Law of the Sea Commons^™

The Field Of International Business Transactions Law, Kathleen Claussen

Seattle University Law Review

This Article studies the evolution of the scholarly subfield referred to as the law of “international business transactions” (IBT). It reviews data on academic articles, courses, textbooks and other signifiers of the growth of this research area. Beginning around 1960, scholars began to use the term “international business transactions” and by the 1980s, several law schools were offering a course by that title. A handful of dedicated textbooks soon followed. These data reflect a gradual increase in research on the topic of IBT, particularly in the United States, but also considerable diversity of subject matters covered by those works. The …

Kim Gyeong-Seok And The Origins Of Northeast Asia’S Corporate Accountability Movement For War And Colonialism, Timothy Webster

Seattle University Law Review

For the past three decades, a transnational reparations movement has unfolded across Northeast Asia. Hundreds of victims—assisted by attorneys, academics, and activists—seek remedies from Japan for various atrocities committed during World War II, colonialism, and other historical injustices.  They press their claims in street protests, legislative hearings, dramatic performances, and other fora.  The “comfort women” are the best known of these claimants; their global redress campaign ex-tends from noisy protests outside of Japan’s embassy in Seoul, to mute statues in raucous boroughs of Berlin.  More obscure, though larger in number, were the roughly one million Koreans who performed forced labor …

Navigating Compliance In A Geopolitical Era: The Case Of Chinese Multinationals In The United States, Ji Li

Seattle University Law Review

This Article examines how Chinese multinational companies (MNCs) approach compliance in the United States amid deepening geo-political rivalry and intensified regulatory scrutiny. Drawing on original survey data, this Article maps variations in compliance structures, staffing, and governance mechanisms across Chinese firms and identifies key determinants such as industry-specific regulatory intensity, listing status, and organizational imprinting from headquarters. The analysis employs a dual institutional framework to explain how compliance systems emerge from the interplay between host-state regulatory demands and home-state institutional legacies, producing hybrid structures that blend local adaptation with headquarters-driven replication. Findings reveal that while certain compliance features—such as committee …

Volume 49 Masthead

Seattle University Law Review

Volume 49 Masthead

A Comparative Study Of Chinese And American Approaches To Shaping International Outer Space Law And Norms, Ariel G. Silverman

Seattle University Law Review

This article explores convergences and divergencies in the United States and PRC’s responses to the stalemate in the United Nations over the future of outer space resource governance. I do so by systematically analyzing these leading space-faring nations’ policy-positions and tactics deployed to shape norms around three substantive areas of outer space resource governance: rights of ownership and scope of utilization of space resources, mechanization of the “benefits sharing” principle, and the rights and responsibilities of the private sector. I theorize that these leading space-faring nations have adopted divergent approaches due to their differing historical relationships with international law and …

Table Of Contents

Seattle University Law Review

Table of Contents

Legal Implications Of The Mauritius V Maldives Case On The Delimitation Of Archipelagic States, Aishath Ruhsha Nasheed, Mohd Hisham Mohd Kamal

Indonesian Journal of International Law

Maritime boundary delimitation is a complex field of international law characterized by uncertainty and unpredictability. Historically, States have relied on case law to develop and elaborate on the ambiguous provisions stipulated under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) concerning maritime boundary delimitation. However, case law related to the maritime delimitation of archipelagic States is limited, leading to conflicting interpretations of the basic principles of maritime delimitation in the context of archipelagic States. This paper aims to examine the legal implications of the latest Mauritius v. Maldives case on the maritime boundary delimitation of archipelagic States. …

International Governance Of Ocean Iron Fertilization Research: A Case Study Of The Proposed Exploring Ocean Iron Solutions Field Experiments, Ashwin Murthy, Romany M. Webb

Sabin Center for Climate Change Law

Ocean iron fertilization (OIF) has been a subject of scientific research since the 1980s. The primary international legal instruments regulating OIF are the 1972 Convention on the Prevention of Marine Pollution by Dumping of Wastes and Other Matter (London Convention or LC) and the 1996 Protocol to that Convention (London Protocol or LP). To guide regulation of research activities, under the LC and LP, the Assessment Framework was developed.

To demonstrate how domestic regulators might use the Assessment Framework, this paper explores its application to recently proposed OIF field trials advanced by the Exploring Ocean Iron Solutions (ExOIS) research consortium. …

Dokdo/Takeshima And Maritime Delimitation Between The Republic Of Korea And Japan: A Comment On Icj Dispute Resolution, Katherine Angell

American University International Law Review

The Republic of Korea (Korea) should agree to submit the issue of sovereignty over Dokdo/Takeshima and the issue of maritime delimitation in the East Sea/Sea of Japan to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) because the ICJ is likely to decide that Dokdo/Takeshima is Korean territory and the tensions in the East Sea/Sea of Japan can be resolved to allow further cooperation between the two nations. The ICJ is the primary avenue for peacefully resolving territorial and maritime delimitation disputes between nations, and the ICJ has developed a substantial body of case law analyzing these issues. The ICJ considers various …

Dokdo/Takeshima And Maritime Delimitation Between The Republic Of Korea And Japan: A Comment On Icj Dispute Resolution, Katherine Angell

Celebrating WCL Student Authors

The Republic of Korea (Korea) should agree to submit the issue of sovereignty over Dokdo/Takeshima and the issue of maritime delimitation in the East Sea/Sea of Japan to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) because the ICJ is likely to decide that Dokdo/Takeshima is Korean territory and the tensions in the East Sea/Sea of Japan can be resolved to allow further cooperation between the two nations. The ICJ is the primary avenue for peacefully resolving territorial and maritime delimitation disputes between nations, and the ICJ has developed a substantial body of case law analyzing these issues. The ICJ considers various …

Narcos Of The Caribbean: Addressing Transshipment Drug Trafficking Through Caribbean Ports, Manuel Muñoz-Repiso

FIU Law Review

Drug trafficking from source countries in South and Central America to other parts of the world is of growing concern as drug use increases globally. Driven by the region’s geographic proximity to source countries in South and Central America and weak antitrafficking infrastructure, drug traffickers have increasingly used routes through Caribbean ports to access target consumer nations. The use of Caribbean ports for transshipment trafficking has led to record homicide levels, corruption, and democratic backsliding. In response, Caribbean nations, other Western democracies, and international organizations have created numerous cooperative organizations and programs to reduce the number of drugs trafficked through …

A Corporate Accountability “Turn” In International Climate Litigation, Jacqueline Peel

Lewis & Clark Law Review

Corporations are among the most significant emitters of anthropogenic greenhouse gases, which are responsible for the existential threat of climate change. Yet accountability for corporate emitting activities has been difficult to secure, particularly where companies operate across nation-state borders or have global value chains. This Essay looks at recent developments in international law, found in a series of climate-related advisory opinions issued by international courts and tribunals, which may signal greater corporate accountability for climate harms. It argues that the recent advisory opinions of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, and …

Ai And Naval Operations, Wolff Heintschel Von Heinegg

International Law Studies

Artificial intelligence systems in naval operations are reality. They enhance naval capabilities in various respects. Autonomous surface and underwater vehicles depend on such systems. Moreover, these systems contribute to threat detection and identification, to real-time strategy optimization, and to intelligence analysis. The present article provides a brief analysis of the legality of AI systems used by naval forces under the law of naval warfare, which, in many respects, differs considerably from the law of land warfare. Accordingly, it is necessary to distinguish between attacks from the sea against targets on land and attacks against targets at sea and in the …

Questioning The Effectiveness Of Environmental Policy Implementation Related To Ocean Pollution., Lydia Knobloch

Student Scholar Symposium

No abstract provided.

The Doctrine Of Constructive Presence And Damage To Submarine Cables And Other Critical Underwater Infrastructure, Jame Kraska, Elizabeth Hutton

International Law Studies

Maritime law enforcement regarding attacks on critical underwater infrastructure remains one of the weakest parts of the legal system governing undersea infrastructure. While the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea and the 1884 Submarine Telegraphic Cable Convention require States to criminalize and penalize willful or negligent damage to submarine cables, these agreements depend heavily on national enforcement. In international waters, enforcement becomes more complicated due to the principle of exclusive flag State jurisdiction, which limits a coastal State’s ability to enforce laws in international waters. This article proposes that the legal doctrine of constructive presence provides an international …

"Reeling In" The Governance Problem: How To Achieve Sustainable Fisheries On An International Scale, Louis Morais-Andrade

Brooklyn Journal of International Law

In 2025, it was estimated that over 35% of international fish stocks were overfished, risking severe depletion of high seas fisheries. In general, countries have control over fisheries within 200 nautical miles of their coastal border. Many countries have established fishery conservation laws to help prevent overfishing. Some examples of the largest domestic fishing laws are the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act and the European Union’s Common Fishery Policy (MSA), which functions as an international policy that governs all of the United States’ fisheries and the European Union’s Common Fisheries Policy (CFP). Concurrently, the United Nations has also opened …

Investigating The Relationship Between Noun Classes And Plant Folk Taxonomy In Chasu Language Of Kilimanjaro Region In Tanzania, Peter Rabson Mziray

Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences

The current study investigates the relationship between noun classes and plant folk taxonomy in Chasu (G 22). The study focuses on two objectives: the first objective is to describe the plant folk taxonomy in Chasu and the second objective is to determine the relationship between noun classes and plant folk taxonomy in Chasu. Data were collected from rural villages in Same and Mwanga districts by using free listing, field interviews (jungle-walk-and-identify), and written texts containing Chasu plant names. The findings reveal that Chasu folk taxonomy reflects different ethnobotanical categories; including a unique beginner which is mmea/mimea ‘plant(s)’, and three life …

Living Property, Joseph William Singer

Seattle University Law Review

The Supreme Court has increasingly defined property rights that are per se exempt from regulation in the absence of compensation, most recently in Cedar Point Nursery v. Hassid (2021) and Tyler v. Hennepin County (2023). The Court claims that it can identify property rights that are categorically protected from regulation by reference to history, tradition, and precedent. Yet this approach is oddly ahistorical; it is inconsistent with the fact that property law changed dramatically over U.S. history, as well as varying tremendously among the states. It is also inconsistent with the historical context of the Founding era. At that time, …

Table Of Contents

Seattle University Law Review

Table of Contents

The Roots Of Credit Inequality, Andrea Freeman

Seattle University Law Review

Debt oppression began before the United States became a country. Settlers enslaved Africans and Indigenous people, treating them as property that they could buy and sell for their economic and personal benefit. When enslavement became illegal, new economic systems and laws that included sharecropping, Black Codes, and Jim Crow kept Black people in servitude. Laws that prohibited enslaved people from owning property or selling goods to white people evolved into restrictions on Black people’s occupations and market participation, both formal and informal. When Black entrepreneurs overcame these obstacles and built wealth within Black business enclaves, white people enforced their racist …