International Economic Law and Policy Blog

WTO Scholars' Forum Event in London

For those in London this coming Monday:

The Directors of the WTO Scholars' Forum would like to invite you to a seminar on Monday 23rd June

Dr Lorand Bartels, University of Cambridge, 'The EU's Economic Partnership Agreements with African, Caribbean and Pacific States'

Speaker: Dr Lorand Bartels, University Lecturer in International Law, University of Cambridge

Monday 23rd June, 5-7pm, Moot Court, UCL Laws, London
(map: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/laws/faculty/index.shtml?laws_map)

Chair:
Dr Andrew Mitchell, Senior Lecturer, Melbourne Law School, University of Melbourne

Here's the link:  http://www.ucl.ac.uk/laws/wto-forum/index.shtml?events_new

ASIL IELIG Conference on "The Politics of International Economic Law"

From the ASIL's International Economic Law Interest Group:

"The ASIL's International Economic Law Interest Group will hold its biennial conference in Washington this year just after the U.S. Presidential election, on the timely theme of "The Politics of International Economic Law: The Next Four Years."  The conference committee has just issued its Call for Papers here. Paper proposals are due by July 20.  The Call supplies a wide range of suggested topics, but it is open for "politics-of" topics in any area of international economic law, not just trade. 

The conference will take place at George Washington University Law School in downtown Washington, on Friday and Saturday November 14-15, in a month when new vistas will open, no matter which candidate wins."

Calling all Asian IEL/WTO Scholars

As many of you know, the Society of International Economic Law (SIEL)will have its inaugural conference in Geneva from the 15^th to the 17^th of July. At 16:00 PM on July 15^th, there will be a meeting of the Asian WTOResearch Network (AWRN) . To encourage the intellectual exchange among Asian scholars, we welcome all WTO/IEL scholars from Asia (especially South Asia) to join us in the meeting even if you are not a member of the AWRN or if you are not a speaker at the SIEL conference. Please check the SIEL conference webpage for further details on the venue later. 

ACP-EU Relations Conference

Arbitration and Mediation in the ACP-EU Relations Conference
ACP House 451 Avenue Georges Henri, 1200 Brussels, Belgium.
May 21st 2008, Brussels

The Association for International Arbitration (AIA) is organising this conference to promote and create awareness of the Arbitration and Mediation in the ACP (African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of countries) – EU Relations. Our goal is to promote arbitration and mediation as an alternative dispute resolution mechanism, ultimately in benefit of business development and creation of tighter bounds between the ACP states and the EU states.

This conference will not only serve to raise awareness and create stability for future business development, but also it will also lead to a working group in this area.

The 1 day conference will take place in the city of Brussels at the secretariat of the ACP, from 9:30h - 18:30h, coffee breaks, lunch as well as a cocktail after the conference will be part of the event.

More details here: http://www.arbitration-adr.org/activities/upcoming_conf.html

Upcoming WTO Scholars' Forum Events

Some upcoming events in London:

The Directors of the WTO Scholars' Forum would like to invite you to a series of events organized in May:

1. Talk by Professor Don Regan on 'What Are Trade Agreements For?'
Thursday 15 May 2008, 2-4pm, Moot Court, UCL Laws, London (map: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/laws/faculty/index.shtml?laws_map)
Chair: Dr Fiona Smith, Faculty of Laws UCL, Co-Director WTO Scholars' Forum

Speaker: Professor Don Regan, William W. Bishop Jr. Collegiate Professor of Law, University of Michigan

More information available at: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/laws/wto-forum/index.shtml?events_new

2. Roundtable Discussion with Professor John H. Jackson on 'The Changing Nature of Sovereignty'

Tuesday 20 May 2008, 3-5.30pm, Moot Court, UCL Laws, London (map: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/laws/faculty/index.shtml?laws_map)

Chair: Professor Dan Sarooshi, Queen's College, University of Oxford

Speaker: Professor John H. Jackson, Georgetown University Law Center, Director Institute of International Economic Law, and Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of International Economic Law

More information available at: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/laws/wto-forum/index.shtml?events_new

All events organized by the WTO Scholars' Forum are free of charge and all are welcome (http://www.ucl.ac.uk/laws/wto-forum/index.shtml).  If you would like to be added to our email-list or confirm your attendance of both events, please contact Ms Ann Tucker, the Forum's administrator at UCL on ann.tucker@ucl.ac.uk.

We look forward to seeing you at both events.

Best wishes,

Dr. Fiona Smith and Dr. Isabelle Van Damme

Directors of the WTO Scholars' Forum

SIEL Conference Update

From The SIEL Conference Committee:

Society of International Economic Law - Conference Booking Arrangements

For those of you who are planning to attend SIEL's Inaugural Conference in Geneva on July 15-17 this year, we strongly suggest that you register and book your travel and accommodation as early as you possibly can. If, as appears possible at this stage, there is a meeting of Ministers at the WTO during that time, it may become impossible to find available accommodation and flights later on. Please refer to the conference section on our website, www.sielnet.org, for a list of recommended hotels near the conference venue.

Please also register for the conference before booking your travel and accommodation, as it is possible that we will be forced to restrict registration in due course, depending on numbers of participants.

The SIEL Conference Committee

ASIL - IELG in DC: April 10

From the ASIL's International Economic Law Group:

Readers of the blog who will be in Washington on April 10 are invited to the annual business meeting of the International Economic Law Interest Group of the American Society of International Law, from 7:45 am to 8:45 am Thursday, April 10, in the Longworth Room at the Fairmont Hotel (2401 M St. NW, Washington DC).

Come have coffee and bagels, and talk about the Group's programs for the coming year - including a conference scheduled for October 2008 in Washington DC, on The Politics of International Economic Law; a West Coast colloquium to share research on international economic law, to take place in early 2009 in UCLA; and more.

Anyone is welcome who is interested in the work of the Interest Group -- including those who are not registered for the ASIL Annual Meeting, and those who do not currently belong to the ASIL. 

* * * * * * * 

The ASIL Annual Meeting this year will include a Finance, Trade and Investment track of panels within its theme of The Politics of International Law -- further information at http://www.asil.org/events/am08/about.html.  The IEL Interest Group is co-sponsoring two panels, on International Law and the Fight Against Corruption (Thursday, April 10 - 2:45pm – 4:15pm, Executive Forum) and The New Politics of Regulatory Cooperation: The Case of Food Safety (Friday, April 11 - 9:00am – 10:30am Roosevelt Room).

RTAs Conference in St. Louis

In early April, Saint Louis University School of Law will be holding the following conference on Regional Trade Agreements:

Saint Louis University Public Law Review

and

The Center for International and Comparative Law
presents:

THE CHANGING TIDE OF TRADE:
The Social, Political and Environmental Implications of Regional Trade Agreements
Friday, April 4, 2008
8 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Regional Trade Agreements (RTAs) have become a very important part of the world trade system in recent years.  As World Trade Organization (WTO) membership has grown to over 150 countries, the interests of the WTO Members have diverged on numerous issues and negotiations have become more cumbersome.  Many nations have turned to negotiating RTAs, which focus on the interests of countries in a particular region or group of regions, and not on global interests.  RTAs allow for more efficient trade negotiations and permit countries greater freedom to choose their trading partners, trade deals and conditions of trade.  By 2010, the WTO estimates that nearly 400 RTAs will be in effect.

This symposium will bring together a group of leading legal scholars to examine the social, political, and environmental issues that arise as a result of the proliferation of RTAs.  Some of the key questions to be addressed are:  What are the impacts of RTAs on developed versus developing countries?  What do governments gain or lose from pursuing such agreements?  Will RTAs play a role in shaping the rights of women, children, minorities and the poor?  And finally, how will they affect labor and environmental laws, regulations and standards?

WTO Law & Practice Conference in Chicago

For those in Chicago, the Loyola University Chicago International Law Review will be hosting a conference on February 15 on:  WTO Law and Practice: The State of the Discipline.  Many of the folks on the left side of this page will be there, along with quite a few others.  More details here.

Upcoming WTO Scholars' Forum Events

The following two "WTO Scholars' Forum" events may be of interest to this blog's readers:

1. WTO Scholars' Forum Seminar:

"Normative Integration as Authority Allocation: Two Models and their Application in the WTO"
Dr Tomer Broude, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
28th January 2008 at 1pm at the LSE

To register free of charge please contact Forum administrator, Ann Tucker, ann.tucker@ucl.ac.uk
For more about the WTO Scholars' Forum see the website: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/laws/wto-forum/index.shtml or contact Dr Fiona Smith (fiona.m.smith@ucl.ac.uk) or Dr Isabelle Van Damme, (iv218@cam.ac.uk).

About the seminar:

This seminar compares and contrasts two models of normative integration in international law, focusing on their explicit and implied application in World Trade Organization (WTO) jurisprudence. 'Normative integration' in this context refers to a deliberate processes of countering normative fragmentation by blending and merging formally disparate substantive rules through interpretation, concurrent application, inter-rule 'comity' and other methods. One quite celebrated model of normative integration is offered by Article 31(3)(c) of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (VCLT), whereby in the interpretation of a treaty, any relevant rules of international law applicable "in the relations between the parties" shall "be taken into account". A less well-known model of normative integration, applicable in the international law of sustainable development, can be found in the Principle of Integration in Paragraph 4 of the 1992 United
Nations (UN) Rio Declaration on Environment and Development, whereby ‘[i]n order to achieve sustainable development, environmental protection shall constitute an integral part of the development process and cannot be considered in isolation from it’. The discussion will first explain how models of normative integration – usually considered as methods of reconciling conflicts in applicable law - also serve as principles of authority allocation among different generators of international norms. It will then review the application and/or implementation of both Article 31(3)(c) VCLT and the Rio Principle of Integration in WTO jurisprudence. The benefits and limits of each model will then be analyzed, and in conclusion, the viability of a general rule of integration as a principle of authority allocation in international law will be discussed, highlighting the VCLT model's tendency to focus on technical hierarchies, on one hand, and the Rio Model's abstractness and circularity, on the other.

2. WTO Scholars' Forum: Roundtable Discussion: The Brazil/Tyres Dispute

Iain McVay, Steptoe & Co.
Lothar Ehring, Directorate-General for Trade, European Commission
Dr. Andrew Lang, London School of Economics
5th February 6-8pm, Moot Court, UCL

To register free of charge please contact Forum administrator, Ann Tucker, ann.tucker@ucl.ac.uk
For more about the WTO Scholars' Forum see the website: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/laws/wto-forum/index.shtml or contact the Directors, Dr Fiona Smith (fiona.m.smith@ucl.ac.uk) or Dr Isabelle Van Damme, (iv218@cam.ac.uk).

About the discussion:

“The decision of the World Trade Organization’s Panel in the Brazil – Tyres case has the potential to become a milestone in WTO jurisprudence on trade and the environment. At issue was Brazil’s ban on imports of retreaded tyres. The European Communities (EC) challenged the ban as a violation of WTO rules, whereas Brazil defended the measure as necessary to protect health and the environment. The Panel held that, although the ban was necessary to protect health and the environment, it was applied in a WTO-inconsistent manner because Brazil failed to enforce a similar ban on used tyre imports. Thus, the Panel decision effectively directed Brazil to impose further trade restrictions so as to advance its environmental objective. Previous WTO decisions have not gone this far in safeguarding environmental values. “ (2007) 11(23) ASIL Insights. The recent Appellate Body decision, only adds further interest. Our distinguished speakers will evaluate aspects of the dispute from both the EU's perspective, and an industry perspective to act as a starting point for further discussion.