Law and Politics Commons^™

China-Australia Free Trade Agreement New Icing On An Old Cake-An Opportunity For Fair Trade?, Benedict Sheehy, Jackson N. Maogoto

ExpressO

The on-going challenge in economic development and globalization, particularly for developing countries, is the issue of development and equality in society. The issue becomes particularly problematic when confronted in matters of international trade. Often misnamed anti-globalization activists and pro-globalization activists fail to take note of the underlying assumptions that lead them to conflict—namely, the actual costs and benefits to society that result from their particular positions. In essence, both activists are searching for ways to improve the lives of people in the domestic context and to minimize the damage to their society and environment. China’s impressive economic record is threatened …

Corporations And Social Costs: The Wal-Mart Case Study, Benedict Sheehy

ExpressO

This article examines the role of the corporate vehicle in the creation of social costs. The article identifies some of the political commitments and philosophies behind the differing notions of corporations. Social costs are those activities which result from business activity and cause uncompensated harm to society. The founding contribution to the law and economics discussion by Ronald Coase is given a thorough treatment. The paper next, turns to the dominant explanation of corporate structure, namely the law and economics model developed expounded by Easterbrook and Fischel. It then applies the theoretical discussion in a case study of the world’s …

Un-Fair Trade As Friendly Fire: The Australia-Usa Free Trade Agreement, Benedict Sheehy

ExpressO

Trade, economists and trade theorists advise, is a mutually beneficial exercise. Among this group, a particular set of advocates, claim that “Free Trade” is in the interest of all parties. As will be demonstrated, Free Trade is not truly “free” but an exercise of foreign policy and the implementation of policies favouring wealthy corporate interest groups. Free Trade is controlled by wealthy nations who have stacked the rules in favour of themselves, and in particular their corporate interests, and against the poor producers in poor nations. This control is used contrary to fairness, economic and ecological logic. Fair trade, by …

Recent Defined Benefit Pension Reform: Reasons And Results, Daniel B. Klaff

ExpressO

In the face of corporate bankruptcies, the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (“PBGC”) assures workers that their defined benefit pensions will be protected. It is this fact which has motivated recent reform of the PBGC and the overarching defined benefit plan system by Congress. This paper explores those reforms by addressing the reasons for and results of the most recent reform which had as its primary aim restoring the fiscal solvency of the PBGC. The paper challenges popular accounts of the reform process while examining the results of such reform for important stakeholders without resorting to an overly technical discussion of …

Reviewed Work: Understanding Institutional Diversity By Elinor Ostrom, Jonathan G.S. Koppell

Publications from President Jonathan G.S. Koppell

No abstract provided.

Bond Repudiation, Tax Codes, The Appropriations Process And Restitution Post-Eminent Domain Reform, John H. Ryskamp

ExpressO

This brief comment suggests where the anti-eminent domain movement might be heading next.

Les Enfants De La Guerre : Adolescence Et Violence Postcoloniale Chez Badjoko, Dongala, Kourouma Et Monénembo, Koffi Anyinefa

Présence Francophone: Revue internationale de langue et de littérature

This essay deals with the representation of African child-soldiers in three novels and an autobiography. Why do children take part in African postcolonial civil wars? How are they portrayed? These children are not —as public opinion would often have it— only the victims of postcolonial violence, but are also agents of social change. Their violent involvement in political affairs constitutes the most radical form of their determination to be heard, and the most eloquent form of their protest against their precarious living conditions in a postcolonial Africa in crisis.

Review Essay: Radicals In Robes , Dru Stevenson

ExpressO

This essay reviews and critiques Cass Sunstein’s new book entitled Radicals in Robes. After a discussion of Sunstein’s (somewhat misleading) rhetorical nomenclature, this essay argues that Sunstein’s proposed “minimalist” methodology in constitutional jurisprudence is beneficial, but not for the reasons Sunstein suggests. Sunstein alternatively justifies judicial restraint or incrementalism on epistemological self-doubt (cautiousness being an outgrowth of uncertainty) and his fear that accomplishments by Progressives in the last century will be undone by conservative judges in the present. Constitutional incrementalism is more convincingly justified on classical economic grounds. While affirming Sunstein’s overall thesis, this essay offers an alternative rationale for …

Draft Effects Report: Potential Transfer Of Garrison Project Lands Within The Fort Berthold Reservation Boundaries, Pursuant To The Fort Berthold Mineral Restoration Act, Us Army Corps Of Engineers, Omaha District, Nebraska

US Government Documents Related to Indigenous Nations

This report, dated May 2006, from the United States (US) Army Corps of Engineers (Omaha District, Nebraska) explains the potential transfer of unused lands from the Garrison Dam Project back to the Three Affiliated Tribes of Fort Berthold Reservation. The land transfer proposed to return a portion of land out of the 153,000 acres taken by the US Government for the construction of the Garrison Dam. The authority of this transfer is granted by the Fort Berthold Mineral Restoration Act of 1984 (Public Law 98-602). This report is broken into four sections: Introduction, Background, Proposed Determination, Public Comment and Response. …

The Refund Booth: Using The Principle Of Symmetric Information To Improve Campaign Finance Regulation, Ian Ayres, Bruce Ackerman

Philip A. Hart Memorial Lecture

On March 22, 2006, Professor of Law, Ian Ayres of Yale Law School, delivered the Georgetown Law Center’s twenty-sixth Annual Philip A. Hart Memorial Lecture: "The Refund Booth: Using the Principle of Symmetric Information to Improve Campaign Finance Regulation." The article, The Secret Refund Booth, was co-authored with Professor Bruce Ackerman of Yale University.

Ian Ayres is a lawyer and an economist. He is the William K. Townsend Professor of Law and Anne Urowsky Professorial Fellow in Law at Yale Law School and a Professor at Yale's School of Management. He is the editor of the Journal of Law, …

Buried Online: State Laws That Limit E-Commerce In Caskets, Jerry Ellig, Asheesh Agarwal

ExpressO

Consumers seeking to purchase caskets online could benefit from the Supreme Court’s 2005 decision that states cannot discriminate against interstate direct wine shipment. Federal courts have reached conflicting conclusions when asked whether state laws requiring casket sellers to be licensed funeral directors violate the U.S. Constitution’s Due Process Clause. In Powers v. Harris, the 10th Circuit even offered an unprecedented ruling that economic protectionism is a legitimate state interest that can justify otherwise unconstitutional policies. In Granholm v. Heald, however, the Supreme Court declared that discriminatory barriers to interstate wine shipment must be justified by a legitimate state interest, and …

The Promise (And Limits) Of Neuroeconomics, Jedediah S. Purdy

ExpressO

Neuroeconomics – the study of brain activity in people engaged in tasks of reasoning and choice – looks set to be the next behavioral economics: a set of findings about how people make decisions that casts doubt on widely accepted premises about rationality and social life. This essay explains what is most exciting about the new field and lays out some specific research tasks for it.

By enabling researchers to view the mind at work, neuroeconomics puts in question the most basic premise of twentieth-century empiricism, sometimes called positivism or behaviorism: that people are black boxes to one another, and …

Regulatory Status Of Voip In The Post-Brand X World, Jerry Ellig

ExpressO

During the past several years, the Federal Communications Commission has engaged in a series of rulemakings to determine the regulatory status of Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP). The Supreme Court’s Brand X decision clarifies that even if the FCC’s determination conflicts with that of a court, the FCC’s judgment holds sway as long as the decision is reasonable. We believe that VoIP should be classified as an information service, rather than a telecommunications service, for several reasons. First, the Internet Protocol nature of VoIP technology means that it functions like an information service, rather than a telecommunications service. Second, in …

Backlash To Globalization In The Form Of State Legislation: Constitutional Implications, John R. Weber

ExpressO

This paper will examine the Constitutional issues raised by the influx of state anti-outsourcing legislation using a recently enacted New Jersey statute. The New Jersey statute is very similar to, and contains many of the same features as, many other bills introduced in legislatures across the nation. Moreover, the political impetus for the introduction and enactment of the legislation reflects the struggle over the outsourcing issue that is occurring in communities nationwide.

The New Biopolitics: Autonomy, Demography, And Nationality, Jedediah S. Purdy

ExpressO

No abstract provided.

Card Check Recognition: The Ongoing Legal And Legislative Battle, Michael E. Aleo

ExpressO

A great debate has been brewing for years over whether unions should be able to organize employees outside of the traditional election procedures provided by the National Labor Relations Act (“NLRA” or “the Act”). Typically, in an organizing drive, a union solicits support from employees to indicate a desire to run a National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB” or “Board”) election. The union does this by collecting cards from employees affirming the employees’ desire to have a representation election. If the union collects valid cards from at least one-third of eligible employees in the appropriate bargaining unit, the union may then …

Reform In Lieu Of Change: Tastes Great, Less Filling, Jonathan G.S. Koppell

Publications from President Jonathan G.S. Koppell

In this response to Light, Koppell argues that the increasing frequency of reform may reflect Congress's inability to make significant changes to the substance of entrenched government programs. Moreover, he observes that the more profound evolution in government has been the movement toward the market-based provision of services, which has created a demand for new competencies in the public sector.

Singapore: A Tax Compact For The Future?, Eugene Kheng Boon Tan

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

No abstract provided.

Conditions For Judicial Independence, Mathew D. Mccubbins, Roger Noll, Barry R. Weingast

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Constitution-Making: A Process Filled With Constraint, Donald L. Horowitz

Faculty Scholarship

Constitutions are generally made by people with no previous experience in constitution making. The assistance they receive from outsiders is often less useful than it may appear. The most pertinent foreign experience may reside in distant countries, whose lessons are unknown or inaccessible. Moreover, although constitutions are intended to endure, they are often products of the particular crisis that forced their creation. Drafters are usually heavily affected by a desire to avoid repeating unpleasant historical experiences or to emulate what seem to be successful constitutional models. Theirs is a heavily constrained environment, made even more so by distrust and dissensus …

Agenda Control In The Bundestag, 1980-2002, William M. Chandler, Gary W. Cox, Mathew D. Mccubbins

Faculty Scholarship

We find strong evidence of monopoly legislative agenda control by government parties in the Bundestag. First, the government parties have near-zero roll rates, while the opposition parties are often rolled over half the time. Second, only opposition parties’ (and not government parties’) roll rates increase with the distances of each party from the floor median. Third, almost all policy moves are towards the government coalition (the only exceptions occur during periods of divided government). Fourth, roll rates for government parties sky- rocket when they fall into the opposition and roll rates for opposition parties plummet when they enter government, while …

Recalibrating The War On Terror By Enhancing Development Practices In The Middle East, Kevin J. Fandl

ExpressO

This research paper suggests that the cart has been placed before the horse, that democratization and open markets in the Middle East are more likely the result of effective development than the catalyst for it. The war on terror has been justified by the United States as an effective means of reducing the possibility of terrorist attacks. This paper analyzes the validity of those justifications by reviewing the linkage between democracy and economic growth and that between democracy and peace.

The paper begins by hypothesizing that the war on terror and forced democratization of the Middle East are leading to …

Multiracialism Engineered: The Limits Of Electoral And Spatial Integration In Singapore, Eugene K. B. Tan

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

This paper examines Singapore's innovations in electoral and spatial integration. In examining the Group Representation Constituency and the Ethnic Integration Policy, a critique is made of the official discourse that multiracialism is internalized and entrenched in Singapore's political psyche and electoral process. While the electoral and spatial integration policies are driven by the objective of enhancing multiracialism, their actual workings do not adequately advance the development of norms and values that would be truly supportive of the need for a multiracial legislature and an abiding commitment to multiracialism. The layering of the electoral system with other political objectives, such as …

Evaluation Of The Civic Engagement Initiative, 2003-2004, Paul Watanabe, Anne W. Gathuo, Claudia Green, Michael Liu, Mary Jo Marion, Carmen Vivian Rivera

Institute for Asian American Studies Publications

The CEI integrated high levels of data collection, use, and analysis into its implementation model. TBF and members of the coordinating team also conducted evaluative and summary research at different periods throughout the project. To assess the CEI's impact on voter participation, therefore, the evaluation team reviewed analyses by these stakeholders, including primarily data from the Massachusetts Voter Education Network (MassVOTE, January 2005), LeLievre Information Systems (March 2004; May 2005, ) and Northeast Action (June 2003); reports to the funders group by the donor collaborative liaison Bates Consulting (March 2004; various dates 2005); an evaluative report to TBF by the …

Breaking The Bank: Revisiting Central Bank Of Denver After Enron And Sarbanes-Oxley, Celia Taylor

ExpressO

No abstract provided.

Do Institutions Really Matter? Assessing The Impact Of State Judicial Structures On Citizen Litigiousness, Jeff L. Yates, Paul Brace, Holley Tankersley

ExpressO

No abstract provided.

An Analysis Of The Duties And Obligations Of The International Legal Community To The Eradication Of Poverty And Growth Of Sustainable Development In Light Of The Jus Cogens Nature Of The Declaration Of The Right To Development, Freda R. Murray-Bruce

ExpressO

This paper examines the copious problem of world poverty affecting half of the world’s population in the South and assesses the international legal obligations of the international legal community, viz., developed states, transnational corporations and the international financial institutions of the IMF, World Bank and WTO to the eradication of poverty and the growth of sustainable development, in view of the inviolability and peremptory nature of the Charter of the UN, and the international human rights provisions arising therefrom. To this extent, we examine the 1986 General Assembly Declaration on the Right to Development, along with the other International Bill …

The Same Side Of Two Coins: The Peculiar Phenomenon Of Bet-Hedging In Campaign Finance, Jason Cohen

ExpressO

The paper addresses the propensity of large donors to give to competing candidates or competing party organizations during the same election cycle – for example, giving money to both Bush and Kerry during the 2004 presidential race – a practice here termed 'bet-hedging.' Bet-hedging is analyzed in strategic and game-theoretic terms. The paper explores the prevalence of bet-hedging, the possible motivations behind the practice, and the informational concerns surrounding it. The paper argues that bet-hedging, out of all donation practices, carries with it a uniquely strong implication of ex post favor-seeking: if a donor prefers one side over the other, …

How And Understanding Of The Second Personal Standpoint Can Change Our Understanding Of The Law: Hart's Unpublished Response To Exclusive Legal Positivism, Robin B. Kar

ExpressO

This Article describes recent developments in moral philosophy on the “second personal standpoint,” and argues that they will have important ramifications for legal thought. Moral, legal and political thinkers have, for some time now, understood important distinctions between the first personal perspective (of deliberation) and the third personal perspective (of observation, cause and effect), and have plumbed these distinctions to great effect in their thought. This distinction is, in fact, implicit the law and economics movement’s “rational actor” model of decision, which currently dominates much legal academic thought. Recent developments in value theory due to philosopher Stephen Darwall suggest, however, …

The Expansion Of Intellectual Property Rights By International Agreement: A Case Study Comparing Chile And Australia’S Bilateral Fta Negotiations With The U.S., Ralph G. Fischer

ExpressO

This paper attempts to address the ongoing debate regarding the expansion of intellectual property rights (IPRs) through international negotiations. Commentators have described three theories that purport to explain the growing scope of IPRs in international law, as reflected in international agreements: that these agreements reflect coercion by economically powerful nations; that they are the products of lobbying by multinational corporations; and that they represent autonomous, welfare-enhancing instruments that benefit all parties. The article tests these theories by using a case study comparing free trade agreement negotiations that the United States recently concluded with a less developed country, Chile, and with …