity not directly affiliated with the government of any country, has created such a program. In addition, some governments have created similar programs, including Japan through its Marine Eco-Label Japan program. While …

Legal Techniques For Dealing With Scientific Uncertainty In Environmental Law, Jorge E. Vinuales

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

This Article analyzes how scientific uncertainty is handled in international environmental law. It identifies ten legal techniques used for this purpose (i.e., precautionary reasoning; framework-protocol approach; advisory scientific bodies; law-making by treaty bodies; managerial approaches to compliance; prior informed consent; environmental impact assessment and monitoring; provisional measures; evidence; and facilitated liability) and links them to four different stages of development of environmental regimes (i.e., advocacy, design, implementation, and reparation). These techniques are illustrated by reference to some fifteen environmental treaties and other instruments as well as through a detailed case study focusing on the climate change regime.

Missed Opportunity: Congress's Attempted Response To The World's Demand For The Violence Against Women Act, Brenton T. Culpepper

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

The Supreme Court's decision in U.S. v. Morrison struck down, as a violation of the Commerce Clause, § 13,981 of the Violence Against Women Act, that provided a private right of action for victims of gender-motivated violence to assert against their abusers. However, § 13,981 should have been affirmed as implementing legislation designed to fulfill U.S. obligations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and customary international law. Recognizing § 13,981 as implementing legislation serves as a foundation for the United States to restore itself as a legitimate human rights leader capable of both appreciating its own international …

National And Global Responsibilities For Health, Lawrence O. Gostin, Mark Heywood, Gorik Ooms, Anand Grover, John-Arne Røttingen, Wang Chenguang

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Preventable and treatable injuries and diseases are overwhelming sub-Saharan Africa, the Indian subcontinent, and other impoverished areas of the world. Why are health outcomes among the world’s poor so dire after the first decade of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and despite a quadrupling of international health assistance over the past two decades? We believe that this dynamic can change by establishing clearer understandings of, and forging consensus around and governance structures to support, national and global responsibilities to improve global health.

With the goal of a new post-MDG global health paradigm, we are establishing the Joint Action and Learning …

Opting Out Of The Law Of War: Comments On 'Withdrawing From International Custom', David Luban

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This paper is a response to Curtis A. Bradley & Mitu Gulati, Withdrawing from International Custom, 120 Yale LJ 202 (2010), which argues against the "Mandatory View" (according to which states are bound by customary international law with no possibility of opting out), and in favor of a "Default View" which permits states to opt out of international custom unilaterally. My response offers the following arguments: (1) Currently, the most significant contested issue about customary international law in U.S. discourse concerns the laws of war -- a topic that Bradley and Gulati treat only briefly and incidentally. Their proposal would …

Beyond Compliance: Rethinking Why International Law Really Matters, Robert Howse, Ruti G. Teitel

Articles & Chapters

The conceptual, and more recently empirical, study of compliance has become a central preoccupation, and perhaps the fastest growing sub-field, in international legal scholarship. The authors seek to put in question this trend. They argue that looking at the aspirations of international law through the lens of rule-compliance leads to inadequate scrutiny and understanding of the diverse complex purposes and projects that multiple actors impose and transpose on international legality, and especially a tendency to oversimplify if not distort the relation of international law to politics. Citing a range of examples from different areas of internationallaw-ranging widely from international trade …

Human Rights For Hedgehogs?: Global Value Pluralism, International Law, And Some Reservations Of The Fox, Robert D. Sloane

Faculty Scholarship

This essay, a contribution to the Boston University Law Review’s symposium on Ronald Dworkin’s forthcoming book, Justice for Hedgehogs, critiques the manuscript’s account of international human rights on five grounds. First, it is vague: it fails to offer much if any guidance relative to many of the most difficult concrete issues that arise in the field of international human rights law and policy - precisely the circumstances in which international lawyers might benefit from the guidance that moral foundations supposedly promise. It is also troubling, and puzzling given Dworkin’s well-known commitment to the right-answer thesis, that his account of human …

Introductory Note To The United States Supreme Court: Graham V. Florida & The Federal Court Of Australia: Habib V. Australia, Chris Jenks

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

This introductory note considers two different and completely unrelated cases: Graham, a U.S. Supreme Court criminal case on the cruel and unusual punishment clause of the U.S. Constitution and Habib, an Australian civil case involving a former Guantanamo Bay detainee. This note focuses on one aspect of the disparate nature of the cases, starkly contrasting judicial attitudes towards the role of “foreign law” in domestic jurisprudence. Juxtaposed, the two cases offer an interesting view of not only the obvious differences between the U.S. inward and the Australian outward looking judicial philosophies, but perhaps a broader sense of how the two …

Prospective Parents And The Children's Rights Convention, Carter Dillard

American University International Law Review

This Article addresses the novel question of whether states parties can successfully implement the Children’s Rights Convention by placing legal obligations on prospective parents, thereby influencing not just a child’s environment, but also the procreation of that child. First, the Article takes a unique version of the child-centered perspective, one that recognizes that as we move back in time in the direction of and even before a child’s birth, our obligations to the child grow because our actions become ever more influential. The perspective also takes into account current moral theories of parental obligation to prospective children. The Article then …

The Internationalization Of Law: The “Complex” Case Of Bank Regulation, Lawrence G. Baxter

Faculty Scholarship

International bank regulation has ramped to prominence over the past two decades, as nations and the global economy have lurched from one financial crisis to another. The current global financial crisis has brought unprecedented general attention to the subject. It is possible that we will witness fundamental changes in the way nations cooperate in the regulation of their financial institutions. Major reform efforts are underway. Yet international bank regulation has unusual characteristics and does not fit easily within the traditional framework of international law. The emerging system is also extremely fluid and complex-matching an extremely fluid and complex system of …

International Soft Law, Andrew T. Guzman, Timothy L. Meyer

Faculty Scholarship

Although the concept of soft law has existed for years, scholars have not reached consensus on why states use soft law or even whether “soft law” is a coherent analytic category. In part, this confusion reflects a deep diversity in both the types of international agreements and the strategic situations that produce them. In this paper, we advance four complementary explanations for why states use soft law that describe a much broader range of state behavior than has been previously explained.

First, and least significantly, states may use soft law to solve straightforward coordination games in which the existence of …

Enforcing International Corrupt Practices Law, Paul D. Carrington

Faculty Scholarship

This Essay strives to advance the current international movement to
deter the transnational corrupt practices that have long burdened the global economy and weakened governments, especially in “developing” nations. Laws made in the last decade to address this longstanding global problem have not been effectively enforced. Described here are the moderately successful efforts in the United States since 1862 to reward private citizens serving as enforcers of laws prohibiting corrupt practices. It is suggested that this American experience might be adapted by international organizations to enhance enforcement of the new public international laws.

Unsex Cedaw: What's Wrong With "Women's Rights", Darren Rosenblum

International & Comparative Law Colloquium Papers

Although the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (“CEDAW” or the “Convention”) has succeeded in some respects, even its supporters acknowledge broad failures. CEDAW’s weakness draws on the titular mistaken diagnosis: “women” are not the issue&#;gender disparities are. The 1970’s drafting of CEDAW focused on bringing women to their place at the international law table. What’s wrong with women’s rights? In the international context, CEDAW attempts to empower women but fails to respect other gender inequality. As the preeminent treaty on gender inequality, CEDAW cannot succeed in creating gender equality if its scope remains limited …

Accountability For Property Crimes And Environmental War Crimes: Prosecution, Litigation, And Development, Mark A. Drumbl

Scholarly Articles

None available.

The Dragon In The Room: China's Anti-Monopoly Law And International Merger Review, Christopher Hamp-Lyons

Vanderbilt Law Review

In a world where mergers affect every corner of the planet, any government seeking competitive markets has an interest in ensuring that these mergers are not harmful to competition. As China, the world's most populous country, has committed to a market economy, it has now taken the momentous step of enacting its own Anti- Monopoly Law ("AML"). This effects a dramatic change in the antitrust regulation of multinational mergers. In international antitrust, even subtle legal differences between jurisdictions create significant potential for conflict. For this reason, the advent of antitrust merger review by a country with such massive international economic …

Norm Conflict In International Law: Whither Human Rights?, Marko Milanovic

Duke Journal of Comparative & International Law

No abstract provided.

Constitutions, International Law, And The Settlement Function Of Law: A Schema For Further Reflection, Larry Alexander

San Diego International Law Journal

Imagine a community living in a defined geographical area. Its members generally believe that their actions should be guided by moral norms, and they generally comply with those norms as they understand them. And, from our external vantage point, we believe that they are indeed subject to moral norms and should comply with them, both in dealing with each other and with those outside their community....

Application Of Non-Implemented International Law By The Federal Court Of Appeal: Towards A Symbolic Effect Of S. 3(3)(F) Of The Irpa?, France Houle, Noura Karazivan

Dalhousie Law Journal

Since 1999, the Supreme Court has explored the linkages between domestic statutes and international norms and values and has slowly developed the basic principles underlying a new mechanism of relevancy that the authors call harmonization of domestic law with international law The authors analyze this development in PartI of the present article. In Part II, they study the application of this harmonization mechanism in the field of Canadian immigration law Of, particular importance in the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act is s. 3(3)(f), for it directs judges to construe and apply the IRPA in a manner that "complies with international …

The Continental Shelf Beyond 200 Nautical Miles, Vladimir Jares

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

As policymakers, academia, and the media have paid increased attention to the Arctic region, there is more evidence of a certain lack of knowledge concerning the applicable international law.

The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea of December 10, 1982--adopted in 1982 and in force since November 16, 1994--provides both a legal framework within which all activities in oceans and seas must be carried out and, as far as the seabed of the Arctic Ocean international law is concerned, answers to questions related to its legal status and applicable regulations.

If a coastal State wishes to delineate …

The Fog Of Certainty, Robert B. Ahdieh

Faculty Scholarship

In a recent essay in the Yale Law Journal, constitutional law scholar Michael Stokes Paulsen argues that “[t]he force of international law, as a body of law, upon the United States is . . . largely an illusion.” Rather than law, he suggests, international law is mere “policy and politics.”

For all the certainty with which this argument is advanced, it cannot survive close scrutiny. At its foundation, Professor Paulsen’s essay rests on a pair of fundamental misconceptions of the nature of law. Law is not reduced to mere policy, to begin, simply because it can be undone. Were that …