Features Essays

Features Essays are a medium through which practitioners and legal scholars may share more detailed long-form pieces on recent developments in international law. Features Essays are longer and offer more in-depth analysis than our Forum pieces.  
Traditional Knowledge, International Environmental Law, and Bangladesh by Mahatab Uddin

Traditional knowledge (TK), which is orally passed down from older to newer generations, is of vital importance to local communities and indigenous people who own and apply it in their everyday lives. While various areas of international law can potentially protect TK from such misuse or misappropriation, this Essay specifically examines the ability of international environmental law to do so. The piece focuses on TK related to biodiversity and plant varieties, arguing that instead of offering any positive protection for TK per se, which would grant exclusive rights to the communities who own TK, international environmental law adopts a “win-win” approach by introducing two mandatory elements: “prior informed consent” and “benefit-sharing agreement.” Both of these components seek to ensure that any commercial gain deriving from the utilization of TK is proportionately shared with the relevant communities.


Unlawful Nationality-Based Bans from the Schengen Zone: Poland, Finland, and the Baltic States Against Russian Citizens and EU Law by Sarah Ganty, Dimitry V. Kochenov, & Suryapratim Roy
This Essay demonstrates that there is no legal way under current European Union (EU, the Union) law to adopt a citizenship-based ban on entering the Schengen zone. The de facto national-level ban against Russian citizens introduced by Poland, Finland, and the Baltic States breaches EU law. Further, amending the law to allow for a citizenship-based ban goes against the core values the Union is based upon, pitting populist proposals against the rule of law. References to “wholly exceptional circumstances” would not help either.

Book Review: Building the Rule of Law: Firsthand Accounts from a Thirty-Year Global Campaign by Hon. John M. Walker, Jr. & Isa C. Qasim

In August 1991, a Colorado lawyer, Bill Meyer, accompanied by his wife Jane, traveled to Sofia, Bulgaria to begin an adventure. Their trip, initially planned to be three months, lasted an entire year. The only Western lawyer in a country recently liberated from communism, Meyer’s work was far afield from his Boulder civil litigation practice. He was in Bulgaria to build the rule of law . . .


Interest Rates & Human Rights: Reinterpreting Risk Premiums to Adjust the Financial Economy by Oliver Pahnecke & Juan Pablo Bohoslavsky

This Article proposes an innovative and human rights-based interpretation of interest rates applied to public and private loans where interest rate and risk premium are adjusted after the full payment of the principal.


The International Law of Rabble Rousing by Hendrick Townley & Asaf Lubin

It was noon on an ordinary sunny spring day in May, but the scene was not as it should have been outside the Islamic Da’wah Center in downtown Houston, Texas. On one side of the street stood approximately ten protestors. . . .
Section 7 of the United Kingdom Bribery Act 2010: A “Fair Warning” Perlustration by Jonathan J. Rusch

Within the past year, the tides of global corruption have begun a perceptible shift. In a growing number of countries around the world, public reactions to corruption have moved from apathy and resignation to fear, anger, and even defiance, and government agencies are pursuing corruption . . .


A Principled Defence of the International Human Right to Privacy: A Response to Frédéric Sourgens by Asaf Lubin

Frédéric Sourgens’s recent article, The Privacy Principle, dares to ask a provocative question: can international law regulate global surveillance programs without sacrificing national security interests? . . .
Grey Zones in the International Law of Cyberspace by Michael N. Schmitt In 2015 and 2016, hackers affiliated with the Russian government broke into servers of the U.S. Democratic National Committee (DNC). The subsequent release of documents hurt Democrats in Congressional races, led to the resignation of the DNC Chairperson, created tension between the Clinton and Sanders camps, and, above all, figured prominently in the race for president. The Russian operations were yet another example of Russia’s proficiency at exploiting the “grey zones” of international law. . . .
A General Look at Specific Jurisdiction by Lea Brilmayer

Success, in domestic and international litigation alike, depends on finding a court with jurisdiction over the defendant. American constitutional law, which governs assertion of jurisdiction even over international defendants in American courts, has developed the subject of personal jurisdiction into a fine art. It’s all a question of whether ‘minimum contacts’ exist between the defendant and the forum, and whether the assertion of jurisdiction satisfies a standard of “fair play and substantial justice.” . . .


“Uniting for Peace” in the Age of International Justice by Michael Ramsden

The United Nations Security Council (“Council”) has performed a central role since the end of the Cold War in establishing mechanisms to hold perpetrators of international crimes accountable . . .
Indian Executive’s Pro-Arbitration Power Move Sanctioned by Parliament: Transnational Ideals Versus National Reality by Joseph (Yusuf) Saei

On October 23, 2015, the President of India Pranab Mukherjee, with input from Prime Minister Narendra Modi, signed into law a new Arbitration Ordinance (“the Ordinance”), which took effect immediately and was passed into law two months later as an Amending Act (“the Act”) . . .


The Yukos Award and the Debate over the New York Convention by Steven Levy

As the Obama Administration defends the Trans-Pacific Partnership (“TPP”), and several presidential candidates rail against it, international arbitration has increasingly come under public scrutiny . . .
Rethinking the International Refugee Regime by T. Alexander Aleinikoff
How do we tell the refugee story? We—refugee advocates, the press, international organizations—frequently focus on a dramatic personal story, often one of tragedy . . .
From the Aztecs to the Kalahari Bushmen: Conservative Justices’ Citation of Foreign Sources: Consistency, Inconsistency, or Evolution? by Zachary D. Kaufman
On April 28, 2015, there were few surprises at the Supreme Court. During oral argument in Obergefell v. Hodges, counsel for each side mostly rehearsed the usual marriage equality arguments around rights, dignity, fairness, love, procreation, family, tradition, religion, and slippery slopes . . .
Exhaustion of Local Remedies in Investor-State Dispute Settlement: An Idea Whose Time Has Come? by Matthew C. Porterfield
The proposed Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) between the United States and the European Union presents an opportunity to reconsider an old idea: requiring foreign investors to exhaust local remedies before bringing investor-state claims . . .
MLATS and the Trusted Nation Club: The Proper Cost of Membership by Yonatan L. Moskowitz
Until recently, Mutual Legal Assistance Treaties (“MLATs”) were dusty, specialists’ treaties used mostly to gather evidence during investigations of transnational crimes . . .
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