Archive for ‘Uncategorized’

Exploring Evil with Dr. James Waller

Exploring Evil with Dr. James Waller

In October 2022, The Comparative Jurist sat down with Dr. James Waller, Cohen Professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies at Keene State College in New Hampshire and Director of Academic Programs at the Auschwitz Institute for Peace and Reconciliation (AIPR), an international non-governmental organization dedicated to genocide and mass atrocity prevention.  Dr. Waller, a trained social psychologist, visited William & Mary Law School to present the research behind his book Becoming Evil: How Ordinary People Commit Genocide and Mass Killing. [. . .]

Lebanese Journalist Dr. May Chidiac Keynotes William & Mary Law School’s Human Security Law Center Symposium on Media Freedom & Human Rights

Lebanese Journalist Dr. May Chidiac Keynotes William & Mary Law School’s Human Security Law Center Symposium on Media Freedom & Human Rights

By Rachel Sleiman

On Friday, January 28, 2022, William & Mary Law School’s Human Security Law Center held its annual symposium online, with this year’s topic centering on Media Freedom and Human Rights. The Symposium hosted experts from around the world to address various issues surrounding freedom of expression, hate speech, incitement, and digital media. This article is the first of a three-part series about the Symposium’s featured panel events. The Human Security Law Center welcomed renowned Lebanese journalist Dr. May Chidiac to open the Symposium as keynote speaker, which also featured Professor Jenik Radon of Columbia University’s School of International & Public Affairs (SIPA) as moderator. [. . .]

Enforceability of Intra-EU Arbitration Awards in the USA

Enforceability of Intra-EU Arbitration Awards in the USA

By Ignacio Zabala Alonso

The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has set the invalidity of intra-EU arbitration agreements, and the possibility of enforcing those intra-EU awards in the European Union. However, the enforceability of intra-EU awards outside the EU – for example, in the United States – is not clear. In order to understand the CJEU’s logic used to invalidate the intra-EU arbitration awards, we need to learn about the CJEU’s relevant decisions in this matter. […]

Elections on Trial: Lessons on Enforcing Gender Equality Protection

Elections on Trial: Lessons on Enforcing Gender Equality Protection

By Regina Waugh, IFES Senior Global Gender Advisor With Contributors Linda “Ellie” Halfacre, Alexandra Brown, Patrick Quimby

For true democracy to exist, all citizens must have equal access to elections.[1] The International Convention on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), to which 173 countries are States Parties, makes clear that this includes equal access for women and men.[2] The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) explicitly promotes women’s political […]

Narrowing the Global Digital Divides: How Lawyers Can Help

Narrowing the Global Digital Divides: How Lawyers Can Help

By Louise D. Williams

In March 2020, no sooner had COVID-19 lockdowns begun sweeping the globe than the breadth of the world’s “digital divide” came into full view. The pandemic forced students, workers, and businesses worldwide to carve digital pathways toward business-as-usual-as-possible. They did so, respectively, by transitioning to online learning, endeavoring to work remotely (job-permitting), and increasing their investments in digital services and e-commerce[. . .]

Historical Memory and Transitional Justice

Historical Memory and Transitional Justice

By Peggy Cooper Davis

I was honored in September of 2020 to join an august group of speakers convened by Professor Christine Warren, the brilliant and prolific director of William and Mary’s Center for Comparative Legal Studies and Post-Conflict Peacebuilding. Professor Warren had called us together at a time of urgent national soul-searching that was triggered by official and sometimes deadly violence against Black and Brown people and against demonstrators supporting the idea that Black lives matter. We came together to understand transitional justice more fully and to assess its applicability in the United States. [. . .]

US-UK Free Trade Agreement: Not So Fast

US-UK Free Trade Agreement: Not So Fast

By Nancy Rosen, Cameron Krause, and Jenik Radon

With the Brexit withdrawal agreement concluded, the United States has an opportunity to finish what it started with the United Kingdom and create a strong free trade agreement—but questions abound. First, is it really an opportunity? Specifically, should it be a focus of US efforts? And should it be a priority before a free trade agreement is entered into with the EU, a much larger, and therefore more important trade partner of the US? [. . .]

EU-China Investment Agreement: A Values Agreement? The Proof Will Be in The Pudding

EU-China Investment Agreement: A Values Agreement? The Proof Will Be in The Pudding

By Allison Lofgren and Jenik Radon

Seven years after talks between the European Union and China commenced, a surprise eleventh-hour investment agreement was struck on December 30, 2020, despite requests from the incoming administration of President Biden to wait. This deal, the EU-China Comprehensive Agreement on Investment (CAI), is intended to replace the bilateral investment treaties that the majority of EU member states currently have with China, effectively unifying and standardizing them. [. . .]

Vagueness and Contradictions in the Trans-Pacific Partnership: Elusive Standards?

Vagueness and Contradictions in the Trans-Pacific Partnership: Elusive Standards?

By Rachel Sleiman and Jenik Radon

With the new administration of President Biden, the United States will have no alternative but to re-assess its relationships with the world. To be frank, the United States has unfortunately lost credibility and stature during the last four years. And re-envisioning, and even reinventing, the Obama initiated Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) would be a good start. While former President Trump withdrew from the original TPP, its potential rejuvenation, welcomed by Australia and Japan, calls for a fresh perspective. [. . .]

A Trade Agreement with a Possible Twist: The EU-Mercosur Agreement

A Trade Agreement with a Possible Twist: The EU-Mercosur Agreement

By Michalis Polygiannis and Jenik Radon.

The monumental European Union–Mercosur free trade agreement was announced in 2019 after twenty years, literally a generation, of negotiations. This trade agreement will create the largest free-trade zone in the world, cut tariffs, and simplify the customs procedures between the EU states and the Mercosur countries of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, Venezuela, and Uruguay. For the EU, this means more exports of high-value products like machinery, automobiles, and pharmaceuticals. In contrast, for the Mercosur countries, it would mean more exports in commodity agricultural products, including meat, poultry and sugar for which quantity is the name of the game, to the European single market,. However, despite the almost endless ongoing global discussions and negotiations for a transition to a low-carbon economy to mitigate climate change, trade and environment are like two ships passing in the night. But President Macron of France is ready to change that and is willing to have a “collision” of these two spheres. [. . .]