International Trade Law Commons^™

International Economic Agreements As Impediments To Carbon Tax Climate Change Mitigation: Is The Un Framework Tax Convention The Way Forward?, Edwin Vanderbruggen

Indian Journal of International Economic Law

This article outlines some of the international legal impediments to domestic environmental tax policies in furtherance of climate change mitigation, i.e. certain WTO rules on trade in goods, fuel tax exemptions in aviation treaties, and tax stabilisation provisions that are protected under the umbrella clause of investment treaties. It argues that international action is the most effective and often the only option to address those legal obstacles. The emergence of the United Nations Framework Convention on International Tax Cooperation (‘FTC’) is, in that regard, a timely development. Given the central institutional role UN-related bodies already have in climate change, sea …

Mapping Human Rights Obligations In Investment Treaty Arbitration: Decoupling By Tribunals, Animesh Das

Indian Journal of International Economic Law

The progressive approach of investment arbitration tribunals in some recent cases represents a gradual development in reconciling human rights law and international investment law. This position finds support in recent scholarly literature, through analyses of cases such as Urbaser, Bear Creek Mining and David Aven. What if the reality is otherwise? For decades, investment arbitral tribunals have maintained a grey area governing the relationship between human rights law and international investment law. The institutional caution has resulted in the decoupling of these two normative orders. Consequently, investment treaty arbitrations face a legitimacy deficit in their ability to uphold human rights …

Copyright And Research In Latin America: Law, Courts, And Perceptions, Mariana G. Valente, Alice P. Lana, André P. Houang

Joint PIJIP/TLS Research Paper Series

Research on the intersection of copyright law, research activities, and innovation in Latin America reveals significant deficiencies in the legal framework and public discourse surrounding copyright limitations and exceptions (L&Es) for research purposes. The problem is more visible with modern data assembling and analyzing techniques, such as through artificial intelligence (AI) systems. This study highlights the scarcity of explicit provisions for research-related exceptions in the region by examining copyright legislation, case law, and stakeholder perspectives in six Latin American countries. Despite indications that judicial interpretation is expanding the scope of L&Es, particularly in Brazil, awareness of legal nuances remains low …

Preventing The Importation And Sale Of Genuine Goods Bearing American-Owned Trademarks: Protecting An American Goodwill, Timothy H. Hiebert

Maine Law Review

A trademark's "primary and proper function," it has been said, "is to identify the origin or ownership of the article to which it is affixed." Thus, if a trademark indicates either the original producer or an exclusive distributor as the source of the goods on which it appears, it will be entitled to protection against infringement. Related to this source identification function are a trademark's quality assurance and advertising functions. Because the public comes to associate trademarked goods with a certain standard of quality, a trademark guarantees that the goods on which it appears will meet public expectations about quality. …

Human Capital Disclosure & Corporate Governance: The New Evidence, George S. Georgiev

Articles

This Article explores the evolution of human capital disclosure-firm-supplied information about various workforce-related matters-as a factor in contemporary corporate governance. Regulatory and nonregulatory developments from recent years have upended longstanding practices and generated extensive new evidence. Most notably, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) adopted a human capital management ("HCM") disclosure mandate in 2020, which, though long overdue, was criticized from the outset for its modest scope and lax design. In the meantime, courts have taken a renewed interest in board of directors' oversight responsibilities in a number of areas, including HCM, while labor's power has unexpectedly increased in some …

New Approaches And Challenges Regarding Trade, Climate Action, And The Wto, Sunayana Sasmal

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment

This report considers how the WTO, as an institution and its rules, can and should be a game-changer in undertaking climate action and the green energy transition globally. By leveraging its toolkit, the WTO has the potential to drive climate action, from regulating border carbon adjustments to promoting trade in green products, green electricity, and dissemination of climate technologies. However, unlocking this potential requires legal reforms, a proactive institutional role, and strong political will from WTO members.

Make America Healthy: Reducing High Pharmaceutical Prices Without Reducing Innovation, Srividhya Ragavan

Faculty Scholarship

Cost of medication in the United States has historically remained one of the highest in the world. The conundrum that the United States has faced in balancing innovation with affordability of life-saving medications is palpable, especially when faced with the reality of patent monopolies conflicting with healthcare obligations. The result is an overflow of issues, which emphasize the need to delineate limits on innovation to balance pharmaceutical novelty with robust public health within the United States. This has increasingly shifted the focus of patent law into the realm of healthcare issues. Naturally, it leads to an inquiry about how best …

Intellectual Property, Global Inequality, And Subnational Policy Variations, Peter K. Yu

Faculty Scholarship

This chapter criticizes the oversimplification of the binary North–South debate on intellectual property, innovation, and global inequality and highlights the wide geographic, sectoral, and income inequalities within middle-income countries. It begins by explaining why the arrival of these countries has called into question the North–South debate. The chapter then moves from the widely studied subject of global inequality to the underexplored topic of national inequality. Focusing on the intellectual property context, the discussion highlights the considerable subnational variations in the economic and technological conditions of middle-income countries. To combat national inequality, this chapter concludes by recommending interventions in three areas: …

Introduction To Intellectual Property, Innovation And Economic Inequality, Daniel Benoliel, Peter K. Yu

Faculty Scholarship

This chapter provides an introduction to Intellectual Property, Innovation and Economic Inequality. It begins by discussing the problem of economic inequality, including the scale of that problem, types of economic inequality, and extant research on such inequality. The chapter then outlines the structure of this volume, which is divided into three parts: (1) theoretical, empirical, and policy issues; (2) intellectual property and national inequality; and (3) intellectual property and global inequality.

Intellectual Property, Innovation And Economic Inequality, Daniel Benoliel, Peter K. Yu, Francis Gurry, Keun Lee

Faculty Scholarship

While growing disparities in wealth and income are well-documented across the globe, the role of intellectual property rights is often overlooked. This volume brings together leading commentators from around the world to interrogate the interrelationship between intellectual property and economic inequality. Interdisciplinary and globally oriented by design, the book features economists, legal scholars, policy analysts, and other experts. Chapters address the impact of intellectual property rights on economic inequality, the effect of economic inequality on the protection and enforcement of these rights, and the potential use of innovation law and policy to help reduce economic inequality. The volume also tackles …

China, The Trips Waiver, And The Global Pandemic Response, Peter K. Yu

Faculty Scholarship

This chapter identifies three distinct reasons why China took a middle-of-the-road position in the debate on the COVID-19 TRIPS waiver at the WTO. It also recounts the country’s more assertive position in the run-up to the adoption of the Ministerial Decision on the waiver. Drawing eight lessons from the international debate on the waiver and the subsequent Ministerial Decision, the chapter offers insights into the future role China can or will play in future international policy debates at the intersection of intellectual property and public health, including during the next pandemic.

Between Hope And Despair: The Misery Of International Law – Confrontations With Injustice In The Global Economy, Kanad Bagchi

Indian Journal of International Economic Law

No abstract provided.

Time To Stop Trip-Ing: The World Needs A New Geographical Indications Agreement, Evan Glatt

Brooklyn Journal of International Law

When it comes to purchasing food and alcohol, a product’s name carries weight and helps consumers make decisions. When the product’s name includes a place and establishes a certain level of quality and expectation, consumers trust that the product is what it purports to be. This concept, the reputation of a particular food product by name, is known as a geographical indication (GI). GIs cover a wide range of products, from the well-known champagne to lesser known products such as Roquefort cheese. GIs create financial value for local producers, contribute to sustainability initiatives, and raise the quality of goods for …

A New Governance Framework In Cross-Border Tax Policymaking, Tamir Shanan, Doron Narotzki, Noam Zamir

Brooklyn Journal of Corporate, Financial & Commercial Law

The first tax treaty can probably be traced to the end of the 19th century: the treaty between the Swiss Federal Council (on behalf of the Canton of Vaud) and Great Britain. However, most tax scholars refer to the period following World War I, including the work of the League of Nations, as the formative period in which the international tax regime was founded. In the 1920s, the League of Nations formed a committee of four renowned economists that was asked to formulate a set of rules that would assist states in allocating taxing rights of cross-border income and gains …

How The European Union Should Respond To Trump's Tariffs, Ignacio García Bercero, Petros C. Mavroidis, André Sapir

Faculty Scholarship

President-elect Trump has threatened to increase United States tariffs to 60 percent on imports from China and 10 percent to 20 percent on imports from other trading partners, including the European Union. In doing so the US would be ignoring its World Trade Organisation commitments and would also rollback the substantial liberalisation that has taken place during the past 80 years, with a potentially major negative impact on the world economy.

In response to this threat, the EU should pursue a three-pronged strategy.

First, the EU should engage bilaterally with the US to seek to avoid the imposition of tariffs. …

The Compatibility Of The Substance Over Form Doctrine With Tax And Investment Treaties: A Case Study Of Lone Star V The Republic Of Korea, Blazej Kuzniacki

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

In late August 2022, the Lone Star tribunal concluded one of the latest awards in tax-related investment treaty disputes (the tax-related claims account for almost USD 1.5 billion of the total of almost USD 4.7 billion claimed in compensation). It also is the first award in which the tribunal dealt with the application of the substance over form doctrine (SOFD) by tax authorities and courts of the host state to prevent the abuse of a double tax treaty (DTT), and the impact of the refusal to accord the claimants the benefits under the DTT via a domestic (Korean) SOFD on …

Disputing Personal Data In The Eu-China Comprehensive Agreement On Investment, Mark Mclaughlin

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

This chapter analyses the emerging data realms in China and the European Union against the backdrop of the Comprehensive Agreement on Investment (CAI). It examines the link between data protection and investment flows and undertakes a comparative analysis of the PIPL and GDPR. Moreover, this chapter will also analyse the Digital Silk Road in promoting China’s model of data sovereignty. While early trade and investment agreements did not consider data relevant for the regulation of cross-border commerce, modern treaties are increasingly cognisant of rules for data protection. As such, the data-related provisions of the CAI will be placed in the …

The Akwesasne Black Hole: America’S Hidden Border Crisis, Anthony Puntasecca

University of Miami Inter-American Law Review

No abstract provided.

Kei Briefing Note 2024:8 The Basic Proposal For The Design Law Treaty (Dlt) And Its Inappropriate Restrictions On Transparency, James Love

Joint PIJIP/TLS Research Paper Series

The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) is holding a diplomatic conference from November 11 to 22, 2024 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, to conclude and adopt a Design Law Treaty (DLT). The negotiators will be working from the documents dated May 10, 2024: a thirty-one page “Basic Proposal For The Design Law Treaty” (DLT/DC/3), and a sixteen page “Basic Proposal For The Regulations Under The Design Law Treaty” (DLT/DC/4), both documents submitted by the Director General of WIPO, as well as a nineteen page, “Notes On The Basic Proposal For The Design Law Treaty” (DTL/DC/5), prepared by the WIPO Secretariat.

While …

The Fair Use/Fair Dealing Handbook, Jonathan Band, Jonathan Gerafi

Joint PIJIP/TLS Research Paper Series

More than 40 countries with over one-third of the world’s population have fair use or fair dealing provisions in their copyright laws. These countries are in all regions of the world and at all levels of development. The broad diffusion of fair use and fair dealing indicates that there is no basis for preventing the more widespread adoption of these doctrines, with the benefits their flexibility brings to authors, publishers, consumers, technology companies, libraries, museums, educational institutions, and governments. This is particularly the case considering that the copyright laws in many “civil law” countries currently allow their courts to apply …

Breaking The Chains: Lessons Learned From Anti-Slave Labor Laws And Their Applicability To Proposed Expansions To The Uflpa, Kaitlin Danielle Chang

William & Mary Business Law Review

With global trade growing every day and more products being imported from foreign countries, responsible sourcing of products is more important now than ever. Irresponsible importation of goods can lead to countries like the United States supporting human rights abuses abroad by allowing goods made with forced labor into their domestic markets. The Uyghur Forced Labor Protection Act (UFLPA) has empowered the United States’ Customs and Border Protection to hinder the flow of goods made with Uyghur forced labor into the United States, but it has not been completely successful in preventing these goods from being sold in the United …

A Critical Examination Of "Decoupling": An Introduction, Dongsheng Zang, Miles Lee

Washington International Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Japan's Response To The Trade Conflict Between The United States And China, Rikako Watai

Washington International Law Journal

Abstract: Decoupling refers to the strategy of separating and disconnecting economies and markets between different nations. However, in the contest of the ongoing trade conflict between the United States and China, decoupling primarily refers to determining economic dependence on a specific nation as a national security risk, thereby reinforcing vulnerabilities in one’s supply chain. Japan views the United States as its primary partner in national security policy and China as a significant market because of its geographic proximity. As a result, ensuring economic security became a pressing concern for Japan.

Japan refers to the United States’ idea of economic …

Is India The "New China" In U.S. Foreign Policy?, Sital Kalantry

Washington International Law Journal

Abstract: The University of Washington International Law Journal’s timely symposium explores the strains in the U.S.-China political and economic relationship. As China and the United States become estranged, or “decoupled,” this essay explores the United States’ relationship with India in light of this trend. The U.S.-India foreign relations are stronger today than they have been in India’s 75-year history as an independent nation.[1] To understand why this is the case, we have to examine both the U.S. and Indian foreign policy perspectives. The United States’ interest in India has grown in part due to the United States’ own …

Bidenomics Versus Maganomics: Pick Your Poison, Thomas Schoenbaum

Washington International Law Journal

Abstract: This essay compares the international trade policies of the two candidates for U.S. President in 2024, Joseph Biden[1] and Donald Trump, and argues in favor of a “third way” alternative to promote free trade in 2025 and onward. I first analyze the trade law revolution effected by the Trump presidency from 2017-2021. During these years the Trump administration adopted a protectionist policy rooted in nationalism and populism. As a direct result of Trump administration trade policy there occurred: (1) a significant retreat from globalization; (2) paralysis of the World Trade Organization; (3) a revival of U.S. unilateralism …

Decoupling Defined: Four Theories And Four Illustrations From The Sino-American Trade War, Raj Bhala

Washington International Law Journal

Abstract: This article seeks to bring clarity to a much used, yet ill-defined, term “decoupling.” The article explores the theory and practice of “decoupling” in the context of the Sino-American Trade War, which, launched in March 2018, shows no sign of a ceasefire. As to theory, this article argues that conceptually, “decoupling” takes (at least) four forms. There is efficiency, jurisprudential, security, and values decoupling. As to practice, this article shows these four theoretical typologies of decoupling are obvious today. This theory and practice are illustrated (respectively) with respect to labor-intensive industries, commercial transactions in rule-of-man jurisdictions or …

Imperial Collision: Future Of China's Relations With Russia, Dongsheng Zang

Washington International Law Journal

Abstract: In April 2024, Biden Administration officials revealed that in the year 2023, about 90% of Russia’s microelectronics came from China, which Russia has used to make missiles, tanks, and aircraft. Nearly 70% of Russia’s approximately $900 million in machine tool imports in the last quarter of 2023 also came from China.[1] U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken recently stated at the G7 meeting that “[w]e see China sharing machine tools, semiconductors, [and] other dual-use items that have helped Russia rebuild the defense industrial base.”[2] This demonstrates how far China is willing to go in defiance of the …

China's Response To The U.S. Call For Decoupling: The Foreign Investment Law Of 2020, Daniel C. Chow

Washington International Law Journal

Abstract: In response to the U.S.’s calls for U.S.-China decoupling by repatriating U.S. business operations and eschewing new investments in China, China introduced the Foreign Investment Law (“FIL”) in 2020. The FIL marks a new era of foreign investment in China. It eliminates the requirement of prior government approval for all foreign-funded enterprises, including joint ventures consisting of U.S. companies and domestic Chinese state-owned enterprises. Many U.S. companies found the approval process under the previous legal regime to be time consuming, arduous, and oppressive. This process has now been replaced by a simple registration process under the FIL and the …

The Adr Movement: Theoretical Aspects And Practical Potential, Craig A. Mcewen

Maine Law Review

My mission in this paper is to draw upon what we know from the active and lively domestic dispute resolution movements in the United States, Canada, and beyond to identify some of the prospects for and potential problems in developing a dispute resolution system for Canadian-United States trade disputes. Alternative dispute resolution (ADR) is flourishing in the 1980's. Increasing numbers of individuals as well as public and private programs identify their work as alternative dispute resolution. These include private mediation practitioners, ADR partners in major law firms, private organizations such as EnDispute, which will arrange mini-trials and other dispute resolution …

Privatizing Dispute Resolution Under The Free Trade Agreement: Truth Or Fancy?, Leon E. Trakman

Maine Law Review

Replete with evidence of extensive forum shopping, unending discovery procedures, and countless delays in the formal adjudicatory process, the case for an alternative, more specialized medium for the resolution of trade disputes between the United States and Canada has grown more pressing. The problem, however, is in being convinced that the alternative, embodied in the proposed Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement, addresses the deficiencies in the existing medium for dispute resolution without introducing greater social and personal costs of its own. A government, in distancing itself from dispute resolution, also separates itself from the process through which social problems are …