International Law Commons^™

Reforming Wto Discipline On Export Duties: Sovereignty Over Natural Resources, Economic Development And Environmental Protection, Julia Ya Qin

Law Faculty Research Publications

The current World Trade Organization (WTO) regime on export restraints comprises two extremes: at one end is the near-complete freedom to levy export duties enjoyed by most Members, which renders theWTO discipline on export restrictions largely ineffective; at the other end, the rigid obligations imposed on several acceding Members prohibiting the use of export duties for any purpose.The recent WTO ruling in China-Raw Materials has only solidified the latter extreme. This article seeks to expose the irrationality of the current regime, especially the problems created by the rigid obligations of the several acceding Members. It contends that such obligations deprive …

An International Treaty For Animal Welfare, David Favre

Animal Law Review

Currently there is no international agreement that ensures the welfare and protection of animals. Nor is there any international standard that regulates and defines the acceptable treatment of animals. This lack of international consensus leads to the current disparate treatment of animals around the world, echoing the need for an international framework addressing the issue. This Article discusses a proposed umbrella treaty, the International Convention for the Protection of Animals (ICPA). This umbrella treaty would enable animal welfare issues to gain international recognition and protection by setting the general guidelines and polices regarding the treatment and use of animals. This …

Overcoming Our Global Disability In The Workforce: Mediating The Dream, Elayne E. Greenberg

Faculty Publications

The unparalleled global support for the 2008 United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities ("CRPD") highlights the global schism between the public extolling of human rights for individuals with disabilities and the private castigating of such individuals in their daily lives and in the workforce. The CRPD explicitly mandates that work is a right accorded to individuals with disabilities, and global employers are now being challenged to implement that right. Yet, in order to ensure meaningful, universal compliance with its directives, the CRPD imposes affirmative duties on Supporting States to develop a customized, workable plan that effectively …

Preventing Mass Atrocity Crimes: The Responsibility To Protect And The Syria Crisis, Paul Williams, J. Trevor Ulbrick, Jonathan Worboys

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

The Responsibility to Protect (R2P) is a complicated and "emerging norm"' of international law that seeks to provide a means for the international community to prevent mass atrocity crimes occurring within the boundaries of a sovereign state.' Since its emergence in 2001, in the wake of humanitarian tragedies in Bosnia, Rwanda, Kosovo, and Darfur, R2P has been hailed as a way of resolving what one commentator called the "problem from hell."3 Under R2P, however, the use of force is reserved for actions within the UN Charter's Chapter VII framework. As the Syria crisis has demonstrated, this position continues to hinder …

Navigating Eu Law And The Law Of International Arbitration, George A. Bermann

Faculty Scholarship

The European Union and international arbitration are two robust legal regimes that have managed to develop largely in accordance with their own respective “first principles,” and they have accordingly thrived. This article initially explains why that has been the case.

But the era of parallelism between the regimes has ended, and rather suddenly. This article identifies the two principal fronts on which tensions between EU law and international arbitration law have emerged. Interestingly, both commercial and investment arbitration are implicated.

A first front entails a conflict between the European Court of Justice's (ECJ's) expansive notions of EU public policy and …

Is Europe Headed Down The Primrose Path With Mandatory Mediation, Jacqueline Nolan-Haley

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Memo To The Sec On The Proposed Rule On Disclosure Of Payments By Resource Extraction Issuers, Perrine Toledano

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Staff Publications

CCSI strongly supports the transparency of contracts and tax flows. CCSI shares the belief of many stakeholders that transparency is essential to leverage extractive industries for sustainable development and is in the mutual interest of all stakeholders. However, some industry players continue to voice the concern that increased transparency would be harmful for their business. Therefore, CCSI is working to also establish the business case for transparency.

In one such case, some industry players have been lobbying against the regulations developed by the Security and Exchange Commission to implement the mandatory disclosure provisions of the Dodd Frank Wall Street Reform …

Wider Role For Our Miners In Africa, Lisa E. Sachs, Joel Negin, Glenn Denning

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Staff Publications

The Australian government is rapidly increasing aid to Africa. But the real story about the country's engagement in Africa is the massive investment by Australian companies in extractive industries.

More than 150 Australian resource companies are active in more than 40 African countries with a total investment greater than $20 billion, including in coal in Mozambique, copper and uranium in Zambia, gold in Eritrea and uranium in Malawi.

Attribution Of Criminal Liability A Critical Comparison Of The Us Doctrine Of Conspiracy And The Icty Doctrine Of Joint Criminal Enterprise From An American Perspective, Mark A. Summers

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Non-State Actors From The Perspective Of The Policy-Oriented School: Power, Law, Actors And The View From New Haven, Anthony A. D'Amato

Faculty Working Papers

Law needs Power for enforcement of its rules; Power utilizes Law for creating conditions of stability that enhance its salience. Yet when the New Haven school tries to include international law in its power-oriented view of international relations, it ends up with a misleading two-dimensional descriptivism.

Guy Lancaster On Genocide: A Normative Account. By Larry May. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2010. 283 Pp., Guy Lancaster

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

Genocide: A Normative Account. By Larry May. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2010. 283 pp.

Donald W. Jackson On Prisoners Of America’S Wars: From The Early Republic To Guantanamo. By Stephanie Carvin. New York: Columbia University Press, 2010. 336pp., Donald W. Jackson

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

Prisoners of America’s Wars: From the Early Republic to Guantanamo. By Stephanie Carvin. New York: Columbia University Press, 2010. 336pp.

Defining International Law Librarianship In An Age Of Multiplicity, Knowledge, And Open Access To Law, Richard A. Danner

Faculty Scholarship

Many law librarians are experts in international law and legal research. The concept of ‘international law librarianship’, however, encompasses something more than a field of study in which a group of experts practise their profession. In the broader sense, the idea suggests a common calling, similar interests, and goals shared by librarians with a range of specialties beyond international law, working in all types of law libraries. What commonalities create and sustain the concept of international law librarianship? This paper suggests that they can be found in: law librarians’ common need to respond to the ‘multiplicity’ of information sources facing …

Investment Promotion Agencies And Sustainable Fdi: Moving Toward The Fourth Generation Of Investment Promotion, Columbia Center On Sustainable Investment, World Association Of Investment Promotion Agencies

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Staff Publications

In April and May 2010, CCSI supported WAIPA to conduct its annual survey. This report, Investment Promotion Agencies and Sustainable FDI: Moving toward the Fourth Generation of Investment Promotion, benchmarks the responses of IPAs regarding sustainable FDI and its four dimensions (economic development, environmental sustainability, social development, governance) and finds, among other things, that these are unevenly addressed by investment promotion strategies and investment incentives. The report also draws attention to the desirability of attracting sustainable FDI, rather than focusing on volume of investment alone.

In 2017, CCSI also helped the World Association of Investment Promotion Agencies (WAIPA) to conduct …

The Americanization Of Constitutional Law And Its Paradoxes: Constitutional Theory And Constitutional Jurisdiction In The Contemporary World, Luis Roberto Barroso

ILSA Journal of International & Comparative Law

Contemporary democracies-both long-standing and recently- established-follow a standard that was established in the United States over the past two hundred years.

International Organization Reform Or Impunity? Immunity Is The Problem, Great L. Rios, Edward P. Flaherty

ILSA Journal of International & Comparative Law

'No one can read the significant Supreme Court cases on sovereign immunity... without concluding that the field is a mass of confusion; and if he ventures beyond that to attempt some reconciliation of the courts of appeals decisions, he will find confusion compounded." '

Edzia Carvalho On Human Rights: Politics And Practice. Edited By Michael Goodhart. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009. 455pp., Edzia Carvalho

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

Human Rights: Politics and Practice. Edited by Michael Goodhart. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009. 455pp.

Establishing Governmental Legitimacy In Iraq: The Path To Protecting Human Rights, Matt Mines

Human Rights & Human Welfare

Rule of law is essential for ensuring the protection of human rights in post-conflict societies. Contention and disagreements, however, often arise regarding the best ways to establish rule of law in a reconstructive state. It is a vital prerequisite to rule of law that a government be viewed as legitimate. Following an armed conflict, the restoration of basic services and infrastructure is essential for instilling confidence that the government is legitimate and is capable of providing for the needs of the local populace. The essential services include water, electricity, and security on a consistent basis. In order to ensure ongoing …

The Challenge Of Interpreting 'Wto-Plus' Provisions, Julia Ya Qin

Law Faculty Research Publications

This paper seeks to address special interpretive issues raised by the China Accession Protocol, focusing on provisions that prescribe more stringent rules for China than generally applicable WTO disciplines. These ‘WTO-plus’ provisions have already been involved in several WTO disputes. In the light of these disputes, the paper analyzes the interpretive challenge presented by the Protocol and suggests that, to meet the challenge, WTO adjudicators need to embrace a more holistic and systemic interpretive approach. The paper then proposes three working principles that may help to interpret the WTO-plus provisions of the Protocol in a coherent and systematic manner.

The Unconscionable Health Gap: A Global Plan For Justice, Lawrence O. Gostin

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

International norms recognize the special value of health. The WHO Constitution states that “the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of health” is a fundamental human right. The right to health, moreover, is a treaty obligation with clear obligations. Despite robust international norms, unconscionable health disparities exist between the world’s rich and poor, causing enormous suffering. The WHO urges “closing the health gap in a generation” through action on the social determinants of health. As the Marmot Commission observed: “the social conditions in which people are born, live, and work are the single most important determinant of good or ill …

Elusive Equality: The Armenian Genocide And The Failure Of Ottoman Legal Reform, Mark L. Movsesian

Faculty Publications

I would like to thank the organizers for inviting me to deliver some remarks this morning. By way of background, I am not a historian or genocide scholar, but a law professor with an interest in comparative law and religion. Comparative law and religion is a relatively new field. It explores how different legal regimes reflect, and influence, the relationships that religious communities have with the state and with each other. My recent work compares Islamic and Christian conceptions of law, a subject that has engaged Muslims and Christians since their first encounters in the seventh century.

When I approach …

From Kosovo To Catalonia: Separatism And Integration In Europe, Christopher J. Borgen

Faculty Publications

In July 2010 the International Court of Justice rendered its Advisory Opinion on the legality of Kosovo's declaration of independence and the Constitutional Court of Spain rendered an opinion concerning the autonomy of Catalonia. Two very different cases, from very different places, decided by very different courts. Nonetheless, they each provide insights on the issue of separatism in the midst of European integration. Does the Kosovo opinion open the door for other separatist groups? Does the process of European integration increase or undercut separatism? In addressing these questions, this article proceeds in three main parts. Part A briefly recaps the …

Redressing The Unconscionable Health Gap: A Global Plan For Justice, Lawrence O. Gostin

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Consider two children—one born in sub-Saharan Africa and the other in the United States. The African child is twenty-five times more likely to die in the first five years of life; if she lives to child-bearing age, she is a two hundred times more likely to die in labor; and overall, she will die thirty years earlier than the American child. The international community is deeply resistant to taking bold remedial action—more concerned with their geostrategic interests than the health of the poor. The scale of foreign aid is both insufficient and unsustainable and fails to address the key determinants …

Sexual Rights And State Governance, Katherine M. Franke

Faculty Scholarship

We sit at an interesting juncture in the evolution (in some cases, devolution) of the idea of sexual rights in international law. For at the very moment that we are experiencing a retraction in both domestic and international commitments to rights associated with sexual and reproductive health, we see sexual rights of a less-reproductive nature gaining greater uptake and acceptance. It is the moral hazard associated with perceived gains in the domain of international rights for lesbians and gay men that I want to address today. In the end, the point I want to bring home is that a particular …

Handbook For Promoting Foreign Direct Investment In Medium-Size, Low-Budget Cities In Emerging Markets, Vale Columbia Center On Sustainable International Investment, Millennium Cities Initiative

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Books

In November 2009, the Vale Columbia Center on Sustainable International Investment and the Millennium Cities Initiative (MCI) released the Handbook for Promoting Foreign Direct Investment in Medium-size, Low-Budget Cities in Emerging Markets. With foreign direct investment (FDI) flows declining worldwide by an estimated 40-50% this year (following a decline of over 10% in 2008), investment promotion has become more important than ever: in a highly competitive world FDI market, promotion can make all the difference.

Investment promotion is particularly important for cities other than capital cities, as investors in manufacturing and services often locate primarily in a country’s capital …

Bilateral Investment Treaties And Fdi Flows, Lisa E. Sachs

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Staff Publications

Given that one of the principal purposes of bilateral investment treaties (BITs) is to help countries attract investment flows (by protecting investments), it is only natural that the question has been raised whether they do, in fact, lead to higher investment flows. The main studies on this topic from the past decade are collected in The Effect of Treaties on Foreign Direct Investment: Bilateral Investment Treaties, Double Taxation Treaties, and Investment Flows (Oxford University Press, 2009), a volume I edited with Karl P. Sauvant.

Measuring State Compliance With The Right To Education Using Indicators: A Case Study Of Colombia’S Obligations Under The Icescr, Sital Kalantry, Jocelyn Getgen, Steven A. Koh

Cornell Law Faculty Working Papers

The right to education is often referred to as a “multiplier right” because its enjoyment enhances other human rights. It is enumerated in several international instruments, but it is codified in greatest detail in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR). Despite its importance, the right to education has received limited attention from scholars, practitioners, and international and regional human rights bodies as compared to other economic, social and cultural rights (ECSRs). In this Article, we propose a methodology that utilizes indicators to measure treaty compliance with the right to education. Indicators are essential to measuring compliance …

Universal Jurisdiction And The Case Of Belgium: A Critucal Assessment, Roozbeh (Rudy) B. Baker

ILSA Journal of International & Comparative Law

Praised in some quarters as a useful tool for bringing criminal perpetrators to justice, criticized by others as a threat to state sovereignty, universal jurisdiction has certainly emerged as a heated topic within international criminal law.

Sanctions And International Law (Keynote Address), W. Michael Reisman

Intercultural Human Rights Law Review

Keynote Address by W. Michael Reisman, Myres S. McDougal Professor of International Law at Yale Law School, for the 2008 Intercultural Human Rights Law Review Annual Symposium.

Custom As A Source Of Law: Argentinean And Comparative Legal Systems, German Savastano

ILSA Journal of International & Comparative Law

The purpose of this article is to reflect on custom as a source of law in the Argentinean and comparative legal systems.