This course will provide an indepth study of specific topics in international commercial arbitration from both a theoretical and practical perspective. Topics to be considered will include:

1. the arbitration agreement - the separability doctrine, choice of law, parties to the agreement (including non-signatory issues), competence-competence, enforcement of the agreement and other types of national court intervention;
2. complex arbitrations - multiparty and multicontract issues, joinder of parties, consolidation of cases, parallel proceedings;
3. the arbitral tribunal - selection of arbitrators, duties of arbitrators, independence and impartiality issues, challenges of arbitrators;
4. the arbitral proceedings - bifurcation, interim measures, evidentiary rules, the conduct of hearings; and
5. the arbitral award - drafting of awards, enforcement and setting aside of awards, the 1958 New York Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Awards.

The course will refer to arbitration rules, case law, statutes and international conventions.

This course is designed to provide students interested in transactional practice with hands-on insight into the cross-border practice of business law by creating a simulated law-firm environment in which students are asked to complete tasks as if they were junior associates.

The principle objectives of the course are to teach students how to communicate clearly, concisely, and appropriately in a business-law setting, and how to apply and adapt these skills to situations involving international, cross-cultural, and even multinational business transactions. Students will practice these skills through a variety of written and oral communication exercises based on actual cross-border transactions similar to those they will likely encounter as a junior transactional associate at a law firm. The focus of this course will be on practical skills, rather than on theoretical analysis.

Although some of our discussions and exercises will involve reviewing contract provisions and students will become familiar with basic contract structure, this is not a course on contract drafting. Rather, the focus is on developing the student’s practical lawyering skills such that he or she is able to effectively communicate with parties from all sides of a cross-border business transaction and to recognize and overcome the principle cultural, linguistic, and other barriers to cross-cultural communication.

Enrollment by both JD and LL.M. students is encouraged. Class time generally will be split between lecturing and in-class exercises and discussion. The majority of the in-class exercises will utilize fact scenarios from actual deals and will involve students working in small groups or teams.

This advanced seminar presumes knowledge of patent law fundamentals and examines various specific topics, including the Hatch-Waxman Act, patent administration, claim interpretation, the doctrine of equivalents, the experimental use privilege, and comparative and international patent law. Students will write papers on some specific aspect of patent law, not limited to those topics covered in class.

This course blends mock arbitration experiences with class discussion of techniques, strategy, and ethics in international arbitration proceedings. Students directly participate in a series of practical exercises based upon a series of international arbitration fact patterns, which will entail their role-playing as advocates, cross-examiners, and arbitrators. The course emphasizes advocacy in connection with jurisdictional and procedural issues, selecting and challenging arbitrators, and other scenarios that often arise in international arbitration.

Western law—like Western religion, Western fashion, Western individualism, and Western education—has been imposed on African people enslavement, colonialism, and imperialism. But the history of African people and their thinking on “law” or rules for social living does not begin with these atrocities. This is the central, initial recognition of “Africana Legal Studies.” This seminar focuses on the indigenous African ways of knowing “law” and governance constructs. It will explore the need for application of an Africana Studies lens to legal scholarship, the tenets of Africana Studies, and the contours of Africana Legal Studies. The course will explore a theoretical framework for how to identify and distill precolonial, pre-enslavement (“pre-Maafa”) ways of knowing law. It will include an examination of how Africana legal frameworks have evolved in the face of Western colonialism, European enslavement, and other externally-imposed social structures and how Western law interrupted and interfered with Africana legal frameworks. From participating in this African-centered exploration of “law,” governance, and persistence, students may derive insights and strategies for addressing the issues of today, legal and beyond. The writing requirement offers students an opportunity to write on a topic of their choice pertaining to Africana legal frameworks.

Learning Objectives:

Students successfully completing this course will be able to (1) identify the Africana Studies conceptual framework, (2) de-center the West in their thinking about “law” and indigenous ways of knowing governance, (3) identify methods for researching and identifying Africana “legal” frameworks, (4) through class readings and discussions, analyze avenues of inquiry surrounding the relationship between Africana “legal” frameworks and other frameworks of governance, and (5) discuss and consider ways that American jurisprudence and statutes interfere(d) and interact(ed) with Africana governance protocols. The primary course evaluation is by the traditional two-draft seminar paper.

This course provides an in-depth analysis of the arbitration system in China, juxtaposed with international arbitration practices. Students will explore the historical development, legal framework, and procedural intricacies of Chinese arbitration, alongside a comparative study of international arbitration norms and practices. The course will cover key topics such as the structure and function of major arbitration institutions in China, China’s Arbitration Law, the enforcement of arbitral awards, and the role of Chinese courts in arbitration and other issues.

Learning Outcomes:

1.  Comprehend the arbitration practice and the arbitration rules of leading arbitration institutions in China and internationally.

2. Comprehend China’s Arbitration Law and its ongoing amendments.

3. Gain proficiency in the procedural aspects of joinder, multiple parties, multiple contracts, and consolidation, etc. regarding the arbitration conducted under China International Economic and Trade Arbitration Commission (CIETAC), Shenzhen Court of International Arbitration (SCIA), and Shanghai International Arbitration Center (SHIAC), which play significant roles in the arbitration landscape in China.

4. Understand the differences between various institutional arbitration rules and ad hoc arbitration.

5.  Analyze the process for the recognition and enforcement of arbitral awards pursuant to the international conventions like the New York Convention within China; identify the grounds for challenging and setting aside arbitral awards under Chinese law.

6. Analyze the key international conventions, treaties, and model laws that regulate arbitration proceedings.

7. Know the international arbitration practice.

“In the popular imagination, Asian Americans inhabit a vague purgatorial status,” Cathy Hong Park writes, neither “white enough nor black enough,” regarded with suspicion, overlooked, or, increasingly, used by cynics to dismantle affirmative action.  Asian Americans have occupied various positions along the shifting color line: the arrival of Asian immigrants occasioned the assertion of national borders; this “race so different,” Justice Harlan wrote, could never be assimilated as Americans, no matter how colorblind our constitution.  Since the selective reopening of borders in the 1960s, the image of Asian Americans has been repurposed to serve new and competing ends, to affirm the American dream, to disparage black and brown counterparts, or to signal to white Americans the loss of status threatened by immigration and global capitalism. 

This interdisciplinary seminar will offer students an introduction to the history and experience of Asian Americans, not limited to their encounters with the law.  We will cover legal histories of Chinese exclusion, Japanese incarceration, and the Muslim ban.  But we will also survey instances of Asian American activism, anti-imperial radicalism, and Afro-Asian solidarity.  We will also address current events that have brought Asian Americans into renewed visibility, including violence against Asian Americans and the recent affirmative action cases.  There are no prerequisites for this class, but students should be prepared to engage with variety of materials, not limited to legal cases or statutes.

Students will be expected to draft short weekly reflections, to participate in leading our seminar discussion at least once during the semester, and to submit a final paper on a topic of their own choosing. 

The course, taught by practitioners in the field, covers contemporary and cutting-edge aviation topics such as international commercial aviation, aviation security, and the integration of advanced aviation (i.e., drones and advanced air mobility aircraft) into the national airspace. The course material will encompass most aspects of aviation law, including the law of international civil aviation, the economic and safety regulation of air transportation, aircraft registration and certification, aircraft accidents, airport law, government immunity from tort liability, and airline liability for the carriage of passengers and cargo domestically and internationally under the Montreal Convention. Students are exposed to a range of materials, including cases, treaties, executive agreements, and regulations, with a view towards imparting practical skills that can be applied to any field of law.

The current fierce conflict between Israel and Hamas highlights an important feature of the modern world: the vast majority of hostilities since World War II have been between states and nonstate armed groups. These include insurgencies against states such as such as Northern Ireland, Colombia, Israel, Turkey, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, Yemen, and many others. They also involve conflicts between states and transnational terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda, the Islamic State, and Hezbollah.

These hostilities call into question the assumptions that are the foundations of the post-World War II international regulation of force designed to provide greater protection for human rights, especially the right to life. The legal system governing state use of military force is based on the assumption that the greatest threat to life is armed conflicts between states, known as international armed conflicts. This legal regime, known as International Humanitarian Law (IHL), therefore sets forth detailed rules regarding protection of the right to life during armed conflict between states, with only minimal reference to hostilities between states and nonstate armed groups. The assumption is that state use of force to protect life from violence by private actors will involve police operations against criminal behavior, which is governed by International Human Rights Law (IHRL).

This gives rise to a clear division of regulation: IHRL governs state response to nonstate criminal threats to life during peacetime, while IHL governs state response to threats to life posed by other states during war.  Each legal regime protects threats to life that may arise both from others and from the state. Each does this in a distinctive way by imposing significantly different limits on state use of lethal force. 

The assumptions of the post-war system for regulating state use of force, however, do not easily apply to most conflicts since World War II.  This gives rise to several difficult questions.

First, at what point may a state conclude that it needs to resort to military force against nonstate groups because police operations governed by IHRL are ineffective? In other words, when do hostilities evolve from crime or social disturbances to what is known as a non-international armed conflict (NIAC) that requires the conduct of military operations governed by IHL?

Second, IHL provides detailed guidance on state use of military force against other states, but says very little about state use of force during a NIAC.  Where should states turn for guidance in the absence of explicit regulation? Should they apply provisions of IHL by analogy? Should they rely on IHRL because the threat comes from private groups?  Or are conflicts with nonstate armed groups sufficiently distinctive that other rules should apply? If so, what is the source of such rules?  Should it matter whether a NIAC is solely internal or whether it crosses state boundaries?

Third, it is now widely accepted that regulation of states by IHRL to protect human rights does not cease during armed conflict, but that IHRL and IHL are both applicable during wartime. How must a state reconcile these two divergent legal regimes when using force in an armed conflict?  Is it realistic to harmonize such dramatically different sets of rules?  Or can each body of law make its own distinctive contribution to protecting the right to life during wartime in ways that complement one another?

These are questions at the cutting edge of international law regarding the use of force. The course will draw on case studies from several hostilities, including US counterterrorism activities against transnational terrorist organizations; the conflict between Israel and Palestinian non-state groups; the 30-year hostilities between the United Kingdom and the Irish Republican Army in Northern Ireland; the 50-year conflict between Colombia and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia (FARC); and the ongoing violence involving Mexico and the drug cartels.

In sum, the predominance of hostilities between states and nonstate groups in the modern world requires complex sophisticated judgments by decision-makers and lawyers about how to use force. States must protect life from violence by others, but must do so in ways that minimize state infringement on life. This course will give students an appreciation of this challenge and explore how best to meet it in order to protect the right to life from violence both by non-state armed groups and by the state itself.  New events that illustrate the issues in the course undoubtedly will arise during the semester, and discussion of these will be incorporated into the course.

Learning Objectives:

Learning objectives for the course are for students to become familiar with:

(1) basic concepts in international human rights law, United Nations and European Conventions on basic human rights, and their impacts on domestic law;

(2) basic provisions of international law that deal with when states may use military force, and international law governing how such force may be used in armed conflict; and

(3) based on your understanding of the subjects described above, for students to appreciate how many contemporary conflicts with non-state groups present challenges that do not fall squarely within either international human rights law or the international law governing military force.  This means that students must be able to think creatively about how best to protect human life in the setting of complex modern conflicts.

This course explores practices of border fortification, incarceration, criminal law enforcement, and immigration policing. Migration and incarceration—borders and banishment—present some of the most pressing legal and moral controversies in contemporary public life. Over the past two decades, criminal-immigration matters have become the most commonly prosecuted federal crimes; populations in prison, jail and immigration detention have dramatically increased; and though major proposed immigration reforms are stymied in Congress, pressures for reform in both the immigration and criminal contexts continue to mount.

The course will begin by considering the historical, social psychological, and legal foundations of border fortification and banishment practices. Then, attention will turn to some of the crises that pervade border enforcement, policing, and incarceration settings—from the presence of millions of people in the United States without legal status, to the explosion in criminal and immigration detention, police violence, and the widespread problem of sexual assault and prison rape. Reformist alternatives to the status quo in immigration and criminal legal processes will be considered, including through examination of social movement projects, prisoner advocacy, and public interest practice settings focused on relevant reform. Course readings and discussion will center on proposed criminal and immigration law reform and more far-reaching alternatives to borders and banishment. The course will conclude by investigating various abolitionist efforts to think and work beyond borders and banishment. Students will reflect in class and in writing on the various components of the course in relation to their own interests.

There are no prerequisites. All students are welcome.

This course will provide an overview of the field of Business and Human Rights, while affording students an opportunity to work in organizations that are addressing issues in the field in various ways.  This is a rapidly emerging field characterized by viewing the adverse impacts of business operations through the lens of human rights principles.  There is no single form of regulation or regulatory authority, and only a handful of potentially enforceable legal obligations.  Instead, there are a variety of different types of initiatives and programs that depend upon the type of rights at issue, the business sector involved, and the nature and location of the business activities that cause adverse impacts.  This means that there are significant opportunities for creative approaches to produce meaningful change.

We will examine how the modern global corporation is organized around extensive supply chains, the ways in which its formal legal structure can enable it to avoid responsibility for the full range of impacts that it creates, and the successes and limitations of attempts to address this problem through litigation. We will then turn to the emergence of the concept of human rights as a key conceptual tool in the effort to surmount the limits of conventional litigation and regulatory strategies. This will involve discussion of incidents that served as the impetus for this development, and the human rights instruments that provide the basis for human rights claims.

We will then examine in depth some of the types of impacts that can constitute rights violations, relating to concerns such as forced labor, human trafficking, unsafe working conditions and wage theft, physical abuse, forcible displacement, environmental degradation, child labor, sex discrimination, freedom of expression, privacy, and climate change.  We will also examine ways in which women in the global economy may be especially vulnerable to such harms.

This will provide an opportunity to examine the range of responses to these abuses and their effectiveness, such as voluntary industry standards; mandatory human rights due diligence; guidelines established by international organizations such as the United Nations and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, and the International Labor Organization; mandatory and voluntary disclosure provisions; international finance standards; international trade law, and other measures.

Students will also learn about issues that are distinctive to particular economic sectors, such as apparel, energy exploration, mining, financial services, and information and communications technology industries. Finally, we will focus on how businesses can incorporate human rights concerns into their operations in order to comply with the duty of respect articulated by the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.

With respect to learning objectives, the seminar portion of the practicum is intended to acquaint you with:

(1) some of the most significant types of adverse impacts that business operations can impose;

(2) the debate over the extent to which changes in corporate production processes and liberalized trade law have contributed to such impacts;

(3) the major sources of human rights protections for persons who suffer such impacts; and

(4) the range of initiatives that are emerging to protect against and respond to business violations of human rights.

FIELDWORK: Students will be placed with organizations in the Washington, DC area that are involved in working on business and human rights issues. These may include NGOs, corporations, bar associations, human rights consulting firms, and international organizations. Students will work on a variety of types of projects that further the mission of their particular organizations. These may include legal research; advising, training, and educating community groups; gathering information on the effectiveness of voluntary standards; compiling information on adverse human impacts of different types of activities or in different sectors; helping to devise remedies for human rights violations; preparing staff for and participating in meetings with government, business, and/or non-profits organizations; helping advise on possible legislation; submitting reports to international organizations; helping with human rights due diligence efforts; and others.

Note: F-1 and J-1 international students must consult with an international student advisor before enrolling in this course. Please email lawcentervisa@georgetown.edu.

Corporations today have a global scale as well as an impact that matches or sometimes exceeds that of governments. Their activities -- from sourcing of raw materials, to processing and production of intermediate or finished goods, to distribution and sale -- have major consequences not only for the human rights of their employees but also for the rights of the individuals and communities impacted by their operations. In many countries, government regulation and oversight are either absent or largely ineffective. Companies in turn struggle to define their responsibilities in the face of these "governance gaps" -- particularly where requirements under national law fall short of international standards in areas such as hours of work and safety and healthy.

A robust and often contentious debate over these issues culminated in the development of the U.N. Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (the “UNGPs”) under the leadership of Special Representative John Ruggie. These Principles establish a framework for considering the respective roles of governments and corporations and outline core concepts of human rights due diligence and effective remedy. In doing so, the UNGPs also inform and to some extent refocus efforts that have emerged over the past 20 years to address these governance gaps and have brought together stakeholders from business, labor, civil society, the investment community, and academia.

At the same time, in recent years there has been an increased push from civil society groups and certain governments to go beyond these "voluntary" efforts and develop a binding business and human rights treaty mechanism; this has met with strong opposition from business and many other governments, including the United States.

Even as "non-regulatory" approaches remain the predominant means of addressing various business and human rights challenges, there also has been a growing focus in recent years on tools through which national governments and international institutions could exercise greater leverage. This includes advocacy for stronger labor and other human rights language in trade agreements, one-way trade preference programs, procurement standards, and the rules and guidelines applied by international financial institutions -- coupled with more aggressive enforcement of those criteria. Expanded efforts to advance that "regulatory" approach in trade policy and elsewhere in some cases has been met with resistance from governments and business, but there also have been examples of emerging consensus among a diverse range of stakeholders.

This course introduces students to this quickly-evolving business and human rights landscape, including the diverse set of multi-stakeholder initiatives -- some, but not all, of which include government participation. We will discuss the guidance provided by the UNGPs and other instruments, the range of stakeholders and how they engage with one another, tools utilized by governments and corporations to implement human rights standards, and how all of these interact in the context of both sector-specific and cross-cutting legal and policy challenges.

Among the questions the course will examine are:

• Which human rights standards are most relevant to business?
• What are the appropriate linkages between business policies and practices and the promotion of human rights?
• Which business and human rights approaches are emerging as “best practices" and perhaps even as recognized norms?
• What tools to support those are being used by governments and corporations?
• Who are the principal stakeholders and what are their roles and objectives?
• What are the strategies for addressing business and human rights "governance gaps" at the national and international levels?
• What are the opportunities for increased integration of labor/human rights and trade policies, and what are the limitations?
• What mix of mandatory/regulatory and voluntary/“self-regulatory” approaches has been utilized in different situations to advance human rights objectives? Which approaches have been most effective?
• How are various business and human rights challenges playing out in specific sectors, and how do these inform the debate about different approaches?

To address these and other key questions, the course will begin with several sessions setting out the relevant legal and policy developments, with special attention to the UNGPs. It will also include a review of different stakeholders and their roles and interests, and examination of concepts of corporate responsibility and corporate accountability, and an analysis of the various approaches to business and human rights advanced by companies, governments, labor, civil society, and through multi-stakeholder initiatives. The second half of the semester will then focus on how these concepts are being applied in particular sectors to address specific business and human rights challenges.

Throughout the course, students will be asked to examine the various approaches and differing roles of key stakeholders, including by playing the roles of those addressing the key issues from the perspectives of corporations, civil society and unions, and governments. The class will be divided into three groups for purposes of this “role playing” -- with each asked to adopt all three perspectives during the course of the semester, both in students’ individual analyses of assigned readings and in group sessions during certain classes.

Learning Objectives:

Introduction to business and human rights landscape, including legal and policy developments, particularly the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights. The course reviews different stakeholders and roles, examines concepts of corporate responsibility and accountability, and analyzes various approaches to business and human rights advanced by stakeholders. The course will also familiarize students with sector specific business and human rights challenges.

The relationship between business, human rights, and sustainability has gained momentum in recent years with the private sector, governments, civil society, and international organizations, owing largely to the passage of the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGP) in 2011, the 2012 UN Rio + 20 Sustainable Development Conference and the UN Sustainable Development Goals (2015). These developments were preceded and followed by a series of multi stakeholder (governments, private sector, investors, civil society networks and organizations) and specific industry driven initiatives looking at how to integrate these international standards into both self and binding regulatory processes. As a result, many of these initiatives led to an emerging international soft law system of business, human rights and sustainability that is based in the internationally acknowledged body of hard law principles.

Regardless of being industry, sector specific or multi stakeholder in nature, the regulation, de-regulation, policy, practice and ever growing global litigation in this new field of practice is multifaceted, dynamic, interactive, complex and challenges business leaders, markets and even lawyers to think outside the box in order to address a challenging relationship between business, markets and society. This is where business strategy meets risks. Or instead, this is where risks eat a business strategy.  As a result, business leaders, shareholders and their advisors are now required to integrate a 3D internal and external view and assessment on how to address, prevent, mitigate and remediate the social and environmental impacts (risks) of private sector operations in complex environments and with a collaborative and systems thinking approach.

Bar Associations in America and abroad have begun issuing specific guidance on how corporate lawyers should advice their clients incorporating human rights and sustainability standards. For instance, in a Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A) transaction, corporate lawyers are most likely to encounter questions dealing with social, environmental, human rights and environmental concerns. Those advocating on behalf of environmental and human rights organizations will find their work directly intersects with company law, securities law, investment law, governance, compliance, company law and alternative dispute resolution mechanisms to name a few sub areas.

Fast-forward 2020. The global COVID-19 pandemic has suddenly entered this space. It has done so highlighting the vulnerabilities and opportunities in the relationship between business, governments and society across the globe. Furthermore, the global pandemic is challenging all stakeholders not only to become relevant but to re-think, re-imagine and re-envision new models that seek engagement, resilience, addressing grievances, investment, economic recovery and accountability frameworks.

In practice, these global and ever growing litigation trends are also challenging traditional company-led corporate social responsibility (CSR) and ethics programs that have been associated with both philanthropic, corporate citizenship and company-sponsored activities that give back to societies. While many of these programs have achieved several levels of success, for many sectors in society they remain as corporate public relations or green wash exercises and demand more transparent, accountable and remediation responses.  The stakes are high.

Litigation, a growing movement towards mandatory human rights and environmental due diligence and reporting requirements and other types of social demands are challenging companies to be very purposeful and accountable on how they address the environmental, social and governance negative impacts (for some) or violations (for others) of their operations globally and domestically. Stakeholders are asking companies to integrate ongoing due diligence processes that address materiality concerns when it comes to managing supply chains and making sure they are free of child labor, modern slavery and human trafficking. They are also asking companies to address the social and environmental impacts of extraction of natural resources above and below ground, to name a few. 

Furthermore, stakeholders are not alone on this. The emerging and growing movement of shareholder advocacy is leading the way across industries and pushing the way through different strategies for more corporate engagements that drive responsible business conduct and standard-setting activities that push for robust business, human rights and sustainability policies embedded as part of corporate operations across systems and functions. In particular, a wide range of investors that include asset management firms, trade union funds, public pension funds, foundations, endowments, faith-based organizations and family funds are leveraging their assets of over US$3.5 trillion to collaborate around responsible investment while influencing boards and management.

At the conclusion of this course, students will demonstrate the capability:

• To distinguish between relevant applications of the Business, Human Rights and Sustainability frameworks of international hard and soft laws, in the context of environmental, social and human rights challenges across industries and different actors and how they can be integrated into the business strategy.
• To assess critical human rights, environment and natural resources challenges currently faced by industries and markets in different contexts through a multi stakeholder and 3D lens risk management approach.
• To analyze and discuss how different tools and resources can be applied and be relevant to address human rights and environmental challenges, which tools would be best suited for specific contexts and grievance mechanisms that exist for access to remedy across relevant and selected industries (policy development, stakeholder forums and facilitation, influence and development, multi stakeholder assessments, human rights due diligence and environmental assessments) in international development, conflict and post-conflict environments.

See the Center for Applied Legal Studies website for more detailed information about the clinic.

For registration-specific supplemental materials, please see the Center for Applied Legal Studies PDF.

For information about clinic registration generally, please see the Clinic Registration Handbook.

Over the past forty years, China has gone from one of the most isolated countries in the world to a major player in international affairs, a leading exporter, and a much more influential voice on regional security matters. Yet even with the rapid economic growth and increased influence that China has achieved over the past several decades, it maintains an ambivalent attitude towards many key aspects of international law and the architecture of global order. This class will explore China’s ambivalent engagement with international law in the context of its increasing prominence as an emerging power, and will in particular look to address the question of how China might adapt to the existing world order, and the ways in which it might look to influence its evolution. The class will cover a range of issues, including China’s membership in the WTO; its engagement with the international human rights regime; China’s approach to international cooperation on issues like global warming and nuclear non-proliferation; and international law aspects of the dispute over the South China Sea; among others.

Learning Objectives:

This class will provide you with a solid understanding of China’s approach to key international law issues, and also a sense of the Chinese government’s views on international law and international legal institutions more generally. By the end of the semester, you should have a sense of how China fits into the existing global legal order, and the ways in which it is seeking to influence or even alter it. In-class discussions will also bring out the ways in which other states have sought to influence Chinese behavior, which will give you a sense of how and when relatively powerful states like China can be convinced to alter their approach to key international law issues.

For students who have not previously taken a class on public international law, this course will serve as a basic introduction to key concepts of international law (although the readings will focus very heavily on the Chinese approach, rather than the underlying law itself); for those who have taken prior international law courses, this course will serve as a useful refresher.

A core goal of the class is to understand international law from the perspective of the Chinese state. In other words, students will develop a sense of why China makes the choices it does on key international law issues, and what values and political and historical dynamics drive its decision-making. In so doing, students will gain insight into a different political-legal culture, and seek to understand how different political-legal systems – including non-democratic ones like China – come to grips with legal questions in ways that may differ markedly from the approach of the U.S. government. At the same time, having taken steps to articulate China’s perspective, students may be able to see more clearly the values and political and historical factors that drive American decisions on key international law issues.

Finally, a core goal of the response papers – above and beyond demonstrating an understanding of the substance of the readings – will be to give students the chance to build their skills at analyzing legal arguments, and in building their own written arguments in response to them. As noted below, response papers will be graded both on the basis of demonstrated mastery of the material, and also on the basis of the successful construction of a persuasive and fact-based argument.

This course aims to provide an overview of the legal system of the People's Republic of China. The focus will be more on institutions than on specific rules, because finding the rules is much simpler than understanding their institutional context. We will, however, look at specific pieces of legislation as we go along.

China's legal system exists together with its political, economic, and social structures, and cannot be understood in isolation from them. Thus, part of this course is necessarily about understanding modern China in general, not just its legal system. By the time the course is over, I hope that students will have an understanding of the environment within which Chinese law operates, and will be able to appreciate the differences between the way rules operate in the United States and the way they operate in China as well as the reasons for those differences. Although this course, as a survey course, does not specifically address issues of legal aspects of doing business in China (that is another course), it is a highly recommended preparation for such a course, and it is intended to be useful to anyone contemplating a legal career involving China.

This course will provide an overview of U.S. domestic legal regimes that govern commercial spaceflight activities, including those managed by the Federal Aviation Administration, Federal Communications Commission, Department of Commerce, U.S. Defense Department and State Department. The course will examine existing regulations and statutes as well as current discussions about changes to policy and law to address the evolving nature of the space industry and U.S. national space priorities. Examples include the Space Force, space traffic management, and oversight of non-traditional commercial activities in light of international treaty obligations. 

How do we lose and save a constitutional democracy? How can democratic backsliding be prevented? What should we consider in designing a constitution? Can constitutions exist without constitutionalism? What is an authoritarian constitution? How do constitutions transitions and change occur? What forms of judicial review do courts employ? Is it possible to have an unconstitutional constitutional amendment? How do courts across the world interpret constitutions? Can constitutions be employed abusively?

Comparative constitutional law has exploded in contemporary constitutional practice and as a field of study. Events around the world—from Asia and the Middle East to Europe and Latin America—underscore the importance of understanding how constitutional democracies are born and how they can collapse. In this course, we will explore constitutions in global perspective, examining issues of constitutional structure and rights across comparative constitutional systems. We will cover topics like constitution-making, constitutional change, constitutional amendment, judicial review, and constitutional adjudication. Drawing on examples across the world, we will also examine individual rights issues, such as freedom of religion and freedom of expression, as well as constitutionalism in times of emergency and during the COVID-19 pandemic. We will also consider how constitutions can be abused and the question of whether and how constitutionalism might be able to endure in fragile democracies.

How to lose and save a constitutional democracy? How to prevent democratic backsliding? How to design a constitution? Can constitutions exist without constitutionalism? What is an authoritarian constitution? How do constitutions transitions and change occur? What forms of judicial review do courts employ? Is it possible to have an unconstitutional constitutional amendment? How do courts across the world interpret constitutions? Can constitutions be employed abusively?

Comparative constitutional law has exploded in contemporary constitutional practice and as a field of study. Events around the world—from Asia and the Middle East to Europe and Latin America—underscore the importance of understanding how constitutional democracies are born and how they can collapse. In this course, we will explore constitutions in global perspective, examining issues of constitutional structure and rights across comparative constitutional systems. We will cover topics like constitution-making, constitutional change, constitutional amendment, judicial review, and constitutional interpretation. Drawing on examples across the world, we will also examine individual rights issues, such as freedom of religion, as well as constitutionalism in times of national emergency and in fragile democracies.

J.D. students who wish to write a fulfilling the Upperclass Legal Writing Requirement must register for the 3-credit section of the seminar. J.D. or LLM students taking the seminar for 2-credits will not need to write a paper. There are no prerequisites for taking the class.

Comparative law involves the study of several global legal systems - including common law, civil law and religious law – with a goal of preparing students who may find their future careers require knowledge of more than one legal system. It may also be of interest to students who desire to examine the theoretical underpinnings of other countries’ laws and courts out of academic interest.  While the goal is to explore the application of comparative methodology to national and regional legal regimes, the focus will be on both the theoretical underpinnings of the comparative legal method and the historical development of the process for comparing rules, principles, and institutions of different countries. The course also emphasizes the current use of the comparative method in both public and private law by legal actors such as lawyers, judges, and legislators.  In the light of contemporary developments, the course will also provide students the international perspective to make substantive connections between the American common law and other legal traditions, and consider recent debates whether national legal systems and institutions are converging or whether differing economic, political, and social environments are leading to greater diversity and possibly even conflict.

This course surveys the legal system of the People’s Republic of China, using China as a vehicle for asking broader questions about law and legal comparison.   It is meant to be inviting to all students, including those with no background in China who wish to better understand the legal system of an increasingly important global power.   Topics will include: China’s traditional legal order and encounters with the West; the sources of law in contemporary China; courts and dispute resolution; the legal profession; the criminal justice system; selected topics in administrative law, constitutional law, economic law, environmental law, family law, international law, and labor law; China in transnational litigation; and the evolving use of digital technologies in Chinese law.  As with any course in comparative law, a key aim will be to deepen understanding of our own legal system through close and careful examination of another.

This course consists of an introduction to legal comparison with a focus on private law. The course is divided into two parts. The first part presents the functions and aims as well the methods of comparative law in general. After an overview of the legal systems in the world, the course analyses the civil law system in Europe and compares it with the common law system in the United States. It also shows how international and transnational laws address some of the differences between the two systems. While the course focuses on substantive law issues, in the fields of contract and tort, it also examines some structural issues -- such as the court systems, the education of lawyers and the role of judicial review. The second part of the course aims at providing an understanding of the ways in which EU law impacts the evolution of national law. Special attention is devoted to the link between private law and the Single Market, but also to the cultural and linguistic obstacles that come up in the process of harmonization of national laws in Europe. Overall, the course also aims at providing a practical introduction to issues of European law faced by American lawyers. Further it will show how legal comparison is a means for thinking about the law in broader terms.

In our increasingly globalized world, litigation frequently transcends state or national borders.  Transnational litigation implicates the three main topics addressed by the field of Conflict of Laws (also known as Private International Law):  Jurisdiction/choice of forum; choice of law; and enforcement of foreign judgments.  This course focuses on how U.S. courts resolve these issues (although some attention will be paid to how other countries address them).  Special attention will be devoted to the extraterritorial application of US law and to conflict of laws issues that arise in transnational litigation involving Business & Human Rights. 

This seminar deals with the distribution of powers between the president and Congress in the areas of war, diplomacy, international organizations, foreign assistance, commerce, money, etc. as well as the distribution of powers between the national and state governments. Such related matters as the impact on individual rights and the political question doctrine in this context are also discussed.

For over a century, constitutional governance has been seen as a key reformist goal in China. From the Qing Dynasty to the People’s Republic, would-be reformers, both inside and outside government, have pushed constitutionalist ideas as a means to strengthen the Chinese state, and to redefine the relationship between state and its citizens.

This course will look at the path of constitutional development in what might be called greater China: the People’s Republic, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. Our core question will be  straightforward: to what extent has the goal of constitutional governance been fulfilled? If the goal is not yet reached, what are the key barriers to further constitutional development? In each of these three jurisdictions, our answers will vary – often quite significantly, given the differing paths that each place has taken. But in all three cases, our answers will help us to better understand how political power is exercised in China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan, and what limits – if any – the constitution document places on state power.

In each case, we will examine the constitution to understand its formal provisions on key constitutional questions, including structure of government, separation of powers, and protection of human rights. At the same time, we will ask who is able to push for constitutional change, and how they are able to do it. What role can social movements, rights activists, and rights lawyers play in pushing for constitutional change? How do they use the constitution as a political platform to advance their own agenda? And how does the Party-state use its own constitution to push its own political and legal goals?

“Criminal law across borders” studies two bodies of law. One is domestic (national) criminal law applied to crimes committed outside national territory. The other is crimes under international law: war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide, and aggression. These are the “core crimes” tried by courts like the Nuremberg Tribunal, the tribunals for Rwanda, Sierra Leone, and former Yugoslavia, and the International Criminal Court (ICC). Along with the substantive law on these issues, we examine procedural law on topics such as jurisdiction and immunity from prosecution. As a 1L course, it will introduce basic doctrines of criminal law and international law. The course will also examine the problems confronting international criminal justice today, including the political backlash against holding leaders accountable for core crimes. The aim is to introduce students to basic doctrines of international criminal law, as well as doctrines concerning the extraterritorial application of U.S. criminal law. The course combines law, policy, and history.

Please note that we will read about and discuss some difficult issues in this course, including genocide, torture, sexual violence, and legal issues in current ongoing armed conflicts, including the Russia-Ukraine war and Israel’s conflicts with Hamas and Hezbollah.

This seminar explores white-collar criminal practice in the transnational context.  “Transnational” cases generally involve the potential application of one or more country’s laws to alleged criminal activity that crosses borders. We begin by introducing students to the general differences in the legal structures, concepts of criminal law, and varied standards for corporate and individual liability, that apply in civil and common law systems. We will study the substantive U.S. law that is implicated in many transnational prosecutions and learn when U.S. law applies extraterritorially. The substantive provisions we study may include proscriptions on corruption, fraud, money laundering, tax evasion, data breaches/hacking, or violations of economic sanctions. We will explore the tools available for obtaining evidence abroad, as well as some of the national laws and regulations that impact transnational investigations. Some of the challenges we will explore are regulations regarding data privacy, employment laws, national security/state secret laws, and blocking or economic protection statutes. At the conclusion of the class, we will consider a number of case studies that illustrate issues companies face in attempting to forge a global resolution among regulators and prosecutors from different countries. These include managing competition between sovereigns, joint and parallel national investigations, and the division of penalties.

Learning Outcomes

This course, as its title suggests, is designed to expose students to important issues they will face in the transnational practice of law. One of our goals, then, is very practical: to give students information they will need to be successful practitioners in this area.

Another goal is to challenge students to take a step back and think about larger questions:  When criminal conduct crosses borders, which sovereign should prosecute?  Should U.S. criminal law extend as far as it does? Is it fair or efficient to permit multiple countries to address such conduct criminally?  Should expedited evidence-gathering tools be available to both the defense and prosecution?  What liability rules would best serve the purposes of punishment?

Like all writing seminars, the class also seeks to enhance students’ ability to conduct legal research, capacity to engage in critical thinking, and prowess in communicating effectively, in writing and in class.

The course is designed to give students an overview and practical insight on the legal aspects of doing business with or investing in Latin America. The course will focus on Mexico, but will also address legal issues associated with doing business in Central and South American countries. Topics will be discussed from the perspective of U.S. investors doing business in the region, and will cover the legal implications of cross-border distribution, licensing and joint venture arrangements, acquisitions and direct investments, labor planning and creditor rights.

This seminar will examine cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, Ether and Ripple's XRP, and their possible roles as commodities, payment instruments and investments. It will also briefly touch on “Initial Coin Offerings” ("ICOs")—fundraises by startups identifying technology-based problems and proposing the sale or financing of technology-based solutions. The primary focus will be on the US financial services regulators and their evolving treatment and regulatory approaches to digital assets beginning in 2013 up to the present.

Cryptocurrencies and ICOs have recently attracted more attention—and investment dollars—than early stage venture capital. However, governmental authorities around the world worry that they are under-regulated (or unregulated), pointing to a recent spate of fraud, market volatility, and potential money laundering associated with virtual transactions. This seminar will explore the regulatory framework for digital currencies and payments, and examine the evolving reforms and regulatory efforts arising in the sector. The course will cover topics including the differences between key cryptocurrencies; the varying regulation of cryptocurrencies and ICO tokens as “commodities” vs. “securities;” the mechanics of an ICO; and money laundering and bank secrecy laws.

This seminar provides an introduction to the increasingly important field of private international law as well as an opportunity to explore in depth specific issues now under active consideration in the various international and regional organizations working on the development, codification and harmonization of private international law. Beyond the “classic” PIL questions of jurisdiction, choice of law, judicial assistance and enforcement of judgments, we will explore such topics as international family law (including international adoption, abduction and enforcement of child support and family maintenance), alternative dispute settlement mechanisms (including international mediation and commercial and investment arbitration), as well as the cross-border aspects of such topics as data protection and privacy, bankruptcy/insolvency, secured transactions, securities law, intellectual property, transport of goods by sea, letters of credit, leasing law, consumer protection, and even wills and trusts. You may write your papers in any of these areas (among others).  All students will be expected to choose a topic to research, write and present to the class.

This course requires a paper and an oral presentation. It is open to J.D. and LL.M. students. For J.D. students who choose the 3 credit “writing seminar” option, the objective will be to research and write analytical papers of publishable quality on discrete topics of current importance in transnational practice. Students will be required to satisfy the WR requirement including (1) selection of a paper topic approved by the professor, (2) submission of an outline, followed by feedback from the professor, (3) submission of a draft paper of at least 6,000 words exclusive of footnotes, followed by feedback from the professor, and (4) submission of a final paper of at least 6,000 words exclusive of footnotes, incorporating the professor’s suggested revisions. The paper must use legal forms of citation, where appropriate.

Learning goals for this course:

Familiarity with substance of "Private International Law", where it is developed and how; understanding of the relationship between international and domestic law; ability to research effectively in the field; ability to write coherently and present conclusions orally. 

This course will use recent transactions involving infrastructure projects (domestic and international) to illustrate the legal techniques and financial issues involved in project development and financing. The course will address case studies involving energy projects, telecom, toll roads, mining, ports, airports, other infrastructure and professional sports facilities. Class discussion will include analysis of how project risk analysis is done and review of key documents used to develop, construct and finance projects. Students will participate in simulated contract negotiation and drafting exercises representing designated parties to a transaction. Coverage will include different sources of financing, including banks, capital markets, ECAs and multinational entities. There will be both a final examination (open-book) and a short drafting exercise that will be graded. Class on 11/2 will be a Special Negotiation Workshop, for which the class will be divided into groups to negotiate a financing term sheet for a model transaction. 

The required course textbook is: 

E.R. Yescombe, Principles of Project Finance (London: Academic Press, an imprint of Elsevier, 2014) (2d Edition). Please note that the second edition is materially different from the first edition, and all page number and other references in this syllabus and in the course will be to the second edition.

Additional case studies, such as Henry A. Davis, ed., Project Finance: Practical Case Studies, Second Edition (two volume set: Volume I – Water and Power, and Volume II – Resources and Infrastructure), and other materials not in the above publication will be provided.

Learning objectives:

The course is based on four major themes and aims to teach students to analyze issues in light of each theme: (i) allocation of risk, (ii) non-recourse or limited recourse arrangements, (iii) effective contract structures, and (iv) financeability. The class will focus on both theory (risk analysis and mitigation) and practice (critiquing and drafting agreements). Both the written assignment and the workshop will focus on practical matters relating to practice issues.

This course involves an in-depth look, in a seminar-type setting, at different state-to-state dispute settlement systems in the international trade area.  Although the principal focus will be WTO dispute settlement, the course will also examine the new or re-invigorated mechanisms in regional agreements (e.g., RCEP, CPTPP) and bilateral trade agreements of the United States (USMCA, CAFTA) and the EU. In addition to examining the treaty provisions themselves, the course will involve the close reading of arbitral decisions, as a medium to examine real-world systemic issues regarding dispute settlement, such as the function of terms of reference, approaches to treaty interpretation, confidentiality, coherence between different bodies of international law, the role of precedent, standard of review, the scope of appellate review, implementation and compliance, and remedies. At the same time, students will gain familiarity with some of the leading substantive issues in international trade law. 

Human rights are humanity's greatest ethical, moral, and legal capital. Seventy-five years ago, reeling from the devastation of world war, States came together to agree on a blueprint for preventing future cataclysms—respect for human rights—and codified that plan in foundational documents like the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The rights detailed in the UDHR—which encompass civil and political rights, like the right to free expression and a fair trial, and economic, social, and cultural rights, like the right to adequate food and housing—were seen as interdependent, indivisible, and mutually reinforcing: no right should be privileged above another.

But it wasn’t long before the ideological divide of the Cold War fractured this consensus, with the West generally prioritizing civil and political rights and the Soviet bloc generally emphasizing economic and social rights.

This course will explore the negative impact of that artificial division, which resulted in the demotion of economic, social, and cultural rights (ESCR) to “second generation” rights, with scant enforceability and justiciability, and the urgency of repairing the breach, particularly in the context of the climate emergency. The course will situate economic, social, cultural, and environmental rights (ESCER) in the international and regional human rights systems, with a special focus on the Inter-American system. The course will then examine in detail a number of specific ESCER, with an emphasis on the impact violations of these rights have on women, indigenous people, people of African descent and other populations in situations of vulnerability or historically discriminated against. The course will examine the contours of the right to a healthy environment and will explore the role and responsibilities of business and other economic actors in upholding such rights.

Learning Objectives:

Students will gain a comprehensive understanding of economic, social, cultural, and environmental rights, including current developments and controversies surrounding these rights. Students will be able to identify tools and gaps in the national and international realization of rights such as the rights to clean water and sanitation, health, education, housing, work, and a healthy environment.

The course will also train students to craft persuasive arguments for the legal defense of these rights at national and international levels and to advocate on key issues, such as the climate emergency and the obligation of corporate due diligence.

Students will learn to apply the principles of universality, indivisibility, and interdependence, with a gender and intersectional approach, to the analysis of ESCER.

Students will get a unique insider’s look at high-level advocacy for ESCER. I will share some of my own field experiences during the course and students will also have the opportunity to hear from some distinguished guest speakers.

Finally, this course aims to provide students not only with exposure to the legal principles underlying ESCER but a deep understanding of the impact of violations of these rights on the most historically discriminated populations. Exploration of each course topic will include the perspectives of people and communities most impacted by the lack of access and enjoyment of ESCER. This approach is designed to help build a community of practice and solidarity that will live on beyond the course.

Students in this class will have an opportunity to study, comment on, and develop scholarship of their own regarding environmental law and policy. The class will include introductory materials and discussion about attributes and methods of environmental scholarship.  Then the workshop will introduce you to some of the best academic scholars in environmental law who will present a work-in-progress.  In both advance written comments and through workshop discussion, students will engage presenting scholars regarding their scholarship.  Depending on the presenters’ paper subjects and others’ availability, the workshop might also include a few classes with responsive comments from an outside visitor from government, not-for-profits, law firms, businesses, or legal academe.

Students can fulfill their Georgetown Law upper level writing requirement with an opportunity to produce substantial, publishable legal scholarship on a topic related to environmental, energy, or natural resource law, broadly defined, and receive three credits for their efforts.  All students will provide all speakers and the professor with at least brief (no more than one page) of advance comments and questions.  Two credit students will provide more in-depth comments to three speakers and the professor, with such comments expected to be five pages in length and reflect careful reading of both the paper and, as necessary to provide knowledgeable comments, draw on selective delving into other scholarly or primary materials relevant to, or referenced in, the presented paper.  Our last session together will include a bit of debriefing, but will mainly be a session for three credit students to present their drafts and receive comments.

The course examines the role the European Court of Justice plays in the evolution of private law in Europe. It focuses on the way in which the court has interpreted the EU Treaty in order to ensure effectiveness of EU law, and analyzes some of the landmark cases in that area. The course also shows how the ECJ has dealt with the interpretation of directives, particularly in the field of consumer protection, and what impact this case law has on national law making.

How -- and with what legal capacities -- can the European Union address challenges to its foreign policy and security interests like the war in Ukraine?  How has the EU led the way globally in establishing rules for the digital economy, in areas ranging from data protection law to dominant platform services?  How is the EU adapting to major changes in the global trade and investment system, ranging from a new focus on economic security to the retreat from investor-state dispute settlement?  What legal tools can “Brussels” deploy to rein in illiberal EU member states?  What is the legal and economic relationship between the United Kingdom and the EU following Brexit?
This two-credit survey tackles these and other topics in the course of providing a comprehensive introduction to the scope and operation of the law of the European Union. The first part of the course begins by focusing on the key legal and political dimensions of European integration. We next examine the EU judiciary and its relationship to national constitutional courts, followed by consideration of the EU’s increasingly important fundamental rights and rule of law frameworks. Our examination of the EU’s foundations concludes with the EU’s singular economic and political accomplishment, the Single Market.  
In the second part, we turn to several dimensions of the EU’s extensive international reach.  We focus on its role as an international actor, for example through adoption of economic sanctions, and on EU law governing external trade and foreign investment.  Several classes take up the EU’s growing body of legislation and jurisprudence on the digital economy, most notably its leadership on data protection, data privacy and the multifaceted regulation of large digital platforms. The EU’s response to the Ukraine war, and its expanding role in the security and defense area, is also considered.  Topical political, economic and institutional developments are addressed throughout the term.

The course has no prerequisites. International Law or related courses may be useful at the margins. 

Learning Objectives:

• Recognizing and appreciating the legal fundamentals and doctrines that underpin the European Union, the historical and current context in which European integration has evolved, and the nature of the relationship between EU institutions and Member States.
• Understanding general structure and specific instruments of EU primary and secondary law, in particular the text of essential articles in the EU Treaties, as well as gaining facility in identifying and working with a variety of EU law source materials.
• Connecting and applying legal understandings to current/ongoing political developments involving the EU, member states and third countries, including by producing a professional-caliber legal research memorandum on an EU law topic of personal interest or selected from a list provided by the instructors.

This course is designed to complement the rest of the 1L curriculum in several ways.  First, it will expose you to selected elements of international and foreign law, beyond the usual concentration on the U.S. domestic law system.  Second, our focus will be principally upon treaty texts, rather than judicial decisions, within a system that does not rely upon binding precedents in the same ways you have already encountered.  Third, we hope to nurture your sensitivity to facts, as much as to law, as key elements in legal practice.  Finally, through a series of collaborative simulation exercises, we intend to engage you in active, experiential learning in a direct, powerful way.

The four-day simulation is based upon a hypothetical attempt by the United States to secure the extradition of two accused terrorists, who have been indicted in federal court for participating in terrorist acts on U.S. soil, but who are currently resident in Russia and in France.  The leaders in those countries appear willing to return the two suspects to the United States, but the effort may be blocked by those countries’ membership in the European Convention on Human Rights, which may bar extradition in cases where the accused would face the prospect of capital punishment or indefinite detention in harsh conditions.

Students will be assigned the role of counsel for one of the defendants or one of the governments, and will work in small teams on two primary tasks.  The first exercise is to prepare for and conduct a fact-gathering interview of one of the clients.  The second exercise is to plan, practice, and conduct a simulated hearing before the European Court of Human Rights.  Throughout, students will be guided by the instructor and by a team of teaching fellows in the development of essential lawyering skills, including fact development and analysis, problem solving, strategic planning, and effective oral advocacy.

Each colloquium session will focus on a scholarly paper and presentation by, or structured dialogue with, a leading scholar in the field of international law and foreign relations. The papers will relate to cutting edge issues concerning international law, broadly understood.  On occasion, a second leading expert in international law and foreign relations will serve as a discussant and comment on the paper.

Students are expected to (i) carefully read the speakers’ papers; (ii) prepare weekly response papers that will be provided to the speakers in advance of the colloquium session, and (iii) attend, and actively engage in, weekly, in-person sessions, including the preparation and asking questions at each meeting. This is a small and focused course and thus reading and active participation are essential.

In addition to the students enrolled in the colloquium, faculty members from the Law Center and other area law schools will attend the weekly paper presentations. The colloquia will be open also to professionals working in international law and policy in Washington.

This is an advanced course on constitutional principles bearing on U.S. foreign relations: primarily, separation of powers, federalism and judicial review of Executive acts and Congressional legislation. It focuses on some of the most challenging issues that have divided the American polity from the inception of the Republic and continue to do so today, e.g., the allocation of foreign affairs power between the Executive and Congress; the scope of Presidential power to protect the nation in times of danger; and the proper role of the courts in deciding legal issues relating to national security.  We will study historical materials that inform the legal arguments on both sides of current controversies over Presidential and Congressional power and discuss foreign relations issues under judicial review in 2024. We also study the power to make treaties and executive agreements, the Supremacy clause and application of customary international law by U.S. courts.

The Russian Federation’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine brings to the forefront the question of aggressive war. The 1946 Nuremberg Charter labeled aggression a “crime against peace,” and the Nuremberg Tribunal called aggressive war the supreme international crime. The UN Charter forbids the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of another state. In its turn, Russia has invoked its right of self-defense under the Charter.

Legal questions pale in comparison with the life-and-death issues on the ground—but the legal questions are important, and will have long-term consequences. They include questions about how to define international crimes, mechanisms of accountability (the International Criminal Court, a proposed special tribunal for aggression, domestic prosecutions), immunities, and the very nature of sovereignty.

The seminar will tackle these questions not only from a legal point of view, but also from the points of view of history, philosophy, political theory, and practical questions. We will look closely at the Nuremberg trials and the formative era of the UN. We will consider the question of whether the United States has also waged aggressive wars – in Vietnam, the Balkans, and Iraq. This will require an examination of so-called “anticipatory self-defense” (preventive war) and humanitarian military intervention as justifications for use of force.

Although the focus will be on crimes against peace, the seminar will also treat other core international crimes: genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity.

In fieldwork practicum courses, students participate in weekly seminars and conduct related fieldwork at outside organizations. This fieldwork practicum course will focus on governmental protection for persons fleeing gender-based persecution and abuse. Students will participate in a two hour/week seminar and ten hours/week of fieldwork with law firms and nonprofit organizations in the D.C. metro area to assist lawyers representing clients fleeing their countries due to gender-related violence.

SEMINAR: In the two-credit, graded seminar portion of the practicum, students will discuss how shifting migration patterns and societal forces have caused more women and sexual minorities to leave their home countries and immigrate to the United States. In many countries, individuals face persecution and violence on account of their gender. This includes the use of rape as a weapon of war, domestic violence, so-called honor crimes, forced marriage, widow rituals, one child policies, forced sterilization policies, and female genital mutilation. During the seminar, students will study and learn through experience about the societal forces causing the forced migration of women and sexual minorities and how U.S. laws and policies address the immigration status of these immigrants. We will focus on forms of relief that, while available to both men and women, are primarily accessed by women and members of the LGBTQ+ community to obtain legal status in the United States. Specifically, we will focus on: asylum, withholding of removal, protection under the Convention Against Torture, the Violence against Women Act, U Visas, and T Visas.

FIELDWORK: In the two-credit, mandatory pass/fail fieldwork portion of the practicum, students will work with lawyers from law firms and nonprofit agencies on real cases of immigrants fleeing their countries because of gender-based violence. Students will be assigned in teams to interview clients, prepare research and briefs, and assist the principal lawyer conducting the case. Students will also work directly with attorneys at local legal service agencies who are representing survivors of gender-based harm seeking legal status in the United States.

In 1977, the United States adopted the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (“FCPA”) to combat bribery of foreign public officials. As with many U.S.-led initiatives, it was seen at the time as naïve, quixotic, myopic, and doomed to failure. A little more than 20-years later, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (“OECD”) adopted its Convention on Combatting Bribery of Foreign Public Officials, and as required by the Convention, the countries of Western Europe promptly adopted organic statutes modeled, in large measure, on the FCPA.

In the ensuing decade and a half, prosecutions of corporations for foreign bribery have become perhaps the most important prosecutorial priority for the Department of Justice (“DOJ”) and Securities & Exchange Commission (“SEC”) and certainly the most financially lucrative U.S. prosecution initiative. Transnational investigations have become a staple of these prosecutions. All 10 of the largest FCPA prosecutions have occurred since 2008; of these, eight have involved foreign corporations.

This course will cover the development of U.S., international, and foreign initiatives against public-official bribery. Because (at least in the US) most of these cases have been resolved without litigation, we will focus on critical, unresolved issues, such as the FCPA’s definition of a foreign “instrumentality” and a “foreign official,” as well as the scope of U.S. extra-territorial jurisdiction. In addition to addressing the substance of foreign and international laws and conventions, we will explore the critical issues that arise from the growing trend in trans-national investigations and prosecutions, including double jeopardy, res judicata, and international data collection.

We will explore these issues through fact-based, real-world scenarios drawn, in large part, from the “Bonny Island” case, which involved a scheme by four international corporations to bribe three successive Nigerian presidents (as well as a constellation of lower-ranking officials) to secure multi-billion dollar contracts for the construction of an LNG facility in Nigeria. We will use this factual setting to frame class participation and in-class exercises and projects, with the goal of sharpening critical thinking, tackling complex legal questions in concrete factual settings, and honing advocacy skills.

Learning Objectives:

We have the following expectations of learning outcomes:

1. We expect each student to achieve mastery of the basic concepts underlying the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, including the basic statutory terms, the elements of the various offenses, and the scope of U.S. jurisdiction. In our experience, it is impossible to fully understand and discuss more challenging questions about the scope or application of the statute without mastery of the fundamentals.
2. We expect each student to gain an understanding of the roles and policies of the U.S. enforcement authorities, the Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the manner in which FCPA cases are investigated, prosecuted, and defended, as well as how the U.S. enforcement agencies would approach a problem and what outcomes are likely to result.
3. We expect each student to gain an understanding of the global enforcement landscape for anti-corruption. Students are expected to achieve a basic understanding of the OECD Convention on Bribery, other international anti-bribery conventions, and the leading state laws, including the Brazil Clean Companies Act, the UK Bribery Act, and the French Sapin II. Students will also gain an understanding of the role of the World Bank and other multi-lateral development banks in the worldwide scheme.
4. We expect students to learn the basic principles of anti-corruption compliance programs, and the manner in which anti-corruption compliance impacts the prevention, detection, investigation, and prosecution of FCPA cases, as well as violations of similar foreign laws.
5. Through scenario-based learning, we expect students to gain a facility in applying law to fact and an understanding of how governments and defense counsel approach challenging question of jurisdiction, enforcement, and punishment in a multi-jurisdictional, cross-border setting.

This course examines the current state of competition (or “antitrust”) policies and enforcement mechanisms around the world, using case studies from the US, EU, Asia and elsewhere. The international competition community is in the throes of a vigorous re-examination of the goals and tools of competition regulation and policy: has inadequate or ineffective competition regulation contributed to excessive industry concentration, income inequality, stagnant wage growth, and related harm to consumers and society? Or are existing competition enforcement tools sufficient to address actual competition problems, leaving other economic and social issues to be better addressed by other public policies and tools? Do digital markets and “platforms” require special rules? These issues present the challenges of accommodating competition policy to evolving political, economic and social demands.

This seminar will examine the development of competition laws around the world, differences in substantive standards among the major enforcement jurisdictions; the role of historical, political, and economic forces that affect those differences; and the possible consequences of those differences. We will start with a basic understanding of competition principles common to key jurisdictions including the U.S., Canada, the EC, the UK, and Japan, and will compare and contrast these with the principles applied in developing and transition economies, such as China, Mexico, India, and South Africa. Particular emphasis will be on current issues and trends including the role of antitrust in a digital economy, multi-jurisdictional merger control, and regulation of dominant firm conduct. We will also consider the role of competition policy in economic and political development generally.

Globalization and the international trade of drugs and medical products have progressed beyond any single regulatory authority’s ability to effectively ensure the quality, safety, and effectiveness of these products. In the U.S., the importation of foreign sourced products has increased tremendously, accounting for over 80% of the active pharmaceutical ingredients. However, varying drug regulations have resulted in gaps in oversight causing differing views on the acceptable level of risk in public health leading to drug quality related deaths and other serious harms. One clear reason for this compromised system is the differences in how these products are regulated from country to country. Nevertheless, the pharmaceutical and related industries are thriving in the global marketplace. This course is intended to be the first comparative survey into the regulatory frameworks of certain key countries, both developed and developing markets, along with international institutions, such as the World Health Organization, involved in promoting the access and development of safe, effective and quality medical products. This course will also identify the major international non-governmental stakeholders, and the multi-lateral schemes and treatises in which they operate that are intended to assist in the convergence of pharmaceutical laws and regulations.

Global Health Law is the flagship course offered by Georgetown University Law Center’s O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law. This course is open to both Georgetown JD and LLM students and is compulsory for students in the National and Global Health Law LLM and the Global Health Law and Governance LLM.

The survey course explores the roles that the law, lawyers, and legal institutions play in public health across the globe. Global health law encompasses international law and policy that directly or indirectly affects health, including treaties, regulations, strategies, and expert guidelines. This course provides a strong foundation in these instruments, laws and policies, including topics such as governance of the World Health Organization, Universal Health Coverage, the International Health Regulations, the role of the UN Special Rapporteur on Health, and the proposed accord on  global pandemic preparedness. The course also explores comparative national approaches to health governance, law, and policy.

The course is divided into three modules. Module 1 covers the foundations of global health law, providing overviews of public international law, international human rights law, international trade law, and the intersections between intellectual property law and health. Module 2 covers health systems and governance, including the World Health Organization, and public health ethics and principles. Module 3 addresses the human right to health and other key emerging topics in health law such as environmental law and health, the global campaign for Universal Health coverage, and the use of litigation to advance the right to health. The course culminates in students presenting proposals to reform international law to better protect and promote global and public health outcomes.

Students will hear from leading voices in global health law and benefit from the expertise of the O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law, as well as other resources at Georgetown University and in the broader Washington, DC community.

Course Goals/Student Learning Outcomes

1. Knowledge of the substantive foundations of global health law, including public international law; human rights law; global health governance; the interface between international trade and intellectual property law and health; and principles of public health law.
2. Knowledge of the legal issues related to a range of global health challenges, including access to health care and prevention and control of non-communicable diseases and infectious diseases.
3. Knowledge of the various roles that lawyers can play in advancing global health, including legal drafting, negotiating, litigation, and advocacy for law reform.
4. Ability to use various skills relied upon by global health lawyers, including legal research, analysis and writing, strategic thinking, and communication. 

In this intensive course, students will work with faculty and fellows at the O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law to gain an in­depth understanding of global health law through intensive examination and role play of one or more major problems in global health. Potential problems could include a naturally occurring infectious disease epidemic such as extensively drug resistant tuberculosis; a future epidemic such as pandemic Influenza (A) H5N; an intentional introduction of a lethal pathogen such as anthrax; and/or major chronic diseases caused by obesity or tobacco use. Students should come to this course with a basic level of understanding of global health law, including the major international health treaties and governing structures. When studying and role playing these kinds of problems, students will be asked to construct innovative methods of global health governance, drawing upon existing international health law and institutions, along with a vision for more ideal models. 

Full attendance and participation is required at all sessions. Class sessions will consist of a combination of lecture, case simulations, and discussion. Grades are based on student participation and a final paper.

During this century, the United States has raised revenue chiefly through the income tax, which is a per capita or direct tax. In many other countries, fiscal authorities rely far more heavily on indirect taxes. With the pace of globalization accelerating, U.S. tax professionals increasingly advise foreign clients, for whom indirect taxes may constitute a large percentage of aggregate tax liability. A basic knowledge of how these taxes work is thus a valuable asset for any lawyer doing corporate or international tax work.

This course will introduce students to indirect taxation, exemplified by the European Union’s Value Added Tax (“VAT”) and Canada’s Goods and Services Tax (“GST”), two of the fastest-growing indirect taxes globally. The course will examine the economic and policy rationales for such taxes and study in detail how different types of value added taxes work, including tax calculations and cross-border aspects. Finally, the course will compare the VAT with the retail sales taxes imposed by many U.S. state and local governments and will consider the feasibility of adopting some version of a VAT in the United States. At the end of the course, students will have a broad technical understanding of indirect taxes and an appreciation of the policy concerns that animate legislative and academic discussion of this important subject.

This two-credit course will be divided into nine 3-hour class sessions. All sessions will be taught by global indirect tax professionals from KPMG’s Washington D.C. office.

Taxes on goods and services continue to be the largest revenue source for jurisdictions, particularly low- (LICs) and middle-income countries (MICs). On average across the OECD, taxes on goods and services accounted for 32.1% of total tax revenues in 2020 but represented 56% and 51% of total tax revenues in LICs and MICs, respectively. Value added taxes (VAT) produced 20.2% of total taxes in OECD countries on average in 2020, making it by far the main category of taxes on goods and services.

With economies becoming more interconnected, U.S. tax professionals increasingly advise clients investing abroad, for whom indirect taxes may constitute a large percentage of aggregate tax liability. A basic knowledge of how these taxes work is thus a valuable asset for any lawyer involved in corporate or international tax work.  This course will introduce students to indirect taxation, including customs duties, and its application in various jurisdictions.
The emphasis of the course is on major principles of VAT regimes, as opposed to exceptions to the general rules. Further, application of a particular principle may produce favorable results to one taxpayer but unfavorable results to another taxpayer. This phenomenon is often encountered when one taxpayer is a domestically registered corporation and the other taxpayer is a non-registered foreign corporation unable to reclaim VAT. Therefore, the course will encourage the student to approach an issue with an open mind regarding possibilities for tax registration in foreign jurisdictions.

The course will examine the economic and policy rationales for such taxes and study in detail how value added taxes work, including tax calculations and the impact of customs duties in cross-border transactions, as well as practical VAT considerations in the digital economy and M&A transactions. The course will also encourage students to give thought to public policy issues such as ease of administration within developing countries.

Course Goals/Student Learning Outcomes:
At the end of the course, students will have a broad technical understanding of indirect taxes and an appreciation of the policy concerns that animate legislative and academic discussion of this important subject.

At the conclusion of this course (i.e., for the take-home exam) the student should be able to apply basic principles of indirect taxes and identify issues.  The student should recognize when a client may have exposure for nonpayment of indirect and when a client may have failed to take full advantage of opportunities provided by various taxing systems.

This one-credit (7 session) seminar is designed to provide participants in the 2L year of the Global Law Scholars program with a concrete introduction to some of the specific skills used by practitioners in the fields of international and transnational law. Sessions are presented by a mixture of Georgetown Law faculty and outside practitioners. In addition to an overview of the basic features of international negotiation, arbitration and litigation, and an introduction to comparative law, emphasis is given to research, technical writing, fact-finding and advocacy skills. Skill development is taught through a variety of mechanisms (i.e., case studies, workshop style methods, role-playing, etc.). Student preparation for the various sessions includes readings on both skills and theoretical background. Student evaluation at the end of the course is based on class participation and completion of a short piece of technical writing (i.e. white paper).

Learning goals for this course: Ability to research and write/present a substantive legal topic. Ability to work together as a group on an advanced level topic. Awareness of relationship between international and domestic law.

This one-credit (7 session) seminar is designed to build on the experiences of the fall 2L GLS seminar (“Building an International Skill Set”) by affording participants an opportunity to apply the specific skills used by international and transnational lawyers in the context of a specific substantive area chosen by them. For 2013/14, the 2L GLS focused on constructing an international trade mechanism to promote corporate accountability in developing countries, specifically addressing environmental and human rights concerns. For 2014/15 the 2L group wrote an assessment of corporate compliance W.R. of 1502 of Dodd Frank in the area of conflict minerals. For 2015/16, the group conducted an in-depth analysis of implementation review mechanisms (CIRMs) in multilateral agreements. In 2016/17 the chosed topic was on use of armed force in outer space. Preparation for the group sessions includes background readings on the theoretical, practical and legal aspects of the relevant issues. Under the guidance of Georgetown faculty, participants determine in advance the goal of their work (for example, an analytical “white paper” on a particular substantive issue, a conference involving noted academics and experts, an advocacy effort, etc.). Student evaluation at the end of the course is based on class participation, contribution to the chosen goal, and completion of a short piece of technical writing.

Around the world, people are mobilizing to defend democracy, protect human rights, and promote sustainable development. We’ll study the international legal framework for civic activism, examining laws governing protests, social justice movements, and and nonprofit organizations. We’ll also explore the impact of national security, authoritarianism, and digital technology on civic space.

We'll take a global tour, comparing approaches in the US, Europe, Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and Latin America. We'll discuss current events, play the role of UN Ambassadors, and help countries draft laws.

This class will provide skills and contacts to help you pursue a career in international human rights law. Past classes have spoken with UN officials, a lawyer for a group allegedly engaged in terrorism, and frontline human rights defenders.

Learning Objectives:

By the end of the semester, you should have the ability to:

1. Analyze international law governing the freedoms of association, assembly, and expression;
2. Evaluate the extent to which national legislation complies with international law;
3. Craft arguments to bring national legislation closer to international law and good practice;
4. Communicate effectively with diplomats, government officials, and civic activists;
5. Analyze ethical aspects that arise in crafting laws that affect the freedoms of association, assembly, and expression; and
6. Assess the impact of law on nonprofit organizations, social movements, and protests.

In this course, students will learn how to structure and execute global securities offerings. The course begins with a brief examination of the process of an SEC-registered offering in the U.S., and the ongoing requirements of SEC reporting companies, and then continues by examining how to conduct offerings, both domestically and internationally, outside of SEC registration. Topics include the registration requirements of 5 of the Securities Act, the various exceptions from registration, including Sections 4(a)(1), 4(a)(2) and 4(a)(7) of the Securities Act, the safe harbors pursuant to those exemptions, including Regulation S, Regulation D, Rule 144, Rule 144A, and the changes to certain of those rules and regulations by recent legislation, including the JOBS Act and the FAST Act. In addition to a thorough review of the rules and regulations in the course materials, this course seeks to give students insight into how those rules and regulations are used in practice, and into the mechanics of conducting various types of securities offerings, so that upon completing the course students are better prepared to address these topics in practice. The course was jointly developed by a senior SEC staffer and a private practitioner. Note that there is no pre-requisite for this course.

A backlash against globalization has emerged in advanced economies as a result of job loss, wage stagnation, precarious work and economic insecurity for the middle class. The liberal globalization of the last three decades is under attack for the unequal distribution of its gains and its failure to provide better opportunities for ordinary working people. Reimagining the global economy will require placing work front and center. This seminar will explore the changing nature of the workplace due to global competition and technological change. It will examine important policy debates about how best to create jobs, improve working conditions, and promote economic growth and well-being. We will analyze how a variety of factors, such as new modes of production and technologies, increasing participation of women in the economy, widespread migration flows, increasing global trade and capital mobility, and the rise of informal economies challenge the assumptions underlying traditional labor and employment regulation in both developed and developing countries. We will consider an array of innovative attempts – national, international, transnational, public, private and mixed -- to improve workplace conditions and assure employment opportunity consistent with economic growth and stability. We will also inquire about the moral and political commitments associated with various approaches.
There are no prerequisites. All students are welcome.

This course explores the potential of using the law, and specifically, the human rights legal framework, to improve health. Students will be exposed to real life projects at the domestic level in a number of different jurisdictions, especially but not exclusively from Latin-America and Africa; as well as at the regional and international level, including the Inter-American Human Rights System and the United Nations Human Rights System. With this approach, students will strengthen not only their knowledge of the human rights framework within their familiar jurisdictions, but will also have the opportunity to develop comparative legal research skills.

The human rights framework that students will learn in depth in this practicum is not limited to the right to health but involves other related human rights that are also social determinants of health or that are instrumental to the effective realization of the right to health. Therefore, students will be exposed to the substantive expertise needed to successfully practice the strategic use of the integrality of the human rights framework in the specific context of health. Students will also be required to consider the use of other legal frameworks that have the potential of having a positive impact on health outcomes.

The variety of projects will take into consideration the complexity and different dimensions of the right to health as well as the nature of the legal obligations that it imposes in different contexts. We will offer projects that respond to current and pressing global challenges with respect to health, for example, projects exploring the right to health and other rights in the context of public health emergencies, the link between health and the environment, the structural disadvantage that specific groups face with respect to their health and the role of private actors, to name a few.

For the execution of their projects, students will work with external partners of the O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law, in particular, the Health and Human Rights Initiative. (“HHRI”).

How can lawyers advocate effectively for solutions to pressing human rights challenges?

This project-based practicum enlists students in tackling real-world human rights challenges and creates a learning environment that equips students to analyze a problem, assess the legal and policy situation, and propose and execute strategies for change.

Students in this practicum receive intensive instruction from law professors and subject matter experts on both the relevant human rights law as well as effective strategies and tactics for human rights advocacy. Professor Massimino has a distinguished record of human rights advocacy and led Human Rights First, one of the nation’s leading human rights advocacy organizations, as president and CEO before coming to Georgetown Law. Michelle Liu is an adjunct professor and has supported partner NGOs in several countries to promote women’s and children’s human rights through litigation and legislative reform. Melody Vidmar is the 2024–2026 Dash-Muse Senior Teaching Fellow and Supervising Attorney and has represented clients in all aspects of complex civil rights and liberties impact litigation before federal and state courts. Together with their professors and fellow classmates, students collaborate on a project that supports the mission and objectives of a chosen NGO partner of the Human Rights Institute (HRI). This collaboration gives students a unique opportunity to conduct legal and factual research, craft legal solutions, and develop an advocacy campaign with real-world impact. 

In partnership with the Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti (IJDH), the 2024-2025 Human Rights Advocacy in Action Practicum will explore avenues to advance Haiti’s case for restitution for its “independence debt,” a payment that Haiti’s former French colonial masters forced Haiti to pay in exchange for freedom from slavery and colonial rule. The catastrophic impacts of the independence debt on Haiti’s development and additional vestiges of colonialism on the Haitian economy and society continue to reverberate today. In addition to developing the case for restitution of this historic injustice, the Practicum will highlight the integral role Haiti’s restitution claim plays in the broader reparations movement. For more information about the project and partner organization, please visit HRI’s Practicum website here.

The practicum is a year-long course and comprises three mandatory components: a two-hour weekly seminar, project-related teamwork performed in and outside of class, and a week-long field investigation (likely involving international travel) during Week One in January 2025. 

Seminar

The seminar portion of the practicum will cover the substantive law and legal framework as it pertains to a particular human rights issue. Students will also use seminar time to propose and assess what legal remedies and accountability mechanisms may be appropriate and viable to address the human rights violation. Guest speakers with subject matter expertise may be invited to seminars to hold workshops and offer critique of student work. Finally, the seminar will also be the training ground for students to develop their critical thinking, public speaking, and persuasive writing skills through the formulation of a human rights advocacy campaign.

Project Work

Students will work in teams to complete a human rights project that furthers the mission of HRI’s partner organization. Depending on the particulars of the project, students may engage in any or all of the following:

• conduct fact-based research on a human rights issue,
• learn about the international human rights framework pertaining to the issue,
• identify the legal gaps and barriers that are impeding justice, accountability, or the realization of human rights,
• assess viable remedies and solutions to addressing such legal gap or barrier,
• propose changes to legislation or draft a legal brief or policy report, and
• develop a multimodal strategic campaign for human rights advocacy.

Field Investigation

Students will have the opportunity to conduct project-related field investigation during Week One. Students will have mandatory full-day obligations from Monday, January 6 through Friday, January 10, 2025. The field investigation may involve international travel to interview or consult with stakeholders, human rights advocates, community leaders, lawmakers, or other relevant individuals working on the ground. While the Practicum will not be traveling to Haiti, we will be working with IJDH to identify a field investigation location that will best serve the needs of the project. More details about the field investigation component of the course will be discussed and established in the fall semester.

Students will be required to complete the Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative (CITI) Program for ethical human subject research before Week One. Students must also have a valid passport with at least six months remaining from the first day of spring semester classes.

Learning Objectives

As a result of completing this practicum, students will be able to approach a human rights issue from the perspective of a legal advocate who is equipped to effect change.

Students will learn how to conduct desk research on human rights violations, as well as how to assess violations of human rights using international and regional treaties, international court jurisprudence, and other sources of law. Students will also learn how to conduct first-person interviews and/or meetings in a cross-cultural context.

Students will learn how to identify legal and political barriers that impede justice, accountability, and the realization of human rights. By working together with law professors and subject matter experts to formulate a viable, impactful, and victim-centric advocacy plan, students will develop the critical thinking and communication skills needed to become effective human rights advocates.

Credits

This is a seven-credit course. Three credits will be awarded in the fall—two for the seminar and one for the approximately five hours of project work per week, for a minimum of 11 weeks. Four credits will be awarded in the spring—one for Week One, two for the seminar, and one for the approximately five hours of project work per week, for a minimum of 11 weeks. Both the seminar portion and the project portion will be graded. The field investigation is an integral and required portion of the course. Students should consider their individual capacity to work cross-culturally with individuals who have experienced or are experiencing ongoing human rights violations. Permission to miss the Week One field-work portion of the course will be granted only in exceptional circumstances, such as a sudden illness or death in the family.

While the public tends to think about capital punishment in relation to a high court's ruling to prevent or allow an execution to go forward, the broader campaign to expose the flaws in the practice of capital punishment and to end the death penalty involves a complex interplay of strategies--federal and state legislative advocacy, strategic communications, and community organizing and litigation. Indeed, nearly every human rights challenge requires a combination strategy, with many moving parts that have different targets, different tactics, and require different skills. How does an advocate know which strategies are appropriate for which challenges?  How can you best prepare for some of the thorniest, most entrenched challenges to human rights? What tools are available to you?  And what if the combination of strategies creates ethical or other tensions? This course will explore the various ways in which litigation and policy advocacy can work together to bring about transformative change on complex and difficult human rights concerns. The discussion will be grounded in the long-term effort to end capital punishment in the United States and it will draw on lessons learned from other human rights campaigns.

This seminar will 1) introduce students to multidisciplinary campaigns for human rights and 2) explore how litigation and policy advocacy can be combined and leveraged to create opportunities to advance human rights.  Students will explore the range of strategies and tactics available and learn when and how to deploy them.  

At the end of the seminar, each student or team of students will have led fellow students through a logic model exercise, prepared a high level multidisciplinary strategy memorandum and led a mock coalition meeting to achieve alignment and engagement on their plan.

There is no textbook for the seminar.  Readings will include legal, academic, and general articles and materials on the subjects being covered.

Learning Objectives: The primary objective of this course is for students to understand the range of disciplines and tools available to them to implement a successful campaign and to identify synergies that can be achieved between litigation; policy advocacy, strategic communications and organizing. Students completing the course will understand which strategies to use when and how to navigate the potential conflicts between them.

We live in an age of Human Rights. Human Rights, as law, discourse, institutional structure, activist organizations, subject activists and local constitutional expressions, can be considered the crowning achievement of Western humanist secular liberalism that has been able to universalize its dictates. And yet, especially since the 90s, critiques of human rights have compounded from those identified with the left of liberalism. Those critiques include: the socialist, the anti-imperialist, the democratic, the multiculturalist, the feminist, the libertarian and the anarchist. The critiques have been so powerful as to create a generalized sense of skepticism in the discourse of human rights within these quarters especially among an emergent generation of activists, scholars, and public intellectuals. Those critiques have been met by a counter critique by a new generation of human rights believers/activists. The bulk of the critique of the critique points to either an empirical evidence of the effectiveness of human rights discourse or to the internal incoherence of the critical claims.

Environmental degradation, species extinctions, ecosystem fragility, climate change, and the disruption of water and food systems are putting our planet and all living things on it at risk. This fuels the triple crisis of climate change, biodiversity loss (including mass species extinctions), and human rights violations (attacks, reprisals, and killings of environmental rights defenders). In response to these existential threats, innovative public interest lawyers are pursuing creative strategies that use "soft law," compliance processes through judicial, quasi-judicial, and non-judicial grievance mechanisms to protect fundamental human rights to life, water, food, health, work, and habitat. This represents a new frontier of emerging comparative environmental rights jurisprudence and protection, influenced by the strengthening of soft laws that have established normative legal doctrines, some of which are now considered customary international law.

This course will explore that frontier. We will examine the history, relationships, linkages, and tensions between human rights, the environment, and development, with an emphasis on how development and corporate conduct are impacting the health and rights of the planet and its people, paying particular attention to the impacts on poor communities, women, Indigenous Peoples, and other vulnerable populations.

The course will introduce students to the work of public interest lawyers and their clients who are pursuing remedial action, justice, and accountability through a range of legal and non-legal fora at the local, national, regional, and international levels and will explore how these efforts are contributing to, supporting, and consolidating the evolution of a comparative environmental rights law doctrine. While topics will be introduced in their national and global context, the course will pay particular attention to jurisprudence in Global South countries.

Course Design

The intersection of human rights, the climate justice dialogue, and environmental protection are topical and evolving fields that provide a dynamic framework for strategic litigation, legal advocacy, education, and activism. Grounded in the history of this evolving framework, the class will engage in a number of contemporary conversations through the examination of ongoing cases and complaints, media reports, conferences, and practitioner toolkits.

Students will examine historical trends, map evolving tensions, explore symbiotic linkages, analyze theoretical concepts, and map their practical applications to contemporary issues. In particular, students will explore the power of corporations and their nexus to bilateral and multilateral institutions in global economic, legal, and political systems and how those relationships are linked to abuses of human rights and the environment. Students will also examine and evaluate attempts at reforms and regulation of the impacts of these corporate actions.

Learning Objectives

The primary learning objective of this course is for students to understand the ways in which “soft law”—non-binding declarations, compliance mechanisms, grievance procedures, and other non-judicial processes—can be used by creative, movement-building lawyers to develop enforceable legal standards. Students will learn to identify the ways in which emerging human rights and environmental law jurisprudential and other tools are being utilized to alleviate or mitigate unsustainable development and prevent environmental and human rights violations at the national, regional, and international levels.  Students will also gain familiarity with how certain business and development projects endanger human rights and the environment and the ways that activists, international organizations, and lawyers on the frontlines are challenging these harms and building the resilience of communities at risk.

“Human rights” names both a body of law and a moral ideal. The French revolutionaries issued a “Declaration of the Rights of Man” and the U.S. Declaration of Independence proclaimed rights that are both self-evident and unalienable. The British jurist Jeremy Bentham replied that the idea of unalienable rights is nonsense – indeed, “nonsense on stilts.” Today we confront similar philosophical debates. Millions believe that international human rights take priority over national politics and legislation. Is that true? Where do human rights come from? What are their limits? Most human rights treaties and declarations ground human rights in human dignity. But what is human dignity, and how does it ground rights? Which matters more, security rights or economic and cultural rights? – These are philosophical questions, and the first part of the seminar will focus on them.

Today the human rights movement faces grave political challenges. Human rights NGOs are under attack in many countries; the same with the International Criminal Court. Scholars warn of “the twilight of human rights law” and “endtimes of human rights,” and some argue that human rights treaties have made little practical difference. Others respond that the human rights movement has tangibly and measurably improved human well-being. Conservative critics warn of rights inflation and threats to state sovereignty; some on the left see the human rights movement as a minimalist substitute for global justice that fits too comfortably with neoliberalism.

This seminar will sample some of this writing and explore major philosophical and political issues about human rights today.

Slavery has been a phenomenon that has existed since before written history, yet it is only in the last 200 years that efforts to abolish it have gained traction. Today, increasing mobility, global supply chains, and continued social discrimination have created the environment for ongoing human exploitation, even though the formal practice of chattel slavery, or the legal ownership of one human being by another, is illegal virtually everywhere. Indeed, some estimate that there are more slaves today than at any other time in human history. Most recently, efforts to eliminate severe forms of human exploitation are being made under the banner of ending human trafficking (or more formally, trafficking in persons).

This course will provide students an overview of the multiple legal perspectives on combating human trafficking and modern slavery. This will include the definitional tensions between different perspectives, alternative approaches to addressing severe human exploitation, and an overview of the current U.S. legal framework for eradicating human trafficking and modern slavery and its weaknesses. Attention will be paid to commonly recognized principles in human rights, criminal and labor law, but also in such areas as corporate responsibility and immigration law. The class will use a range of materials, including international treaties, decisions of international and foreign tribunals, and more familiar U.S. statutory materials and legislative history (such as committee reports).

Learning Objectives:

At the conclusion of the class, students should be able to

• recognize many of the forms of and pervasive nature of human trafficking and modern slavery;
• identify risks of human trafficking and modern slavery in most areas of practice they may choose in the future; and
• have familiarity with emerging issues in the area of human trafficking and modern slavery.

This course will examine the U.S. immigration system through legal and policy perspectives. We will explore the source, scope and constitutional limits of congressional power to regulate immigration; the executive branch implementation of immigration legislation, particularly procedures for entry and removal, and the extent of, as well as constitutional constraints on, Presidential power; and the administrative and judicial review of executive branch action. Close attention will be paid to how membership laws and policies are established and implemented: What laws and policies govern U.S. citizenship? Who is eligible to become a legal immigrant? How are annual admissions numbers set? How and why are family and employment priorities created? How does the U.S. protect refugees? With respect to the arrival of unaccompanied children from abroad, we will consider the laws and policies that govern how the U.S. government treats them. Unauthorized migration will also be examined to understand why some migrants do not use the legal route into the U.S. and what laws and policies the U.S. has in place to deter such unlawful movements at the border and control unlawful presence in the interior. We will analyze the impact of the major 1996 immigration control legislation and its implementation, with particular attention to detention and removal. We will closely examine the role of the Justice Department’s Immigration Courts, with special attention to access to justice issues. We will explore the extraordinary need for, and challenges of, immigration law reform, as well as the particular situation of the Dreamers, children without lawful immigration status brought to and raised in the United States by their parents. Finally, we will assess the various changes implemented by the Trump and Biden Administrations, particularly in connection with the treatment of asylum seekers at the U.S.-Mexico border, the resettlement of refugees from abroad, and the removal of unauthorized immigrants.

This class will cover the constitutional and political framework for the U.S. Immigration System, enforcement and adjudication agencies, immigrants, nonimmigrants, removals and deportations, detention and bond, immigration hearings, judicial review, grounds for removal and inadmissibility, “crimmigration,” immigration reform, “Chevron” deference, refugee and asylum status and other international protections. It will also include reading and analyzing major immigration cases like INS v. Cardoza-Fonseca, 480 U.S. 421 (1987) (well-founded fear) and Matter of Kasinga, 21 I&N Dec. 357 (BIA 1996) (female genital mutilation).

Who can enter the United States as a visitor or an immigrant? Who will get asylum? Who will wait in a detention center? And when, according to immigration laws passed by Congress, over ten million migrants in the United States are unauthorized, who will actually be deported? American immigration law is the product of presidential policy, Congressional command, and various discretionary decisions made by executive officials including immigration judges and Border Patrol officers. This course will examine the relationships between these various decision-makers. We draw on examples from immigration policy throughout the years--from the Chinese Exclusion Act to former president Trump’s travel ban--to illustrate these issues. We also use case law from the Supreme Court, the Board of Immigration Appeals, and various federal circuits to understand how courts have evaluated these issues. Finally, secondary sources from historians and legal scholars help illustrate how various players the immigration system interact in practice. We will use this information to assess critiques of the immigration system and proposals for reform. These readings also introduce students to immigration related legal concepts including asylum, mandatory detention, and the use of the categorical approach to determining the significance of a migrant’s criminal history. Students will develop a familiarity with immigration practice as well as a more nuanced understanding of the legal and political issues that vex immigration law scholars.

Learning Objectives:

• Develop a better understanding of the historic development of immigration law and policy.

• Become familiar with legal concepts concerning asylum, immigration detention, and executive power over admissions and removal.

• Understand different policy-making options and the tension between discretionary decision-making and compulsory enforcement.

• Appreciate the choices and limitations facing various decision-makers in the immigration context, as well as the experience of migrants and asylum seekers in the immigration system.

• Assess separation of powers concerns using examples from the immigration field.

• Make a nuanced assessment of popular news stories and debates about immigration law, paying special attention to the role of various decision-makers at play.

• Summarize and critically analyze various proposals for reform of the immigration adjudications, deportation proceedings, and the asylum process.

• Master a substantive legal issue related immigration by producing a paper and/or presentation on a legal debate in the area. Develop writing and presentation skills by participating in this exercise.

• Practice critical reading of law review articles and cases.

The attempted extradition of Gen. Pinochet from the U.K. to Spain to account for torture and disappearances in Chile, a tragic car accident in Washington, D.C. in which a sixteen year old is killed by a Georgian diplomat, the alleged expropriation of your corporate client’s investment interests by a foreign government, a civil lawsuit against President Mugabe of Zimbabwe during a visit to the U.S., a criminal case in Chicago against a foreign consular officer for aiding and abetting a fugitive -- such cases bring into sharp relief the operation of international immunities. This two-credit course aims to introduce students to the range of jurisdictional immunities recognized by international law and how they are implemented in domestic law. We will cover diplomatic and consular immunity, foreign sovereign (or foreign state) immunity, the immunities accorded to heads of state and government, and the special status of international organizations and their staff and member representatives, including the United Nations, its specialized agencies and individuals on special missions. Increasingly, practicing lawyers (especially those who represent governments and international organizations or who practice in places where embassies, consulates, missions and international institutions are located) need to be familiar with the reach of these rules and doctrines, and the exceptions thereto. Our focus will be on the practical application of the various international conventions, domestic statutes, and judicially crafted rules which define the law of international immunities.

This course explores international finance and regulation as phenomena embedded in the concept of money.  As such, it provides an overview of the theory of money, and then explores key financial and regulatory developments tied to it, including banking and banking regulation.  A significant portion of the class will be spent exploring how these phenomena apply to digital assets, including native cryptocurrencies (e.g. Bitcoin), stablecoins and central bank digital currencies.  The course also addresses the intersection of financial regulation and international monetary law by surveying the 2008 financial crisis, the European debt crisis, recent attempts to internationalize the renminbi, and the future of the dollar as an international currency.

The knowledge, technological inventions, creative works and accumulated experience and expertise of the professional workforce increasingly drives the global economy. Unlike physical capital, this intellectual capital cannot readily be confined to the territorial setting of its origin. The development of cohesive norms to protect intellectual properties on a global basis has thus proven to be an enormous challenge. This course considers this effort by addressing the core international agreements governing intellectual property; norms and norm-making in the international intellectual property rights system; dispute settlement and the enforcement of rights; and tensions arising between intellectual property rights and distinct legal and cultural values.

In this Week One simulation, you will act as outside counsel conducting an internal investigation into Santé, an issuer on a U.S. exchange. Santé has uncovered evidence of bribe-like payments made as part of its operations in Africa. It is concerned that these payments may trigger liability under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), a U.S. statute with a wide extraterritorial reach. Fearing criminal penalties and negative press, the French company has engaged outside counsel—you—to evaluate the potential risks associated with these payments and to consider ways to mitigate those risks. In your role as outside counsel, you will interview key witnesses to gather facts, then assess the risks to your corporate client under the FCPA. You will present your findings and recommendations to Santé’s general counsel, played by Georgetown Law alumni.

The focus of this course is skills exposure and acquisition in a challenging and complex international context. You should expect intensive group work and a highly-participatory environment. You will not only learn about statutory interpretation and the role of the FCPA in corporate transactions, but you will have the opportunity to engage in essential lawyering skills, including fact development, legal analysis, witness interviewing, client counseling, team-building, project management, and problem-solving.

In many parts of the world, women are discriminated against, abused, treated as property, and even murdered because they are women. But today, there is a substantial body of international and regional human rights law that can be used to change the national laws that permit these practices or fail to protect women against them. In addition, many countries have begun to give women equal rights in many fields. Thus, there is now a body of human rights and comparative law that advocates can use to advance equal human rights for women.

This course provides students with an overview of that law. It introduces them to the many forms of discrimination and violence women still face and teaches them about the major human rights treaties that can help women achieve equality with men. These include the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women; the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights; and the regional human rights treaties from Africa, the Americas, and Europe. Students study the work of the human rights bodies that measure state compliance with these treaties, including their guidelines and case law on issues affecting women. The course also examines comparative law on human rights issues such as sex-based discrimination in employment, inheritance, and family law rights, domestic violence and female genital mutilation, polygamy and its impact on women and children, and women’s lack of reproductive rights.

National court decisions from countries in both common law and civil law jurisdictions show how courts are using international and regional human rights law to help resolve domestic law issues. As some issues pose difficult conflicts between women’s right to equality with opposing assertions of religious and cultural rights to discriminate, the course also examines how human rights bodies resolve those conflicts and asks how they should be resolved.

Whenever merchandise crosses an international border, it is subject to customs laws and procedures.  And with the grow of international trade and commerce over the years, customs laws and procedures have become increasingly more internationalized, important, and complex.  Therefore, knowledge of customs laws and procedures is important to the practice of international trade law.

This course will provide a basic introduction to the rules and principles relating to both international and U.S. customs laws and procedures.  This will include an examination and review of those rules and principles relating to tariff classification, customs valuation, rules of origin, border enforcement of intellectual property rights and regional trading arrangements.

International efforts to facilitate trade and to harmonize and simplify customs laws and procedures will be examined and reviewed together with international organizations dealing with international customs laws and procedures (such as the World Trade Organization and the World Customs Organization).

Customs authorities are the guardians of national borders.  The role of customs authorities in combating terrorism and criminal activity and in securing and safeguarding national borders will also be examined and reviewed.

There are no prerequisite courses required for this course. 

This course aims to familiarize students with international commercial arbitration and will follow the traditional steps of international arbitration proceedings from the registration of the dispute to enforcement and challenges of an award in national courts.  This course will not rely solely on US law but, instead, adopt a global approach to international arbitration. 

Traditionally, the law of human rights has received scant regard in the study and practice of international arbitration. Nor have students, scholars, or practitioners of human rights law seen international arbitration as much more than a form of private dispute settlement that is anathema to the principle of an open system of public justice underpinning the rule of law. That position has only been entrenched by the phenomenon of specialization and fragmentation in the study and practice of international law and dispute settlement.

This course offers a different perspective and approach to the subject, at a time when the relationship between the law of human rights and international arbitration is being fundamentally recast, and when international arbitration and human rights are both subject to a populist challenge. The course will address both the substantive and procedural legal issues arising today at the interplay of human rights and international arbitration from the perspective of both legal scholarship and practice. Students will be taken to the key treaties, as well as to decisions of arbitral tribunals, domestic courts, and regional human rights courts. The course will also explore areas of future development, including in the burgeoning areas of ESG and business and human rights.

Almost a decade has passed since the uprisings of the Arab Spring swept across the Middle East, causing political unrest and economic instability. These waves of upheaval and their aftermath have caused severe disruption to foreign investment inflows and cross-border business transactions, propagating a number of high-profile commercial and investment disputes and rendering arbitration an essential tool for doing business in the region more than ever.

This course will examine the history of arbitration in the Middle East and its evolution from the Islamic era, through the early colonial twentieth century’s oil & gas arbitrations, to the modern-day proliferation of commercial and investor-State arbitration cases. The classes will draw upon a wide range of materials including law journal articles, arbitral awards, regional treaties, domestic arbitration laws and court decisions to discuss and provoke debate over core topics in the international arbitration field, such as the impact of Sharia law on the arbitration process; the internationalization of contract-based disputes; the contribution of the Iran-US Tribunal to the development of international investment law; the role of consent to arbitration contained in domestic laws; attribution and State responsibility in the context of the Arab Spring, enforcement of arbitral awards in the region; and the rise of inter-Arab investment arbitration through the investment treaty of the Organization of Islamic Conference.

This course is designed for students, young scholars, and practitioners who are interested in understanding the unique features of arbitration theory and practice in the Middle East, and appreciating the legal and cultural context within which the current arbitration practice in the region has developed. The course will also provide practical insights and commentary on domestic arbitration regimes of selected countries, and arbitration rules and processes of some of the region’s arbitral institutions, including CRCICA, DIAC, DIFC-LCIA, ADGM-ICC, BCDR, and SCCA.

Learning Objectives:

Students will:

• Better understand the origins of the concept of arbitration in Islam, and the role that Sharia law plays in today’s arbitration process in the Arab world.
• Develop familiarity with the arbitration practice and its evolution in the region through the lens of landmark cases involving Arab States and assess the contribution of these cases to the overall development of the international arbitration field.
• Gain knowledge of the protections and guarantees afforded to investors by regional treaties and domestic investment laws of Arab countries, including dispute resolution clauses that refer to international arbitration.
• Identify some of the legal challenges faced by investors when attempting to enforce a foreign or international arbitral award in the Middle East.
• Develop familiarity with some of the major regional arbitral institutions and their common structures and procedural rules.

The course explores issues common to litigation in U.S. courts arising from cross-border business transactions, including venue, jurisdiction, service of process, choice of law questions, discovery, evidence from abroad, privilege and ethical considerations, and the recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments in U.S. courts. The course covers the resolution of disputes in litigation, as well as in arbitral proceedings, and through regulatory and other internal investigations, and explores issues such as the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.

This course is structured around a semester-long, simulated negotiation exercise in which the students in this class will represent a US pharmaceutical company (KJH Pharmaceutical Corporation) and the students in a similar class, at the University of Dundee in Scotland, will represent an African agricultural production company (Malundian Cassava Corporation). The two companies are interested in working together to exploit a new technology developed by KJH Pharmaceutical that uses the cassava produced by Malundian Cassava Corporation. The form of their collaboration could be a joint venture, a licensing agreement or a long term supply contract. The negotiations will take place through written exchanges and through live negotiation via videoconference. Substantive law issues related to the transaction, as well as negotiations strategy and related issues, will be addressed in this class.

The purpose of the course is to provide students with an opportunity (i) to gain an introduction to transactional law and experience the sequential development of a business transaction over an extended negotiation, (ii) to study the business and legal issues and strategies that impact the negotiation, (iii) to gain insight into the dynamics of negotiating and structuring international business transactions, (iv) to learn about the role that lawyers and law play in these negotiations, (v) to give students experience in drafting communications, and (vi) to provide negotiating experience in a context that replicates actual legal practice with an unfamiliar opposing party (here, the students at Dundee).

The thrust of this course is class participation and active involvement in the negotiations process. Students are expected to spend time outside of class, working in teams, to prepare for class discussions involving the written exchanges as well as preparing for the live negotiations. Class discussions will focus on the strategy for, and progress of, the negotiations, as well as the substantive legal, business and policy matters that impact on the negotiations. Grades will be based on participation in the exercises, students’ diaries, and a final paper.

This three credit course is an introductory survey of legal issues that arise in connection with international business transactions.  Subjects covered include:  (1) laws and treaties involved in cross-border business transactions; (2) core international business transactions, including international sales and letters of credit, non-establishment (agency, distribution, contract manufacturing, franchising, licensing) and establishment (branch, subsidiary, joint venture) forms of doing business, equity and debt/project finance transactions, and mergers and acquisitions; (3) fundamental legal concepts such as choice of law, choice of forum, jurisdiction, investment protection (expropriation), anti-corruption and competition regulation, and dispute resolution, focusing on litigation and arbitration, (4) the transfer and protection of intellectual property, and (5) corporate social responsibility.

The learning outcomes for this International Business Transactions course include: (1) basic knowledge and understanding of (a) substantive and procedural laws concerning international business transactions, and (b) the role of private and public international law in the conduct of international business; and (2) international legal analysis and reasoning, problem solving, professional skills, and written and oral communication in the context of international business transactions.

An introductory survey course examining transactional and litigation issues faced by international businesses. The goal of this course is to familiarize students with the broad scope of issues affecting international business prior to the students choosing other courses for further specialization and to introduce students to analytical tools used by lawyers who advise on matters related to international business. Emphasis is given to the actual practice of international business law.  Topics will include the international sale of goods (including letters of credit), international contract issues, cross-border investment, and international investments including project finance. 

This course covers a wide range of subjects relating to the legal framework for international commercial transactions. The course begins with an analysis of transactions for a sale of goods and also assess issues that arise with the transport and payment of such goods (including letters of credit and standby letters of credit). We then address non-establishment forms of business and touch upon distributorship issues and intellectual property. We complete the range of transactions by looking at foreign direct investment and joint ventures. We will generally view each of these subjects through the lens of international dispute resolution, although we will occasionally consider transactional issues as well. We finish the course by assessing the various strategic issues that come up in cross-border litigation and arbitration and also by considering the quickly growing area of corporate social responsibility.

This course presents an introduction to international commercial arbitration. It examines the nature of arbitration, the procedures used in international arbitration (both institutional and ad hoc) and the enforcement and setting aside of arbitral awards. The course will also cover drafting arbitration agreements, the law applicable to arbitrations (including the New York Convention, the ICSID Convention and various institutional rules), challenges to arbitration, multi-party arbitrations, jurisdiction, preliminary or interim measures and selection of the arbitral tribunal. The course also provides an introduction to arbitration between investors and states. Grades will be based primarily upon short papers addressing current issues in international arbitration.

In today's global economy, parties to cross-border commercial transactions usually choose to resolve their disputes through international arbitration. This course provides students with an understanding of the law and practice of international arbitration from the perspective of United States law. Among other things, the course will consider the alternatives to international arbitration; the international conventions and U.S. arbitration statute; the arbitration agreement; the role of courts and tribunals in determining issues of arbitrability; international arbitration rules; provisional measures; judicial enforcement of arbitration agreements and arbitration awards; and judicial setting aside of arbitration awards.

Resolution of disputes between private sector companies and sovereigns arising under international contracts and projects typically are resolved by international commercial arbitration, giving rise to unique challenges, issues, and opportunities.

This class will address the relationship between international arbitration and court litigation, key fora and features that exist in this realm, proper negotiation and mediation techniques, analysis of foreign sovereign immunities, choice law issues, the importance of language and culture in these disputes, interplay with treaty arbitration, issues arising under arbitration clauses, critical trends in case law and arbitral institutions, and enforcement of arbitration awards globally. The course will feature guest speakers, hands-on exercises, use of materials from actual arbitrations, optional field trips to local courts, and a two-class practical moot--all focused on the dynamics and practicalities of dealing with the disputes of sovereigns and private parties.

The course analyzes the regulatory framework of international contracts. On the basis of court decisions and arbitral awards, it focuses on international conventions and uniform rules of law, such as the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sales of Goods (CISG), the UNIDROIT Principles of International Commercial Contracts, the Principles of European Contract Law, and INCOTERMS. The course includes some aspects of conflicts of law rules, as well as an analysis of the main international instruments governing international commercial arbitration.

Examines selected issues involving the application of criminal law to international activities and across national boundaries. The course covers both the procedural aspects of international cooperation in criminal matters (including extradition,  cross-border investigations, mutual legal assistance, and recognition of foreign penal judgments) as well as the developing substantive international law (e.g., war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide, cybercrime, and trafficking in drugs, people and firearms). Particular attention is paid to the question of jurisdiction over criminal activities at the international level, in the context of activities such as money laundering, organized crime, and computer crime, including the reach of Constitutional protections to investigations and law enforcement activities overseas. Addresses the structure, jurisdiction, and jurisprudence of the ad hoc criminal tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda and the statute and rules of evidence and procedure of the International Criminal Court.

This course studies two bodies of law, both concerned with “criminal law across borders.” One is domestic (national) criminal law applied to crimes committed outside national territory. The other is crimes under international law: war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide, and aggression. These are the “core crimes” tried by courts like the Nuremberg Tribunal, the tribunals for Rwanda, Sierra Leone, and former Yugoslavia, and the International Criminal Court (ICC). The Russian invasion of Ukraine, the ICC’s indictment of President Putin, and many states’ proposal to establish an international tribunal for aggression make international criminal law exceptionally salient today.

Along with the substantive law on these issues, we examine the foundational topics of jurisdiction, extradition, and immunity from prosecution. The course will also examine the problems confronting international criminal justice today, including the political backlash against holding leaders accountable for core crimes. The aim of the course is to introduce students to basic doctrines of international criminal law, as well as doctrines concerning the extraterritorial application of U.S. criminal law. It also provides an overview of the work of international criminal tribunals and the challenges they face. The course combines law, policy, and history.

The textbook for the course is International and Transnational Criminal Law, 4^th edition, by David Luban, Julie O’Sullivan, David P. Stewart, and Neha Jain.

Cross-border lending has grown exponentially in recent decades, especially with the opening of new markets in emerging economies and further integration of financial markets globally. High yield, EM risky lending has also grown in a low interest rate environment in developed markets. With a higher inflation and interest rate environment globally, debt refinancing and liability management is expected to significantly increase in the short term.

A natural consequence is the invariable need to restructure cross-border debt. Such financial restructurings or "workouts" can occur individually with a troubled debtor or on a broader level in systemic crises (e.g., the debt crises involving Asia, Russia, and Mexico in the late nineties, Argentina in the early 2000's, the 2008 global financial crisis, and the post COVID-19 changes to behaviors).  In this course we will simulate, from an international lender's perspective, the out-of-court debt restructuring or "workout" of a corporation in distress. The simulation of this hypothetical workout will have role-play and extensive class interaction: we will be members of the restructuring and insolvency practice of an international law firm.

Our client will be an international commercial bank with a troubled loan to a company in a developing country. Our job will be to provide legal advice and services to our client throughout the loan workout process. During the semester we will also have insolvency practitioners as guest speakers. Our work will include conducting due diligence, recommending a legal strategy, coordinating the creditor group, establishing negotiation strategies (and leverage) for our client, structuring the transaction documents, and closing the deal.

The objectives of this simulation are to help students (1) understand the legal framework governing cross-border insolvency and restructuring, (2) debate legal issues affecting cross-border debt restructurings, (3) grasp the principles and best practices of international debt restructurings and insolvency from a practical perspective, (4) develop legal risk analysis and problem solving skills in the context of a troubled international financial transaction, and (5) gain experience with relevant document structuring and cross-border negotiation strategies.

Issues that will be addressed in the course include choice of law and jurisdiction, enforcement of creditors' rights in foreign courts, corporate governance, holdout creditors, moral hazard, distress signs in a company, cultural sensitivities, and cross-border negotiation techniques.

The course will be taught by Claudio N. Rechden, General Counsel at Deva Capital Advisory and former Lead Counsel for Special Operations in Asia and Latin America for the International Finance Corporation (the private sector arm of the World Bank). Claudio has extensive international finance, cross-border restructuring and litigation experience, having worked in several workouts worldwide. Evaluations will be done by a final short reaction paper in groups and by class participation. There will be no exams.

The International Economic Law & Policy Colloquium offers students an understanding of the theory of international economic law and related policy analyses. This year’s theme will be supply chains. Students should expect to discuss subfields of international economic law as they relate to supply chains such as trade, investment, finance, tax, business transactions, sustainability, economic security, and more.

Students will prepare responses to readings for each session in preparation for discussion with distinguished guest speakers from the international economic law and policy world, as well as an end of the semester brief on a specific policy issue concerning a relevant matter of international economic law. High quality briefs may be distributed to policymakers in Washington, DC and beyond.

This course will provide an introduction to the international legal and institutional frameworks that govern economic cooperation among nation states in the key areas: (a) international monetary law, (b) international trade, (c) international capital movements (including foreign direct investment) and (d) international development.  A central area of focus will be how these different frameworks interact – and, in some cases, conflict – with each other, as policy makers struggle to both maximize the benefits of globalization and minimize its costs. Considerable emphasis will be placed on the institutional dimension of cooperation, with a comparative review of the relevant international organizations (including the WTO, IMF and the World Bank).  The Course will identify the current challenges faced by each of these institutions in an environment where multilateral co-operation, although increasingly urgent, is also increasingly unpopular. The Course will be interdisciplinary, focusing on the legal, political and economic dimensions of these complex problems. Senior officials of a number of the major international organizations will participate as guest lecturers, giving their own perspectives regarding the key challenges facing their institutions.

The Course will be divided into two parts:

The first part will include an overview of the relevant legal and institutional frameworks, their relationship with each other and some of the key challenges they currently face.

The second part will cover a number of cross-cutting issues that often require effective coordination among these different institutions, including the following:

• The backlash to globalization and efforts to “decouple” or restrict the flow of capital, goods or technology to certain markets, or to reconfigure global supply chains.

• The role of the state in the market economy, including the role of subsidies and other forms of government intervention and the debate over non-market economies in the WTO.

• The efficacy of “soft law” and “soft institutions”, which are increasingly relied upon in an environment where countries are less inclined to surrender legal sovereignty through the creation of treaty obligations or the establishment of independent international organizations.

• The impact of both economic crime on economic development and financial stability, with a review of efforts by the international community to address this problem.

Learning Outcomes

By the end of the course, students will have gained a general understanding of the range of legal frameworks that govern international cooperation in trade, monetary affairs, international capital movements (including foreign direct investment) and international development. They will also have gained insight into the relationship among these frameworks, which is critical in an environment where global economic problems require integrated solutions. Importantly, they will have gained an appreciation of the institutional dimension of economic cooperation, which is of great importance given that a critical feature of the post-war architecture has been the extent to which the international community has delegated authority to international organizations to provide the “machinery of cooperation” despite a waning faith in multilateralism. Having gained an understanding of the general principles that underpin international economic law and institutions, students will have an opportunity to apply this understanding to a number of cross-cutting issues that are of current relevance, including sovereign debt, the growing importance of soft law, economic crime, the accountability of international organizations, and the backlash to globalization.

International anti-corruption has become an increasingly “hot topic” among lawyers and policymakers: governments, international organizations, and technical experts all identify corruption as a serious impediment to comprehensive economic development. If left unchecked, corruption threatens to undermine the effectiveness of development initiatives in both the public and private sectors. Growing enforcement of legal instruments such as the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and the UK Bribery Act have placed anti-corruption squarely on the agenda of a wide variety of transnational organizations. With so many variant actors invoking the importance of anti-corruption, lawyers must not only have a working knowledge of what corruption entails, but also understand how the development of an international anti-corruption legal framework is changing the way business is conducted in a global economy.

This course explores the international legal framework of anti-corruption, the scope of anti-corruption instruments, the methodologies employed by international actors enforcing these instruments, and the policy dilemmas implicated by these endeavors.

Given the dynamic nature of anti-corruption initiatives, the course presents an interdisciplinary, interactive approach to the subject matter. The class will introduce and discuss perspectives from academic texts, policy papers and media. It is hoped that this broad-based approach will provide students with a strong theoretical foundation in anti-corruption law, foster a practical understanding of international anti-corruption work, and inspire students to integrate this avenue of study into their future professional endeavors.

Students will complete a research paper 20-25 pages in length.

Learning Objectives:

By the end of this course, students will have a working knowledge of the role anti-corruption policy and political institutions (i.e., FCPA, OECD, and UNCAC) play in the field of anti-corruption. Students will be able to engage in professional discussions on the historical context of international anti-corruption efforts, the state of the current political and international climate, and the future of anti-corruption by making connections between past policy and current events. Students will be able to articulate original views, back them up with research and defend them through strategic thinking by engaging with guest-lecturing practitioners and the final oral presentation. Students will further deepen their knowledge on a particular topic within the field by conducting a research paper in which they will need to provide insightful analysis making connections among historical and current policies, institutions, and governments.

The course begins with an introduction to international energy arbitration, followed by discussion of the future of the international energy industry as it transforms to meet the imperatives of climate change. The next section concerns the industry's value chains, life cycles, and commercial relationships. An extensive presentation on the legal framework for international energy arbitration covers international laws and norms, national constitutions, national petroleum laws and regulations, and the historical development of upstream host government petroleum contracts and petroleum fiscal systems. To place the subject of host government contracts in its proper setting, the next section describes resource politics and resource cycles and examine the legal status of host government contracts. Segments on contract stabilization and choice of law come next.
Identification of the types of upstream host government disputes sets the stage for discussion of the early international oil and gas arbitration awards, from there to several modern international oil and gas arbitration awards, and finally to contemporary energy disputes with host governments. The course then examines commercial disputes arising out of joint operating agreements, gas contracts, and LNG sales contracts. It concludes with a discussion of U.S. court enforcement of energy awards relating to projects in Colombia, Mexico, Laos, and India. For those students considering international energy arbitration as a career, the course materials end with the professor's advice on how to build an international energy arbitration practice.
The course provides in-depth knowledge of the main types and key drivers of international energy disputes, including disputes that may arise during the energy transition, and the substantive issues involved in their resolution, not only to aid in understanding the international energy industry, its business relationships and contracts, its broader legal framework, and its disputes, but to build better advocates to represent international energy companies and host governments in these contentious proceedings.
To aid students to learn and retain important facts and features about the international energy industry and its disputes, the course materials contain 19 sets of Key Take-Aways, which appear after each section of materials, except those sections comprising only a few slides.

The course focuses on international law applicable to the leading environmental and natural resource issues.  It provides a framework for identifying and addressing the legal issues, links international law with relevant national laws, and focuses on ways to strengthen compliance with international obligations.  The course covers climate change, ozone depletion, transboundary pollution and hazardous waste disposal, fresh water (both surface and ground water), marine resources, biodiversity, the links between human rights and environment and between environment and trade, and the financing of sustainable development.  Special attention is given to cutting edge issues, such as synthetic biology and ecocide as an international crime.

Learning goals for this course: To enable students to become effective counsel, litigators, negotiators, arbitrators, judges, or legal advisors on a broad range of international environmental problems; to understand international instrucments and negotiations; and to be able to apply legal concepts developed in the course within different national settings for implementing international law. 

In a project-based practicum course, students participate in a weekly seminar and work on a project under the supervision of Professor Vidal. This project-based practicum course will involve working with different environmental organizations on international environmental law and policy issues, providing opportunities for students to navigate the reality of international negotiation, policymaking, and international advocacy. Students will participate in a two-hour/week seminar and work on 10 hours/week of project work.

SEMINAR: This practicum offers a unique opportunity to influence global environmental policy. Through this course, students will learn to do the following: (i) understand and formulate positions on specific issues in international environmental law through the application of general knowledge and targeted research; (ii) develop and implement influencing strategies for advancement of international environmental law through ongoing global policy processes; (iii) communicate effectively and engage appropriately with an international community encompassing different cultures, approaches, and perspectives; and (iv) consolidate lessons learned to support improvement and inform further work in international environmental law. To help achieve these goals, the seminar will feature visiting experts from the international environmental legal community and discussions on practical approaches to influencing global environmental policy.

PROJECT WORK: Students will work on a specific international environmental process over the course of the semester, providing direct support to a specific international organization, party or observer. Topics that students have worked on in previous semesters include i) Research on the relationship between environmental law and space law with UNEP, ii) Operationalization of EU CBAM regulations in developing countries (EDF), iii) Comparative analysis of legislation to phase out coal plants in implementation of international climate change commitments (Earth Justice), iv) Application of forest and landscape restoration principles across Rio Conventions (GPFLR), among others.  Students’ specific activities may include preparing background documents and informational materials in support of an ongoing project; following international discussions and participating as appropriate (e.g., in online discussion fora); drafting policy statements, interventions and motions; organizing intersessional meetings or side events; compiling and analyzing information on commitments (Nationally Determined Commitments, National Biodiversity Strategies and Action Plans, Sustainable Development Goals Voluntary Commitments, etc.); joining (virtually or in person) meetings with members of delegations; and/or developing analyses that result in policy-influencing pieces at the regional and international levels. 

This course examines the law, institutions, and advocacy strategies designed to protect international human rights.  We will analyze civil and political rights and economic and social rights, as well as international humanitarian law, and explore key enforcement mechanisms at the national, regional, and international levels. The evolving role of NGOs and civil society actors in advancing human rights, and the responsibility of corporations, will also be examined. Both progress and enduring challenges in making human rights real “on the ground” will be a focus of this course, together with the need for effective enactment of legal standards, enforcement of those standards, and empowerment of affected communities. Current legal issues and strategies concerning climate change and human rights will also be highlighted.  

This course provides an intensive survey of international human rights law and practice, with a principal focus on interpretation and implementation of human rights obligations, commitments, and norms in the practice of states. The course has three main components: in the first unit, we examine the development of the substantive law of human rights and its sources (including treaties, customary international law, and non-binding international instruments). In the second unit, we examine implementation of international human rights in the international, regional, and domestic systems, focusing on UN organs such as the Human Rights Council and treaty bodies as well as regional systems such as the European and Inter-American Courts of Human Rights.  Finally, in the third unit we look at the application of the substantive law and implementation mechanisms in the context of current issues in international human rights, including in the context of atrocities, and the refugee crisis. The course highlights selected contemporary ethical problems in international human rights law such as genocide, crimes against humanity, and torture; application of human rights obligations, commitments, and norms to non-state actors (including corporations); positive duties on states to protect individuals from abuses by non-state actors; universality of human rights and cultural relativism; and the need to protect human rights while countering terorism, including issues relevant to U.S. law and practice. Along the way we examine issues related to international immunities, impunity, human rights litigation under the U.S. Alien Tort Claims Act and Torture Victim Protection Act, and international criminal tribunals. 

This course provides an intensive survey of modern international human rights law. Tracing the historical evolution of human rights norms, we will first explore how they became a dominant feature of the post-World War II, post-colonial, and post-Cold War international orders. We will cover the doctrinal and institutional mechanisms of the modern human rights system, including the core treaties and international and regional bodies, with a particular focus on how courts, both international and domestic, can give human rights the force of law--or deprive them of it. We will examine how international human rights law defines specific rights (e.g., the right to life, the prohibition of torture), struggles to overcome structural and historical biases (e.g., discrimination on the basis of sex, gender, or race), and adapts to different contexts (e.g., climate change, armed conflict, social media and surveillance). Throughout the course, we will study why states and businesses respect human rights, why they don't, and how lawyers, NGOs, and other actors can work to ensure that most human rights norms are honored most of the time. Our readings will draw from case law, treaties, academic works, legal briefs, and other sources that offer a real-world sense of how 21st Century human rights law is articulated, litigated, and adjudicated.
Learning Objectives:

• be able to identify and apply IHRL treaties, norms, and jurisprudence to historical and contemporary legal and policy issues, including genocide, climate change, torture, racial discrimination, gender discrimination, LGBTI rights, corporate accountability, and online privacy and expression;
• be able to identify the key human rights mechanisms at the international and regional levels;
• be able to strategize how human rights disputes can be brought before these mechanisms or domestic courts.

This course will examine the philosophical and historical underpinnings of international human rights law. Students will encounter early conceptions human rights protection, alternative visions for the modern human rights framework, the development of international human rights law, and critical perspectives on the evolution and implementation of human rights.

Students will be encouraged to critically examine the successes and failures of the normative framework for the protection of human rights, whether we have achieved the universal realization of human rights, and ways in which the system might be reimagined or strengthened. Particular attention will be paid to the legal framework applicable to the protection of the rights of non-citizens, including migrants, refugees, and stateless persons. Contemporary case studies will be used to illustrate the challenges in resolving protracted situations of statelessness or displacement, and how gaps in international legal protection may exacerbate looming human rights crises, including those related to global climate change.

There are no required prerequisites for this course. However, students may find it beneficial to have taken International Law I: Introduction to International Law and/or the introductory course to International Human Rights.

Learning Objectives:

• Students will gain an understanding of some of the historical movements in the creation of human rights and political forces driving outcomes.
• Students will learn how to assess the strengths of the international human rights regime and identify key areas and methods of critique.
• Students will gain the ability to think critically about our assumptions about the structure of international law and human rights in order to imagine ways in which international human rights can be strengthened towards the universal realization of rights.
• Students will strengthen their written and verbal communication skills through written reflections, papers, and classroom discussion.
• Students completing a paper for the writing requirement will gain mastery over their chosen topic related to international human rights law, enhance the clarity and precision of their writing, and sharpen their skills in conveying their understanding through an oral presentation.

International investment law is a unique area of international law in which an individual investor can sometimes hold a State accountable for breach of an international law obligation undertaken by the State towards investors in an international treaty. Investor-state dispute settlement is at once practical – tribunals must resolve the concrete disputes and requests for relief before them – and the subject of passionate theoretical debates.
Since the 1960s, and especially since 1990, States have negotiated over 3,000 treaties containing protections for foreign investors, including bilateral and multilateral investment treaties (BITs and MITs) and trade treaties with investment provisions (TIPs). State consent to arbitration of disputes with foreign investors under such treaties has given rise to a rich, varied, and contested jurisprudence – and regular calls for change and reform.
This seminar will examine the historical emergence and evolution of international investment law, the treaties concluded to encourage and regulate foreign investment, the case law of international arbitral tribunals and commentary thereon, and the procedures followed in the arbitration of international investment disputes. The seminar aims to enable students to develop an understanding of the key jurisdictional, substantive, and procedural issues in international investment law and to engage them in the controversies surrounding them.

This project practicum will provide an opportunity for students to be involved in two projects designed to further accountability for war crimes and other atrocities.

Most of the work will be on the Atrocity Crimes Advisory Group (ACA), which is a project established by the United States, European Union, and United Kingdom to assist the Ukraine Office of Prosecutor General (OPG) in investigating and prosecuting war crimes and atrocities committed during the conflict that began with Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. 

A second project is the Innovation Council for International Justice (ICIJ), which is an initiative that will bring together experts from a wide variety of fields to analyze efforts to achieve accountability for war crimes and atrocities in order to draw lessons for innovative future approaches to this challenge. 

In the project portion of the course, students will be involved in activities with the ACA and the ICIJ that will give them a ground-level view of how institutions to provide accountability for atrocities operate in practice. These activities will enable them to acquire skills that go well beyond the typical law school experience, and may include:

(1) coordinating, developing agendas for, attending, and summarizing meetings involving ACA subject matter experts;

(2) helping organize visits to the US by Ukrainian prosecutors, investigators, and officials, as well as ACA events;

(3) working on initiatives requested by the OPG such as a victim and witness support protection and support program;

(4) supporting the collection of information on the Ukrainian population’s experience of the war and their conceptions of what would constitute accountability for harm; and

(5) conducting occasional research for the OPG.

The seminar portion of the course will:

(1) provide students with a solid understanding of how substantive international law attempts to ensure accountability for war crimes and other atrocities;

(2) give them an appreciation of the jurisdictional issues that arise in international criminal law and their implications for seeking justice;

(3) illuminate political and social challenges in creating mechanisms to seek justice for war crimes and atrocities;

(4) prompt consideration of the conceptual and jurisprudential issues involved in ascribing criminal liability to individuals who may have engaged in significantly different activities, through discussion of concepts such as command responsibility and joint criminal enterprise;

(5) invite reflection on ethical questions that arise in seeking accountability for war crimes and atrocities, such as potential tensions between obtaining an end to conflict and securing justice; the concept of a just peace; the extent to which political considerations should inform prosecutorial decisions; the appropriate role in prosecution decisions of local communities who have been harmed by atrocities; and the relative weight in prosecution decisions of considerations such as the gravity of an offense, strength of evidence, public attention, specific deterrence of allegedly culpable individuals, and general deterrence of future perpetrators.

In these ways, the practicum is designed to enable Georgetown law students to serve as leaders in the next generation of lawyers and policymakers devoted to seeking international justice.

In this colloquium, a paper will be presented each week by a leading national or foreign scholar in the field of international law. The papers will relate to cutting edge issues concerning international law, broadly understood. Students will be expected to read the papers and prepare a short written reaction memos concerning some of the papers. They will also have an opportunity to present oral comments to the paper’s author. In addition to the students enrolled in the colloquium, faculty members from the Law Center and other area law schools will attend the weekly paper presentations. The presentations will take place over lunch in the Hotung faculty Dining Room.  Lunch will be provided.  

This survey course introduces students to the nature, sources and institutions of international law and major developments in the contemporary international legal system. It considers such topics as treaties, executive agreements, customary international law and jus cogens; recognition of states and governments; the principle of self-determination; methods of international dispute resolution, especially before international courts including the ICJ and though international arbitration; domestic jurisdiction over disputes with international elements; international immunities; the role and operation of the United Nations and other international and regional entities, such as the EU and the OAS; International Human Rights Law; Law of the Sea; Law of Outer Space; Private International Law; how the international system protects (or fails to protect) the environment; International Criminal Law; the use of force in self-defense against other countries, rebellions, or terrorist groups, humanitarian intervention, etc.

Learning goals for this course:

Ability to analyze and interpret treaties, judgments and other international law instruments. Awareness of relationship between international and domestic law, how international law is made and applied, how domestic legal systems differ in their approach to international law.

This introductory course deals with the nature, sources and operation of "public international law," with some of the most important contemporary challenges to the international legal system, and with the international community’s evolving responses to those challenges. It includes such topics as the law governing treaties and other international agreements; the recognition of states and governments; methods for international dispute resolution including litigation in the International Court of Justice; the United Nations and other international and regional entities; international human rights and international criminal law; law of the sea and international environmental law; and the rules governing the use of force. Some attention is also given to the role of international law in the U.S. legal system; questions of jurisdiction, foreign sovereign immunity and the act of state doctrine; and the allocation of foreign affairs powers between the President, the Congress, and the Judiciary. We will discuss a few of the most pressing illustrations of the operation – or shortcomings – of the international legal system in the context of current problems or crises. As a first-year elective, this course is intended to offer a contrast or a complement to the bulk of the first year curriculum, by exposing students to the substance and style of foreign and international law materials, institutions, and dispute-resolution mechanisms, and to provide a gateway to Georgetown's rich international law upper class course offerings. 

This course deals with the nature and sources of international law and major developments in the international legal system, including the interaction of international law and municipal (domestic) legal systems. It considers such topics as treaties, executive agreements, and customary international law; jurisdiction over disputes with international elements; foreign sovereign immunity; methods for international dispute resolution; the role of international law in the U.S. legal system; how the international system protects (or fails to protect) human rights and the environment; and the use of force against other countries, rebellions, or terrorist groups.

Learning Objectives:

This course will expose you to a different legal system – the regime of contemporary public international law governing the conduct of states and international organizations – as well as the way that legal regime is incorporated in the law of the United States. It also serves as a general precursor to other international law courses in the Georgetown Law curriculum.

This course is a broad introduction to public international law. Students will consider the nature of international law as law, sources of international law including customary international law, and the role of national and international tribunals in international dispute resolution. The course will also cover topics including the fundamentals of treaty law, statehood, recognition of states and governments, jurisdiction and immunity, state responsibility, international humanitarian law, international human rights law, international environmental law, the law of the sea, and international commercial disputes. The course will touch on other relevant topics as time permits.

How does international law apply in domestic legal systems? When are treaties and customary international law binding in national courts? What are the rules and mechanisms of “incorporation”? Do judges have a responsibility to follow generally accepted rules of international law? This seminar offers students an opportunity to research, write and make presentations about specific issues related to the status of international law in domestic legal systems. The primary focus will be on the U.S. system, but a comparative approach is included and students are encouraged to investigate the treatment of international law in foreign legal systems that directly incorporate customary international law as well as those where international legal rules always require legislative enactment.

These issues arise in varying contexts, including civil and commercial litigation against foreign parties, suits against foreign states or international organizations, human rights litigation under the Alien Tort Statute and efforts to enforce the judgments of foreign courts.  We will also consider the impact of rulings by the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court, questions of sovereign immunity and Acts of State, when and how international law can be used to interpret domestic statutes, and how to prove foreign law in civil and commercial cases.  More broadly, we will be exploring whether domestic courts can or should act as "enforcers" of international law, whether domestic courts should be considered part of an emergent “global judiciary,” the importance of transnational cooperation between courts, etc.

This course is open to J.D. and LL.M. students and requires a paper and an oral presentation.

Learning goals for this course:

Ability to research, use, and write about topics at the intersections of international and domestic law; awareness of how different legal systems deal with relevant topics; ability to present orally and in writing.

This seminar examines efforts to reduce poverty in countries and problems of accountability in doing so, whether in international institutions, national institutions, or the private sector. Considers various approaches to accountability. Covers issues of compliance, good governance, human rights, corruption, environmental sustainability, and experience with various accountability mechanisms in international institutions. Includes two simulations in which students must address accountability issues.

Learning goals for this course: To understand the difficulties of reducing poverty within countries and the legal issues associated with bringing accountability to doing so. Students should be able to develop insights that can be applied in both the public and private sectors.

This course will explore the global fight against impunity -- specifically, as it pertains to curbing war crimes, human rights violations, grand corruption and looted antiquities -- through class discussions, lectures and guest speakers with personal experience in fighting the impunity that is so often associated with war crimes and economic crimes. It is based on the premise that those that are willing to slaughter thousands of innocents, are also willing to steal millions of dollars and loot our collective cultural heritage – and that the fight against impunity includes both war crimes and economic crimes (and often, the international trend to focus on the former, ignores the domestic interest in prosecuting the latter). Over the semester, students in a seminar-size class will be exposed to the basics of international criminal law, international human rights law and international economic crimes, as well how the fight against impunity impacts national security and foreign policy issues. The class will focus on issues related to war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide, as well as the recent global efforts to fight grand corruption and recover looted assets and antiquities, including UN Convention Against Corruption and the new UN-World Bank Stolen Asset Recovery (StAR) Initiative. Students will be allowed to write a paper of their choice regarding international law and the fight against impunity. Class grades will be a combination between class participation (20%) and a seminar paper (80%). Required readings (cases, statutes, articles, book excerpts, on-line treaties, etc.) will be illuminated by lecture and discussion from a professor with first-hand experience in the global fight against impunity through his personal experience with the Slobodan Milosevic, Saddam Hussein and Omar al-Bashir matters, as well his background with the UN war crimes tribunal, the White House, the Pentagon, and the World Bank’s StAR Initiative, and helping recover stolen assets on behalf of various governments. In order to take advantage of Georgetown’s unique position in the intersection of law, politics, and international affairs, the course will feature high-profile guest speakers who will highlight their own personal efforts to fight impunity and how such international efforts impact national security and foreign policy matters.

The course will survey key aspects of European Union Law relating to transnational litigation in Europe such as jurisdiction, the coordination of parallel proceedings, and the recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments in international cases in Europe.  It will mainly focus on the EU-Brussels I-bis Regulation, which provides for harmonized rules on these issues. The course will provide students with the necessary skills to develop a procedural strategy as claimant or defendant in a cross-border dispute involving European parties.

Special emphasis will be placed on the relevance of these issues from the perspective of non-EU (e.g., U.S.) parties.  A comparative approach involving U.S. law will be taken when useful to promote a better understanding of the relevant EU regulatory provisions.

The International Negotiation course will focus on the methods and objectives for successfully engaging in international negotiations. This course will include in-depth reviews and class discussions of negotiations conducted by governments, the private sector, non-governmental organizations, as well as international institutions. The course will provide important insight into the necessary preparations and research necessary to conduct international negotiations as well as a better understanding of the complexities and nuance of actual negotiations. The course will provide students an opportunity to review and dissect previous negotiations and prepare and conduct negotiations based on their understanding of what works and what does not. Discussions will focus on the most important aspects of negotiations -- mutual understanding of the expected outcome, in-depth review of the expected positions of the parties, how to accurately understand the extent of any leverage and how to assess a successful outcome. Cultural, linguistic and other possible impediments to a successful negotiation will also be explored to provide students a full understanding of all that goes in to a successful negotiation.

This seminar seeks to develop skills and knowledge to participate in negotiations and in particular international business negotiations. Approximately a third of course time is devoted to the negotiating process and analysis of negotiation principles and dynamics. Another third is spent on the cultural, practical, legal and strategic elements of international business transactions. The balance is spent on a series of "mock" negotiations. Students, individually and in groups, experiment with different negotiating techniques and fact situations of increasing complexity. The course requirement is principally satisfied through preparation of a comprehensive negotiated agreement and follow-up memorandum. Heavy emphasis is placed on class participation, including the negotiations. The final negotiating problem requires substantial team work with others, including strategy, analysis, and preparation. Negotiations are carried on both inside and outside normal class time.

After introductory lectures on negotiation theory and practice, the seminar students will be divided into teams for a series of simulated negotiations covering government-to-government, government-private and transnational private negotiations.  Student performance in these negotiations and class discussions will comprise most of the course grade; no research paper or examination is required.

The scramble to secure steady supplies of inexpensive energy to generate electricity and to power industry and transport has defined much of the twentieth and, thus far, twenty-first centuries. Climate change and renewable energy (appropriately) dominate the discussion today, particularly in the developed world, but, absent a major unforeseen technological breakthrough, non-renewable sources such as oil and natural gas are still expected to meet the majority of the world’s energy needs for decades to come (according to the US Energy Information Administration, 82% of energy consumed worldwide will still come from non-renewable sources in 2050).

The oil and gas industry lies at the intersection of global business, international law, geopolitics, the environment and particularly in the developing world, economic development. This seminar will address the international legal norms and public policy principles that have shaped, and continue to guide, this industry. It is designed for students interested in careers in energy, energy policy, project finance, international arbitration, environmental regulation or development – whether for a law firm, energy company, NGO, international organization or government – as well as students simply interested to learn more about an industry that impacts our daily lives in countless ways. 

International organizations touch our lives in many important ways, from actions as simple as sending a postcard abroad to mobilizing the international community to combat global pandemics to responding to one State’s aggression against another. In many instances, they have been very effective as a means of organizing collective responses to common problems. At other times, they have been seen as exceedingly ill-equipped to rise to some of the greatest problems of our times due to political paralysis, mismanagement, and other factors.

The course will provide students with an overview of international organizations and the pivotal role they play as the primary fora within which States develop and implement international law and policy. It will familiarize students with the structure, decision-making powers, financing, and other institutional law aspects of international organizations. It will also explain the position of international organizations within the international legal system, and how the system has evolved to accommodate organizations of varying size, scope, and composition. Toward the end of the course, we will examine the effectiveness of IOs’ engagement on several contemporary issues. Even though this is a survey-type course, the intent is to address these issues at a fairly advanced level of analysis, and the course will involve close reading of international and regional legal instruments.

This course provides a detailed overview and analysis of the technique of project financing in an international environment (particularly in emerging markets). The focus is on the perspectives of the various parties to the project, including output purchasers, providers of goods and services, equity holders, and especially commercial banks, international financial institutions and other lenders. The aspects peculiar to infrastructure projects in specific industries (such as power generation, ports, toll roads, etc.) are also considered.

Learning objectives:

Achieve competency in understanding and analyzing international project finance transactions, from the perspective of the various parties to the project, including:

• Identify, understand and analyze project risks during development, construction and operational phases;
• Analyze transaction structuring and identify contractual and non-contractual risk mitigation and shifting methods for project parties;
• Apply basic finance and legal principles with respect to practical and contractual remedies, as well as dispute resolution mechanisms; and
• Consider specific case studies, as well as sample transaction documents, to better understand the issues that arise in a typical international project financing.

This course examines legal, business and policy issues that arise in international project financings, particularly in emerging markets, and analyzes how such transactions are structured and negotiated and related risks are allocated. We consider the typical roles played by parties to such transactions (equity sponsors, lenders, customers, suppliers and host governments), interests associated with such roles, and how competing interests tend to be reconciled. We will focus on how negotiated arrangements are embodied in and supported by typical transaction documentation such as project documents, financing documents and legal opinions. Coverage will include illustrative local law and political risk issues. Selected international investment transactions, both actual and hypothetical, will be used to illustrate recurring themes.

Course requirements include participation in a simulated international project loan negotiation with outside experts serving as clients.

Examines legal and financial aspects of foreign investment projects, especially in developing countries, from the perspective of the investor, lender and the host country. Legal issues related to the structuring of the foreign investment, the arrangement of the private and public financing, and the construction of a project are considered. A significant amount of time will be devoted to analysis of typical international project finance documentation, but the international and host country legal issues applicable to foreign investment, support from national and multinational agencies, noncommercial risk analysis and dispute resolution will also be considered and discussed.

This course is an introduction to the law and policy of U.S. taxation of U.S. and foreign persons engaged in cross-border activities. The course will address both how individual and corporate foreign taxpayers are taxed by the United States, and how U.S. individual and corporate taxpayers are taxed by the United States on income earned in or from other countries. Topics will include U.S. jurisdiction to tax, allocation of income, withholding taxes, the foreign tax credit, deferral, transfer pricing, and tax treaties. The course will also consider how the U.S. rules in these areas are influenced by developments in other countries. The goal of the course is to provide an overview of the relevant law and policy considerations, with a focus on specific issues that are presently contested as a policy matter. Students should leave the course with an understanding of the basic framework for U.S. international tax law and a sense of some of the policy debates surrounding the current rules.

This three-credit survey course is designed to introduce students to the legal system governing international economic transactions and international economic relations, with a focus on the World Trade Organization (WTO) and its constituent treaty instruments. The primary objective of the course is to give the student an in-depth overview of the world trading system and some exposure to its particular details. The course will cover the basic principles and mechanisms of international trade law, including most-favored-nation (MFN) and national treatment, and relevant law in different substantive areas, including tariffs, quotas, services, intellectual property, trade remedies, and standards.  We will also examine the issue of development in the WTO and trade treaties and whether treaty obligations constrain countries’ policy autonomy and hinder their ability to pursue successful development strategies, as well as the tensions between trade liberalization and other values, such as those concerning the environment, health and safety, workers’ welfare, and human rights.

The course will also cover current trends and issues in international trade law.  The Uruguay Round established the WTO in 1994 as the premiere forum for negotiating multilateral trade agreements and adjudicating international trade disputes; however, the negotiation and adjudication functions of the WTO currently face significant challenges.  Globally, more than 300 regional or bilateral trade agreements have been negotiated, including the recent United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) and Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), with implications for both individual countries and the global trading system overall.  The course will include current developments at the WTO, bilateral and regional trade agreements (including U.S.-Europe and U.S.-Kenya negotiations and trade models in other parts of the world like China’s Belt and Road Initiative and the African Continental Free Trade Area), Brexit, and U.S. “trade wars” pursued on national security grounds.

This three-credit course introduces students to the legal and policy aspects of international trade and investment law, two pillars of international economic law that have developed dispute settlement systems. These two areas of law affect a broad array of national legislation, regulation, and administrative practice, as well as other areas of international law and policy, such as development, human rights, climate change, and other environmental issues. Both trade law and investment law have raised anxieties regarding their linkages, effects, and overlaps with non-economic issues. The United States, European Union, China, and many other countries have actively engaged in litigation and new negotiations in both fields of law. In international trade law, governments bring legal claims against each other for breaches of obligations, while private lawyers work with private commercial interests behind the scenes and often directly on behalf of governments. International investment law, in contrast, provides direct rights to private foreign investors to bring claims against governments. These disputes are proliferating and sometimes overlap with international trade law claims. In the past, the U.S. always sought protection for its investors in developing countries, but with shifts in the global economy, the U.S. increasingly became subject to such suits by foreign investors. This course will introduce students to both of these areas of international law practice.

Economic interdependence between countries and across production chains has grown exponentially. Yet, today, economic globalization is under attack. In this context, existing rules on international trade, and negotiating fora to potentially change those rules, are key. This course focuses on the rules and institutions established under the World Trade Organization (WTO) as well as selected regional trade agreements. What are the benefits and risks of trade liberalization from legal, economic and political perspectives? How can trade liberalization go hand in hand with pursuing public policy goals such as protecting the environment or labour standards ("non-trade concerns"), job creation or promoting the economic development of poor countries? The course will offer an in-depth, practical knowledge of substantive WTO law drawing heavily on case law from dispute settlement practice. It will address the basic principles of trade in goods and trade in services as well as more specific WTO agreements on, for example, health measures, subsidies, trade remedies and intellectual property rights. The course will also focus on the unique WTO mechanism for the settlement of trade disputes, and especially on how it balances trade liberalization with non-trade concerns as well as how it copes with increasing trade tensions between OECD countries and emerging economies like Brazil, China, India and Russia.

Examines international trade laws and regulations and World Trade Organization agreements affecting international trade, and the relationship of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade 1994 and other international agreements to U.S. law and practice. Considers, in detail, the U.S. antidumping, countervailing duty, safeguards (Section 201) laws and regulations and the WTO agreements that establish multinational standards applicable to the use of those remedies. Examines the WTO agreements on services, intellectual property, and technical barriers to trade. Examines the statutory remedies, particularly Section 301, that are available to address foreign restrictions on U.S. exports of goods, capital, services, and intellectual property. Analyzes the U.S.-China "trade war" and resulting tariffs and agreements.  Evaluates the role of Congress, the U.S. Trade Representative, and other U.S. agencies in setting trade policy and overseeing administration of the trade laws. Analyzes the WTO procedures for dispute resolution and key WTO panel and Appellate Body decisions. Reviews free trade agreements, including the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement, as well as bilateral investment treaties. The course includes a weekly discussion of current events affecting international trade law and regulation.

This class is an intensive workshop designed to use case studies of U.S. agency decisions and related WTO jurisprudence to: 1) develop students’ substantive understanding of trade remedy law; and 2) introduce students to the policy and procedural aspects of the various phases of trade remedy disputes in the U.S. and at the international level. The class will include an examination of U.S. law and WTO agreements on antidumping measures, subsidies and countervailing measures, and safeguards.  Particular attention will be focused on developing strong oral and written advocacy and presentation skills through issue spotting exercises/mock agency hearings and the final writing assignment.

Global climate change is most significant environmental challenge of the 21st century. Because the emissions of greenhouse gases (GHGs) result from virtually every kind of economic activity -- driving a car, heating a home, operating a cement factory, raising chickens -- any policy aimed at reducing emissions will have significant and broad-based impacts on domestic economies around the world.  And because most of those economic activities involve the movement of goods, services, people or intellectual property rights across international borders, policy actions taken in response to climate change can implicate global trading rules.

As countries around the world adopt different approaches to addressing the threat of climate change, the risk of conflict between basic rules governing international trade and measures taken to control GHG emissions rises.  This seminar will explore those overlaps and potential for conflict versus the opportunity for the global trading system to contribute to the reduction in GHG emissions.  The course will include a survey of the basic international rules touching on climate change, including the Paris Agreement, underlying UNFCC documents, the UN’s sustainable development goals, human rights agreements and the basic international trade rules of the World Trade Organization (WTO) and key regional agreements, including the EU treaties and the USMCA.  It will examine a number of the key issues at the intersection of trade and climate, including whether and under what conditions countries can impose a carbon border adjustment mechanism that is consistent with the WTO rules; the increasing use of government subsidies to promote the development and use of green technologies and whether new rules on subsidies are needed to regulate them; the increased clamoring for the sharing of cutting-edge green technologies, notwithstanding the WTO’s intellectual property rules; the growing volume of cross-border trade in electricity and the expansion of renewable energy and intellectual property rights feeding into internationally-operated smart grids; the need for the development of accepted and enforced standards for “green” finance; and the implications of climate change for human rights and immigration policies as rising sea levels, severe droughts and extensive fires force massive migrations.

The seminar will also explore the areas in which the trading system could make a positive contribution to the fight against GHG emissions, including the options for limiting fossil fuel and fishery subsidies and supporting the financing of renewable energy facilities.  In addition, it will examine whether the current exceptions to the trading rules provide sufficient policy space for innovative approaches to climate change.

Learning Objectives: The primary objective of this course is for students to develop an understanding of the potential for conflicts between trade measures and trade rules with efforts to restrain or tax GHG emissions, along with WTO-consistent policy and financial options to support the fight against climate change. The course will give students to opportunity to develop cutting-edge proposals of significant value to political and thought leaders around the world about how best to use the trading system to support climate mitigation and adaptation measures.

This course will examine the connection between trade law and development, including aspects of international and regional trade agreements, comparative law, and diverse areas of market regulation at the national level. Overall, the seminar will highlight the role of law and regulation as a driver for sustainable development and inclusive growth and link broader legal frameworks and policy debates with the needs of individuals and enterprises. It will engage students in ways in which economic law can help encourage sustainable and inclusive development and will assess challenges associated with legal and regulatory capacity and the uneven implementation of laws in practice. Cross-cutting and inter-disciplinary approaches in the field, such as socio-legal approaches, human rights, food security, the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and gender and trade will also be discussed throughout the seminar.

The seminar will take place in three phases. In Phase I, the seminar will explore the historical and institutional relationship between trade and development, including World Trade Organization (WTO) disciplines, regional trade agreements (RTAs), and other relevant international legal frameworks.  Phase II will focus on different issues and will cover a number of substantive aspects of trade and development in depth, all of which impact stakeholders and communities and hold greater potential to contribute to the common good.  Specific areas of focus will include domestic market regulation and investment, non-tariff measures, regulation of services, trade facilitation, agriculture, labor and environment, intellectual property rights, gender, and digital trade.  Phase III of the course will consist of an in-class exercise to apply the theory and substantive legal approaches discussed in Parts I and II in the context to practical trade and development challenges. 

Readings will be drawn from a variety of viewpoints and sources – law review articles, white papers, academic journals, newspapers and magazines, and excerpts from books – and will cut across trade and economic law, inclusive economic development, and business.  The readings will highlight different aspects of the legal and regulatory environment in the context of encouraging sustainable and inclusive development globally and at the grassroots level. Discussion questions will be provided for each session, which can be used as the basis for class preparation

The course will also incorporate short, practical case studies that illustrate how different issues in trade, development, and economic regulation can be applied from the perspective of different stakeholders (entrepreneurs, countries, and communities).  Seminar members will be asked to assume roles in discussion of these case studies, which will count towards class participation and lay the groundwork for the final paper.  Questions to guide the case study analysis will also be provided. 

In addition to the readings assigned for each session, optional background readings will be included for students wishing to explore a topic in greater depth (additional background reading is recommended for students who have not taken a trade law course, but the course does not have any prerequisites). 

This class examines the complex intersection of international trade, energy, and climate change law and policy. It explores how these different legal frameworks, designed to protect varying and sometimes conflicting values like non-discrimination, energy security, and decarbonization, interact with each other. The class discussion will concentrate on the approaches policymakers take to navigate the challenges of promoting global trade while also tackling critical issues of energy security and climate change.

The course will survey key international rules related to climate change as these relate to clean energy, including the Paris Agreement, UNFCCC documents, the UN's sustainable development goals, and WTO trade rules. Topics covered include the complex intersection of trade, energy and climate change law and policy; the regulatory space for energy and climate policies under WTO rules; environmental taxes and emissions trading systems like the EU ETS; carbon border adjustment mechanisms like the EU CBAM; green subsidies and the WTO, including the US Inflation Reduction Act; climate-friendly regulation on energy efficiency and green energy; trade and climate negotiations at the WTO; trade aspects of climate action outside the WTO, including free trade agreements; trade implications of environmental due diligence mechanisms; lessons from the Montreal Protocol and Kigali Amendment on curbing ozone-depleting substances; and the growing field of climate litigation and its intersection with trade.

The seminar will examine areas where the international legal system could positively contribute to fighting emissions, such as limiting fossil fuel subsidies and supporting renewable energy financing. Through analyzing real-world case studies and debating key issues, students will gain an in-depth understanding of the challenges and opportunities at the nexus of international trade, energy and climate change law and policy.

This course will cover the interface between the intellectual property rights, international trade and public health, focusing in particular on the WTO TRIPS Agreement and subsequent decisions, including on the Covid-19 vaccines waiver and its possible extension to diagnostics and therapeutics.  It will provide an introduction to the provisions of WTO agreements relevant to public health (other than TRIPS), and to the law and economics relating to IPRs and public health; it will cover the provisions of the TRIPS Agreement relevant to public health, and discuss the relevant disputes settled in the WTO. It will examine the background, content and implications of the Doha Declaration on the TRIPS Agreement and Public Health and of the subsequent TRIPS amendment implementing compulsory licensing for exports.  It will also discuss the TRIPS-plus provisions in bilateral or regional free trade area agreements. The course would study relevant national/regional implementing legislation, for example on compulsory licenses, and discuss use of the WTO export compulsory license provisions. It will devote a session to Covid-19 and infectious disease pandemics.It will devote a session to Covid-19 and infectious disease pandemics. Finally, the course will also cover recent work on trade, intellectual property and public health in other intergovernmental organizations, in particular in the World Health Organization, including negotiations on the pandemic agreement.
In addition to the final paper, students will be graded on class participation, individual/group class presentations.
The learning objectives and outcomes of this course are to be able to:

• Identify the legal and policy implications of international trade rules, particularly those on intellectual property rights (IPRs), for public health, and critically evaluate proposals for changes to these rules; 
• Understand past and current legal work of international institutions in this field, particularly the WTO and the WHO, and evaluate the way forward; 
• Improve the basic skill of communicating effectively, both in writing and orally, on a legal topic covered by the course, for example by explaining clearly how the provisions of TRIPS could be used to promote both the innovation of and access to needed medicines; 
• Improve the skill of independently conducting legal and policy research; 
• Demonstrate the basic value of being respectful of the different views in this area, including during group work and in class.

Please see the International Women’s Human Rights Clinic website for more detailed information about the program.

Modern interstate dispute resolution finds its basis in a string of ad hoc arbitrations and claims commissions from the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries.  The United States was an early adopter of arbitration as a means of resolving interstate disputes, first agreeing with the United Kingdom in 1794 in the Jay Treaty to resolve certain disputes remaining from the Revolutionary War.
 

This course provides an overview of major principles, theories, operational concerns, and public policy issues related to complex humanitarian emergencies. The course highlights selected contemporary crises, examining causes and consequences of these emergencies. Examples include Ukraine, Sudan, Democratic Republic of Congo, Syria, Venezuela, Yemen, Myanmar and others. A particular focus is the role of humanitarian issues in foreign policy and international relations.

This course will introduce the basic concepts of international commercial arbitration from both a theoretical and practical perspective. It will provide a general overview of the subject, and subsequently focus on issues including the agreement to arbitrate, the constitution and duties of the arbitral tribunal, the conduct of the proceedings and the arbitral award. The course will refer to the ICC Rules of Arbitration in discussing many of the practical aspects of these issues.

The subject of investor-state disputes and their resolution lies at the cutting edge of international law, and is a major factor in the development of the global economic system in years to come. Study of this form of arbitration provides insight into the evolving shape of customary international law, the conflict between capital-importing and capital-exporting states, and the status of individuals in the international legal order. This seminar will provide students with a firm grounding in the history, present practice, and future implications of arbitration between foreign investors and host states, sanctioned by multilateral and bilateral investment treaties. Topics that will be covered in this course are the history of the treatment of aliens and investments under international law; an overview of the most important international treaties that give investors a right to arbitration of claims; the most important elements of procedure that characterize investor-state arbitration, including tribunal composition, jurisdiction, evidence, award and challenge or annulment; substantive law of investment arbitration, the standards that apply when a tribunal determines whether a breach of the treaty has occurred; and the future development of investor-state arbitration including the challenges of globalization and other stresses, the clash of capital-importing and capital-exporting countries, environmental protection and free trade, restrictions on state sovereignty, the construction of an international investment jurisprudence, the limits on arbitrability, and the expansion of multilateral investment protections worldwide. Active participation in discussion of the course materials is required.

This seminar addresses modern military weapons – their development, acquisition, proliferation, use, control, and elimination – considering a set of problems that will raise the most difficult security concerns for the United States and the rest of the world in the post-cold-war era. In the seminar, we will explore a wide range of weapons technologies--including nuclear, chemical, biological, and conventional armaments--and the political and legal mechanisms that constrain them. The seminar will address historical allegations concerning the dissemination and use of these weapons; the rise and fall of various strategic doctrines; the bureaucratic processes of government decision making; and the evaluation of relevant ethical considerations surrounding possession and use. The bulk of the seminar will focus on contemporary legal and political issues such as ongoing treaty negotiations, export controls, verification of compliance, enforcement of treaty commitments, and the dismantling of redundant weaponry. The seminar is particularly recommended for those interested in exploring careers in public international law, but will also be relevant to others interested in the role of the lawyer in influencing United States public policy more generally. Each student will prepare a substantial original research paper and participate in small exercises designed to provide some simulated experience in characteristic legal tasks, such as drafting, analyzing, briefing, etc.

This seminar examines both progress and ongoing challenges in seeking meaningful justice and accountability for serious international crimes, including crimes against humanity, genocide, and war crimes. We’ll begin with an overview of the challenges of effective atrocity prevention and an examination of fundamental developments over the last few decades establishing international and hybrid criminal tribunals and other mechanisms of transitional justice, including truth and reconciliation commissions. Building on this foundation, and drawing upon legal scholarship, social science research, and country case studies, we will then explore a range of responses to key justice challenges recurring in a number of countries emerging from conflict. These challenges include: (1) the often complicated relationship between peace processes and justice initiatives; (2) the question of whose justice goals are being pursued and how national, regional, and international stakeholders interact in such efforts; and (3) the complexities of building enduring justice on the ground through meaningful domestic rule of law reform, outreach, cultural engagement, and other means. Students will write a substantial seminar paper within the subject matter scope of the seminar.

This three-credit survey course is designed to introduce students to the different dimensions of law and development, integrating legal, historical, academic, and practical models and approaches.  The course will cover a range of issues and substantive areas of law, including economic and social development and rule of law approaches; human rights law; comparative law; peace and security; international economic law (including trade, finance, aid, and investment);  labor, environmental, and health law; market regulation; institutional models for advancing law and development; gender; and sustainable development.  It will also examine the increasing role of technology and data in law and development and the connection between law and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).  Throughout the semester, the course will explore how different areas of law address questions of equity, inclusiveness, vulnerability, and environmental sustainability.  There are no prerequisites for this course, and it is intended to be both an introduction to law and development and a complement to other course offerings at Georgetown Law.  

The course is divided into three parts.  The first part begins with an exploration of the foundations of law and development, including an examination of the issues, debates, and academic literature.  This portion of the course will examine the role of governments and institutions in law and development (including the World Bank, WTO, IMF, UN system, donor organizations, regional organizations, and others), as well as how rules are designed and implemented from the perspective of individual and community stakeholders.  Part I of the course will also highlight the evolution of different approaches, theories, and models within law and development, including economic approaches (structural change approaches, dependency theory, neoclassical/neoliberal approaches, endogenous growth theory, post-Washington consensus models, and others), promotion and criticism of rule of law approaches (legal pluralism, institutionalism and new institutional economics, constitutionalism, international vs. national law approaches, legal empowerment, informality, and others), and current movements such as law and political economy and TWAIL (Third World Approaches to International Law).   

The second part of the course will introduce students to the different substantive dimensions of law and development.  This segment will allow students to both understand the legal foundations of different aspects of law and development and explore intersections between different areas of law as they relate to development, highlighting the cross-cutting nature of law and development.  Topics will include human rights law, international economic law (finance, investment, and trade), conflict and resource control, gender and development, corruption and development, development assistance, and law and development aspects of health, environment, and climate change. 

The third part of the course will focus on issue-based and regional case studies, allowing students to apply what was covered in the first two parts of the course in different contexts and explore ways in which law has been – or could be – a driver for development.  Issue-focused case studies will include land tenure and contracts, labor, agriculture and food security, intellectual property rights, and data and development.  Regional case studies will include Africa, Asia (with some focus on China and India, among other countries), and Latin America.  In this part of the course, students will also assess which law and development approaches have been best suited to different circumstances, economies, cultures, and communities. 

Learning Objectives

The course has several interconnected learning objectives:

• Understand the legal, historical, economic, and political context of different aspects of law and development, individually and in relation to each other;
• Examine different normative approaches to law and development, globally and regionally;
• Interpret academic research, relevant excerpts from international treaties, provisions in bilateral and regional agreements, and laws and regulations, building an understanding of the inter-connected nature of different legal instruments;
• Assess law and development challenges facing governments and international institutions, identifying possible approaches and trade-offs;
• Understand how economic, social, and sustainable development can be further incorporated into soft and hard law, as well as international, regional, and national law;
• Introduce students to different roles for lawyers in the field of law and development; and
• Equip students with the knowledge and tools to approach law as a tool for promoting social, economic, and sustainable development. 

The aim of this course is to introduce the students to the ways in which liberal constitutionalism deals with the fact of difference (religious, ethnic, or national). After general theoretical introduction to various issues (such as law, culture and difference, politics of recognition and politics of redistribution, the risks of politics of identity, the liberal and feminist critiques of multicultural politics, the analytical problem of group rights), the course will survey the ways that liberal democracies deal with the claims of several groups within society to be different. We will read cases and materials from the United States, Canada, France, Israel, India, and Germany.

This course explores the development of law (domestic and international) governing space operations generally, application of the law to present day national security activities, and emerging issues in national security space law. The course will address the impact of the UN space treaties to national security activities, international and domestic law governing national security space operations, the role of commercial space actors in conflict, and current issues in national security space law. It will also consider U.S. strategic competitors’ (Russia and China) approaches to the law of space operations.

Surveys the law of armed conflict (LOAC) and customary international law as applied by the United States in warfare. From where does LOAC arise? What is a war crime – and who decides? What is “unnecessary suffering,” and what drives that legal determination? When does LOAC apply and what role do other rules of law, such as domestic U.S. law and International Human Rights Law play in regulating the conduct of armed conflict? Does it cover non-state actors? What are U.S. LOAC obligations, and how are they enforced? How does one distinguish illegal combatants from prisoners of war? Where do military commissions come from, and who may be tried by them? Could the atomic bombing of Nagasaki have been a war crime? Can a superior’s order constitute a defense to war crime charges? What is the U.S. position in regard to laser weapons? Land mines? Non-lethal weapons? Torture? Rendition? Reprisals? The assassination of enemy commanders? What is an illegal order, and what should a soldier do if she receives one? How may battlefield war crimes be prosecuted? Our inquiry will focus on the law applicable to the conduct of U.S. military operations in past and current conflicts, whether or not they be declared, whether they be internal or international. Although primarily focused on the law of land warfare, the law of air and naval warfare, as well as space and information warfare, will be considered.

Learning objectives:

To gain a firm understanding of the law of armed conflict and to consider, through discussion of practical exercise from the textbook, how the law is applied in an operational context.

This seminar will examine the characteristics that define the Civil Law and the Common Law traditions. Students will learn the roles of different relevant actors of the legal community, establishing contrasts, differences and similarities between legal traditions. The course will expose students to the Civil Law tradition, as well as cultural, linguistic, historical and political traits, that influences the ways in which clients, partners and communities from Spanish-speaking regions understand the law.

The objective of this course is to introduce students not only to the main contemporary legal traditions, but also to encourage them to think about the theory and practice of each tradition, in order to make useful and critical comparisons of the different legal systems. Throughout the class, students will understand the influence that different political events had in shaping the current legal systems of Spanish-speaking countries and will have the opportunity to discover the relations and interactions between domestic legal systems and international legal systems. The comparative law perspective of this course will allow students to explore, for instance, the distinctions between the United States judicial review model with constitutionality control systems in civil law countries.

The seminar will build students’ practical legal concepts and terminology, and written and oral communication skills by introducing them to and reinforcing technical language and concepts in Spanish, in areas such as immigration, criminal law, commercial and civil law (including statutory interpretation and status), labor law, and family law. In-class presentations, written assignments, and readings will give students the opportunity to strengthen speaking, listening comprehension and written communication in legal Spanish.

By the end of the seminar, students will be equipped with an understanding of the different legal traditions, the strengths and weaknesses of current legal frameworks, the role of international human rights law in domestic legal systems, as well as Spanish communication skills in the context of legal practice.

This seminar requires attendance and participation in seminar discussions, preparation for class, and writing response posts. For the 2-credit section, students will be required to write three reaction papers throughout the semester. For the 3-credit section, students will be required to submit a final paper.

Learning Objectives:

• Understanding of contrasts, differences and similarities between the Civil Law and the Common Law systems.
• Understanding of the impact of cultural, historical, and political events in shaping legal systems in Civil Law countries.
• Understanding of practical legal concepts and terminology in different areas of law of Civil Law systems.
• Exposing students to the Civil Law tradition to ensure their successful lawyering with Spanish-dominant clients, partners and communities.

This course surveys various principles and aspects of admiralty and maritime law of the United States, including: the historical and constitutional bases for its existence; the admiralty and maritime jurisdiction of the courts; the substantive law of maritime contracts and maritime torts; the application of criminal law at sea; the laws governing carriage of goods and passengers by sea; the public order of the oceans at the national and international levels; protection of the marine environment; and federal-state maritime issues. Consideration is given not only to the current state of the law in these areas, but also to related U.S. government policies and international and comparative law issues.

This course will examine the general contours of the law of the sea the essential part of which is governed by the UN Law of the Sea Convention. First, the applicable regime(s) governing establishment of maritime zones will be analyzed, including the policies that inform it. Second, we shall carefully consider the rules governing the exploitation of living and non-living resources in areas under national jurisdiction, the high seas and the Area. Third, the legal regime governing the continental shelf under international law will be analyzed, including its status as a customary international rule, prior to analyzing the particular role that the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf (CLCS) holds in so far concerns the establishment of outer limits of the continental shelf. Fourth, the pretorian-made delimitation methodology will through case law be examined, including the role of CLCS recommendations in the delimitation of the outer continental shelf. Fifth, the legal regime in disputed maritime areas will be also be analyzed. Finally, the architectural structure of the dispute settlement mechanism in the UN Law of the Sea Convention, and its interrelations with other dispute settlement mechanisms, will be given careful attention.

In this interdisciplinary colloquium, leading national and international scholars in a range of domains will explore fundamental normative and policy problems of contemporary concern in health law. Topics will include health care, public health, global health, science, regulation, politics, ethics, and policy. The colloquium will have participants from across the Georgetown University campus among faculty, senior administration, and students, as well as participants in the Washington health policy and legislative community.

Each seminar session will focus on a presentation by, or structured dialogue with, distinguished guest speakers. Students from the Law Center and other schools within Georgetown University (including Nursing and Health Studies, Medicine, Arts and Sciences, Foreign Service, Business, and other graduate programs) will be expected to prepare for intensive discussions in which experts, faculty and students explore, analyze and deepen their understanding of issues selected for consideration each month. The colloquia will be open to other students and faculty members across Georgetown University as well as interested members of the public, particularly professionals working in health law and policy in Washington.

This course reviews the basic principles of international law related to the many exclusive and inclusive uses of ocean space, especially on those critical issues affecting U.S. national security. Students will develop a comprehensive understanding of the legal regimes governing the ocean, from internal waters and other coastal zones through the regimes of the high seas, and an overall appreciation for U.S. ocean law and policy, based on relevant principles of international and national law. Topics include navigation and overflight rights, living and non-living ocean resources, military and law-enforcement activities, protecting the marine environment, marine scientific research, the law of naval warfare, and the formal and informal processes for developing ocean policy and for resolving international disputes. Students will research and engage in class discussions on a number of problems involving national security issues and the use of ocean space, including resources on the continental shelf, maritime terrorism, military exercises, maritime transportation systems, at-sea trafficking in illicit drugs, piracy, weapons of mass destruction, collection of intelligence, and naval rules of engagement.

The struggle to respect and ensure human rights while also protecting national security raises important and complex legal and policy challenges. This course will examine current issues at the intersection of human rights and national security, with a focus on the use of force.

The first half of the course will cover the legal frameworks governing the use of force, including the UN Charter and jus ad bellum, the law of armed conflict (also known as the law of war or international humanitarian law), human rights law, and the U.S. Constitution. Students will examine how the rise of transnational terrorist organizations and advancements in armed drone technology have blurred the line between wartime and peacetime legal rules and placed tremendous pressure on these legal frameworks in the decades following the 9/11 attacks. By the end of this portion of the course, students will be able to analyze uses of military force in the daily news to determine whether the use of force is lawful under domestic and international law.

The second half of the course will cover key issues at the intersection of national security and human rights including: U.S. drone strikes, indefinite detention and the use of military commissions at Guantanamo, the CIA’s torture program after 9/11, the climate crisis, and more. Where feasible, we will cover current events and have practitioners from the field join us for a discussion of the topic. In past years, we have had speakers from the State Department, Defense Department, Congress, and human rights organizations such as Human Rights Watch and Human Rights First.

Student learning objectives for the course are to use class sessions and the preparation of a paper:

• To become familiar with basic human rights standards that govern the use of force in law enforcement settings, with particular emphasis on the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the European Convention on Human Rights;
• To become familiar with basic international law standards that govern the grounds for resort to force (jus ad bellum) and regulate the way force may be used in armed conflicts (jus in bello or law of armed conflict/international humanitarian law);
• To gain an appreciation of the complex ways in which many current security threats and responses to them have features that do not fall squarely into the categories of either crime subject to law enforcement operations or armed conflict subject to conventional military operations; and
• To become familiar with a range of complex issues at the intersection of national security and human rights and the diversity of professional opportunities in these areas.

This seminar is about the phenomena of national and cultural identity formation within states and non-state groups (ethnic, racial, regional, religious, cultural, tribal) and the roles played by law and culture in defining and distributing membership in a collective or “national” community. The course material will provide a foundation in political theories of nationalism and will focus on two different forms of contemporary nationalism: the rise of a new American and predominantly white nationalism (since the 2016 election) and a non-US example of a sovereignty or self-determination movement (such as the Catalan independence movement in Spain). Along the way we will discuss additional and alternative forms of belonging and exclusion, such as monuments and memory, statelessness and diaspora, and postcolonial and cosmopolitan forms of citizenship. This interdisciplinary and comparative seminar is geared toward better understanding how law and culture are used to divide and unify diverse populations, and exploring how democratic, heterogeneous states and communities might find common purpose.

This course will provide students with an understanding of the current matrix of nuclear non-proliferation treaties, multilateral arrangements, laws, regulations, initiatives, proposals, and organizations that aim to halt the spread of nuclear weapons and prevent nuclear terrorism. The goal is to examine the full array of tools employed by the United States to address nuclear proliferation, as well as how the Executive Branch brings these tools to bear through the inter-agency process and its joint efforts with Congress and international partners.  Virtually every element of the nonproliferation toolbox was deployed to address the nuclear programs of Iran and North Korea, so considerable time will be spent examining these critical cases.  We will also examine how the nuclear programs of India and Iraq shook and ultimately altered the nonproliferation regime.  Throughout the course, we will consider nonproliferation efforts in the context of great power strategies, alliance obligations, and regional rivalries, on how these factors influence the decision-making of proliferating countries and countries seeking to prevent proliferation.  A continuing theme in the course will be the evolution of nonproliferation tools over time and the role of and lawyers in that evolution.

In a project-based practicum course, students participate in a weekly seminar and work on a project under the supervision of their professors. This course explores the challenges and opportunities of using law to address risk factors that contribute to the rising prevalence of NCDs, such as unhealthy diets, tobacco use, and alcohol consumption. By taking an international and comparative approach, it navigates the theory behind the regulation of risk factors to NCDs in relation to concrete examples from around the world, with a particular emphasis on Latin America, where considerable progress has happened in recent years. Students will participate in a two-hour/week seminar and carry out 10 hours/week of project work under the direction of the course professors.

SEMINAR: In every class, students will learn substantive content and develop lawyering skills, leading to a comprehensive understanding of the role of law in relation to risk factors to NCDs, including in policy, advocacy, and litigation. Specifically, students will be introduced to NCDs (definition, risk factors, and global burden); understand the role of corporations as drivers of NCDs; learn about regulations to address NCDs, such as pricing and taxation, labelling and packaging, and restrictions to marketing and advertising; and explore the strengths and weaknesses of regulatory, advocacy, and litigation approaches to NCDs. In navigating these topics, students will develop a set of lawyering skills, including generating and using evidence, monitoring policy, building coalitions, conducting scenario-planning, engaging decision-makers, segmenting audiences, and framing arguments.

PROJECT WORK: On the experiential/field-work side, students will work with external partners of the O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law (and the newly created Global Center for Legal Innovation Food Environments) on legal and policy projects related to NCDs and the law. For example, students may draft alternative reports to UN bodies analyzing compliance with human rights obligations related to unhealthy diets, tobacco use, or alcohol consumption (e.g., “shadow reports”). Such a report could analyze the prevailing legal frameworks in a particular country and highlight strengths and weaknesses in the statutory and regulatory language. By working with the O’Neill Institute and civil society organizations, the course gives students the opportunity to use law to address critical health challenges.

The course will discuss the legal and constitutional issues that arose with the establishment of the modern state of Israel over land inhabited by Palestinians.  The course includes historical accounts of the unfolding conflict, debate over the one state solution, the nature of the Israel lobby and the BDS movement. 

This course will cover the pressing threats to global health security, challenges in pandemic preparedness and response, and the law and policy responses required to make us all safer. We will examine the major actors, institutions, and legal frameworks in global health security, question whether they are adequate to meet the task, and discuss how they can be improved to better prepare the world for future health threats. Specifically, this course will offer opportunities to reflect upon the COVID-19 pandemic, including the weaknesses in international systems that allowed an outbreak to spiral into a pandemic, the various mechanisms utilized in the response, the inequities exposed and exacerbated, and the path forward.

The class will examine legal instruments (both “hard” and “soft” law) at both the national and global level, as well as agencies, institutions, and public/private partnerships.   

The class format will include a mix of formal lectures, class discussions, and real-life simulations as an experiential component. The course is open to both Georgetown JD and LLM students. Subject to changing public health guidance, the course will be taught in person. Attendance and participation will be recorded.

Learning Objectives:

The goal of this course is to guide students to understand and critically assess national and global health law and governance frameworks, together with tools needed to safeguard health security. In addition to law and governance, the class will use health equity as a lens to understand allocation of scarce resources at the national and global level. Additionally, our aim is for students to actively consider solutions to secure a better future; one in which the world can respond to pandemic threats with science and equity at the forefront. We also expect students to develop high quality research and writing skills, presenting a clear thesis and well-developed arguments in all written assessments.

Reading assignments will include chapters and excerpts from the required course text, which explores the threats to global health security, the legal frameworks, institutions, and actors tasked with responding to these threats, and offers a blueprint for a more secure world. The course textbook will be supplemented with up-to-date readings on the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond. Students should come to each class highly prepared to comment and ask questions.

Responsibility in international law—whether attributed to states, corporations, or individuals—takes many forms and is derived from an array of legal, geopolitical, and philosophical sources.  Owing to the predominance of States as sovereign and equal actors in international relations, the philosophy and political science behind the international law of responsibility may be different than with respect to domestic law. This one-credit course is designed to expose students to the range and depth of questions involved in responsibility attribution at the international level. Students will be encouraged to identify and articulate conceptual connections across legal and philosophical texts.

This course, which will meet seven times for two-hour classes, will be a discussion seminar; students are expected to come to each class prepared to discuss the reading. The first hour of each class will generally focus on one or more cases, and the second hour will explore the philosophical or theoretical dimensions of the legal principles presented during the first hour.                  

Students in the Policy Clinic provide services to make democracy work several policy themes. Recent projects include:

• Community equity – Combat gentrification and displacement in low-income communities of color, develop a community support fund, develop a community resilience hub.
• Health and food – Organize a consortium to improve working conditions in university food supply chains, expand access to oral health services, reinvent a better food chain for institutions (universities, hospitals, schools, and shelters), analyze social determinants of health (housing, food security, etc.) for state health officials.
• Labor and human rights – Organize a consortium to improve working conditions in university food supply chains (same as health above), protect worker rights in global supply chains for the FIFA World Cup and other mega-sporting events.
• Trade and climate – Develop mutually supporting climate and trade policies, develop options for international cooperation on climate policies through “climate clubs,” recommend strategies to decarbonize steel production without violating WTO rules, and identify strategies for reducing greenhouse gas emissions while preserving manufacturing jobs.

Please see the Policy Clinic website for more detailed information about the program.

Learning outcomes for this clinic: Students are supervised, evaluated and graded on three skill sets, each of which has specific evaluation criteria in the Policy Clinic Operations Guide.

1. Management and professionalism – includes “managing up” with supervision meetings, initiating self-evaluation, managing effort and deadlines, collaborating, and expectations in a professional culture.
2. Analysis and strategy – covers legal, policy and strategic analysis.  It includes identifying issues that require analysis, learning the context efficiently, using diverse sources to avoid bias, explaining analytic methods, using a logical framework, and drawing conclusions that meet client needs.
3. Communication, writing and speaking – includes organizing documents and presentations, meeting audience needs for context and decision-making, relating analysis through stories and examples, presenting visual information, and editing for plain language, clarity, and English style.

The objective of this 1-credit course is to introduce students to the relationship between international laws governing foreign investment and efforts to protect and promote human health.  The course will examine the extent to which bilateral investment treaties (BITs) and investment chapters in trade agreements that allow for investor-State dispute settlement limit domestic regulatory autonomy, particularly in the field of public health.
International investment law is comprised of over 3000 BITs, which govern the acceptance and treatment of foreign investment.  BITs impose various rules that can limit the freedom of domestic policy-makers, including rules governing national treatment, most-favored-nation treatment (principles of non-discrimination), fair and equitable treatment, and expropriation. Foreign investors, including transnational corporations, are increasingly using these rules to challenge domestic regulations such as public health measures through investor-State arbitrations.
The course will address:
 

1. the theoretical perspectives underlying the international law on foreign investment;
2. the different types of legal tests used to determine the regulatory legitimacy of a measure as well as the impact of varying standards of proof on analysis of this type;
3. rules governing the expropriation of property rights and the circumstances in which health measures might be considered equivalent to expropriation;
4. rules governing the concept of fair and equitable treatment as used in determining the legitimacy of domestic regulatory measures;
5. rules governing non-discrimination and their potential impact on domestic health measures; and procedural issues relating to the participation of civil society in the negotiation of investment treaties and the settlement of investment disputes through international arbitration.

There are no prerequisites for the course.  The course is ideal for students in the Global Health Law LLM program or for students wanting a course on international arbitration or international investment law.

This course examines domestic refugee law and policy, with particular focus on asylum and other refugee-related claims for protection that arise in the U.S. legal system. Students will become familiar with the key actors in the asylum and refugee law arena, including the U.S. Congress, the Department of Justice, the Department of Homeland Security, the federal courts, and international entities.

The course objectives are: (1) to equip students with an understanding of the principles of refugee policy, asylum law, and the United States' procedures for refugee protection, and (2) to provide students with a practical appreciation for how refugee policy is formed and a working knowledge of asylum law, which will serve as a foundation for academic research, clinical study, employment, pro bono work, and/or internship opportunities within the U.S. government and the NGO community.

In addition to focusing on the refugee definition as interpreted by U.S. courts, we will examine the processes for adjudicating asylum claims -- where the system works and where it fails. We will also seek to understand the limits of asylum law and explore the toughest issues facing asylum adjudicators and policy makers today.

This course explores how different societies regulate human mobility. Using a comparative, law and society approach, we will denaturalize and probe the basic norms and values of our own immigration system by examining alternatives. As we will see, these systems answer three essential questions: (1) who gets to join a society (“admissions”); (2) what rights and obligations these new entrants to society have (“membership”); and (3) how much coercion these systems use to enforce (1) and (2) (what we will call “closure”). Some of these examples we will examine are historic and some are contemporary; some are more restrictive than our system and some are more open. 

In every case, we will see that these real-world systems contain implicit answers to questions at the heart of political theory and political ethics. What qualities should we value in new members of our society? What are the rights and responsibilities of citizenship, and what forms of belonging outside citizenship – if any – should societies grant? How much coercion is it OK to use in migration control, and to what ends? 

In the last third of the course, students will use the normative intuitions they have developed through contact with the case studies to grapple directly with classic and contemporary theoretical work asking these same questions. Students who opt into the three-credit version of the class will develop their own research projects that address the relationship between (im)migration law and public values.

Learning Objectives:

Substantive learning objectives:

• To contextualize familiar bodies of domestic and international law within a broader set of institutions and bodies of law that regulate human mobility; 

• To understand some of the different designs that are possible for these systems; 

• To begin to develop an understanding of the trade-offs, values, and assumptions embedded in these institutional designs, and to understand how these institutional designs affect people and communities (migrants and others) (ILO); and 

• To see connections between migration, migration law, and phenomena including national identity, politics, political economy, labor, race, gender, and the state (ILO)

Skills:

• Public speaking and oral presentation

• Critical thinking

• Consideration of ethical dimensions of public policy

• Developing and writing a scholarly research paper (WR)

All constitutions around the world deal with religion. Some constitutional systems are theocratic, some accommodate religion, while yet others advocate neutrality toward religious institutions or call for a strict separation between religion and the state. This course examines core questions regarding how religion and law interact in constitutional systems globally. We will explore the role of religion and the state drawn from comparative contexts including Asia, the Middle East, and Europe. We will evaluate the challenges faced by the different models of the relationship between the state and the church (or mosque) in our modern world. To what extent is liberal constitutionalism consistent with constitutional designs that privilege a particular religion? Should religion or secularism ever be placed beyond constitutional change, like through constitutional eternity clauses?

We will also consider the individual right of religious freedom and the scope of its protection globally. What counts as “religion” and religious freedom? Who is better placed to make these determinations—the courts, legislature, executive, or the people? We will discuss controversies relating to these questions, such as apostasy, religious conversion, religious symbols, and bans on religious dress like headscarves and burkinis. This course will also explore contemporary issues relating to religion and gender, multiculturalism, religious arbitration, and conscience claims.

This fieldwork practicum course, focusing on the interaction between international human rights law and reproductive health and rights.  The course will provide an overview of international reproductive health and rights, while affording students an opportunity to work in organizations that are addressing issues in the field in various ways.

As such, students participate in a two-hour weekly seminar and work for 10 hours/week for at least 11 weeks during the semester at an outside organization.

SEMINAR: The seminar will begin by providing an overview of international human rights law as it pertains to reproductive rights. The course will then focus on access to reproductive and sexual health from an international perspective, examining States’ obligations on a variety of issues, such as maternal mortality and coerced sterilization. Analyzing recent decisions emerging from regional and international human rights bodies, such as the European Court of Human Rights, the Inter-American Commission and Court on Human Rights and the CEDAW Committee (UN Committee on the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women), the seminar component will provide a necessary foundation for the students to conduct their fieldwork.

Fieldwork: Students will be placed with organizations working in the area of reproductive rights. Most likely, the work will be conducted remotely, as several of these organizations are not based in the Washington D.C. area. The work conducted for this portion of the course will be supervised by the external organization

Some of the projects may include assisting in drafting amicus briefs for cases currently pending before international bodies, and briefs assessing a particular State's compliance with human rights law regarding sexual and reproductive rights to be filed in front of UN bodies (shadow reports). Through these projects, students will learn how to conduct an analysis of existing legal and regulatory frameworks for sexual and reproductive health from a human rights perspective. By working with external civil society organizations, the course will give students the opportunity to develop practical projects using international human rights law to advocate for the advancement of reproductive health rights. In the past, external partners have included organizations working on women's rights issues, such as: the O'Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law, the Center for Reproductive Rights, Women’s Link Worldwide, Human Rights Watch (Women’s Rights Division), IPAS, the Women's Equality Center, and the Southern Africa Litigation Centre, among others.

Whether they are representing couples in transnational adoptions or multinational enterprises in cross-border mergers, legal practitioners increasingly are expected to consult international and foreign legal materials. This course will familiarize students with the best tools for researching international law and the domestic law of jurisdictions outside the U.S., enabling them to approach these tasks with confidence, rather than trepidation. Students will learn how to efficiently locate multilateral and bilateral treaties, decisions issued by international tribunals, documentation produced by the United Nations and other international organizations, as well as legislation and case law from selected foreign jurisdictions, including the European Union. Tools for topical research in specialized fields, such as human rights, international trade, and investor-state arbitration, also will be covered. Students will refine their information-gathering skills through a series of in-class research exercises and take-home quizzes based on real world, practice-oriented scenarios. This course will be especially beneficial for journal editors, students participating in the Jessup International Moot Court competition and other international competitions, and for students interested in pursuing careers in international law or in practicing law outside their home jurisdiction.

Overview

While the globalization of private capital markets has generated important welfare gains, it has also been responsible for episodes of financial instability, often with devastating consequences. The Course will analyze the underlying causes of international financial crises and assess the efforts of policy makers to mitigate their impact. The Course will be interdisciplinary in nature, focusing on the legal, financial and economic dimensions of these crises and the relevant policy responses. Key lessons will be distilled from an in-depth analysis of the most important episodes, including the Latin American Debt Crisis, the Asian Financial Crisis, Argentina’s default in 2001 and the crises precipitated by the Great Recession of 2008, including the Eurozone Crisis. We will also conduct a simulation, with students playing the roles of the various policy makers seeking to contain and ultimately resolve the crisis.

The Course will analyze both the common patterns of the previous international financial crises and the extent to which they have differed. In that context, the Course will investigate how the dynamics of these crises have been driven both by the evolution of credit markets (including the transition from bank lending to bond issuance) and changes in the underlying legal framework that supports these markets. The Course will analyze the competing considerations faced by policy makers as they seek to mitigate the impact of a crisis – often with large scale financial assistance – without increasing the risk of future crises through the creation of excessive moral hazard. In that context, the Course will review in some detail the role played by the International Monetary Fund in managing these crises.      

Learning Objectives

By the end of the course, students will have gained an understanding of how global financial markets have evolved over the past 40 years and how this evolution has both promoted welfare and created significant financial instability. They will learn how the relevant legal frameworks have interacted with this evolution to shape creditor incentives, with a focus on regulatory design, contractual provisions and litigation strategies. Through in-depth case studies, they will gain insight into how public policy makers have struggled to both contain the impact of these crises while, at the same time, introducing reforms to prevent them from recurring. In particular, they will gain an understanding of the legal, policy and governance framework of the IMF and the role it plays as a financial fire fighter. More generally, they will gain an understanding of the challenges faced by policy makers when addressing a systemic crisis, with a focus on the key actors, namely: (a) the governments of the countries experiencing the crisis, (b) private creditors and (c) the IMF. Existing and former officials will participate in a number of classes to share their own perspectives regarding the key lessons to be distilled from previous episodes.

Roman law developed over the course of more than one thousand years, and it  continues to influence contemporary legal systems throughout the world. In this  course, we will examine the portions of Roman private law that correspond to the  Anglo-American law of family, property, and wills and estates. Readings will consist of  excerpts (in translation) from Roman legal sources, principally Justinian’s Digest. No  background knowledge of Roman law or of Roman history is required.

This course offers students an opportunity to learn the definitions of “rule of law” and how to reform legal and judicial systems, including measuring the impact of those reforms. The field of rule of law reform is an expanding area of practice, be it focused on strengthening the concept of ‘Rule of Law’ and its indicators or to achieve certain economic, social and/or political goals.

The course begins by reviewing various definitions of what is meant by “rule of law”, recognizing that different institutions, governments, public and private sectors want to promote reforms to legal/judicial systems perhaps seeking the same end, but through different ways. The course uses a case study methodology, including specific sessions with U.S. and foreign judges and other rule of law practitioners active in reform efforts. Topics include: Democracy and the rule of law; Access to justice; Criminal justice and Criminal procedural reform; Court administration and Case management; Commercial court reform; Alternative dispute resolution (ADR); Judicial independence and Accountability; National security and Transitional justice; Indicators to measure the rule of law; and a discussion of the role played by legal actors in addressing corruption, both within and outside the legal system.

We will consider the rationale behind rule of law reforms by examining experiences around the world, including in the United States. We will see how reforms may target more competitive market economies, stronger law enforcement, gender equality or social justice. We will learn the impact of an increase in demand from users of justice systems who want improved services, not only “formal” justice users in courts, but informal justice services like paralegals and chieftaincy also. The course will also address the often overlapping or inconsistent agendas of donors, international organizations (e.g., United Nations, World Bank, Inter-American Development Bank, IMF, USAID, U.S. Military, among others) in the discussion and analysis.

Learning Objectives:

At the end of the course. Students will have acquired an understanding of the various definitions of ‘rule of law’ and the factors leading to and preventing successful reform efforts.

At the end of the course, students will have acquired some understanding of the differences and similarities among international organizations and their approaches to Rule of Law to be able distinguish varying objectives (e.g. democracy promotion, economic development, human rights and social justice, anti-corruption and law enforcement).

At the end of the course, students will have acquired a vocabulary and understanding of overlapping (and even inconsistent agendas) to be able to identify the “drivers” of reform and provide inputs for the design or evaluation of Rule of Law reform efforts.

This seminar will examine sovereign debt and its role in national and global financial systems. By the end of 2012, national governments had borrowed over $40 trillion from private creditors at home and abroad, and hundreds of billions of dollars more from one another and from international organizations. Government debt is a popular savings vehicle, a benchmark for pricing the risk of corporate debt, and the core asset in national and global financial systems. Sovereign governments may also guarantee borrowing by other important economic actors, from cities and provinces to banks and housing lenders. In many ways, sovereign debt functions like money. Yet it is also effectively unenforceable, since most of the debtors’ property is either immune or inaccessible to creditors. In addition to the basic policy, doctrinal and theoretical concepts in sovereign borrowing and restructurings, we will study recent crises in Europe and Latin America, reform proposals, and implications for the financial system.

Each student will be expected to submit a one-page analysis of each week’s reading, and two five-page papers (one each on the third and fourth parts of the syllabus). Students may choose to submit a single ten-page paper for either the third or fourth part of the syllabus in lieu of the two five-page papers. Each student will also direct class discussion of one assigned reading at least once during the term.

This seminar addresses the international and domestic laws governing outer space. Class discussion will include issues such as: liability for damage caused by space objects, use of outer space resources, rescue of astronauts and return of objects launched into outer space, environmental issues in outer space, and other more specific topics such as NASA and the International Space Station, commercial space operations, U.S. Government agencies involved in outer space, and the role of the United Nations in outer space.

Your phone rings. It is your Colombian client, and he has just been wronged! He needs your help to bring this bad-actor to justice. But not all of the relevant conduct took place in the United States, and you are not a Colombian lawyer. Where do you begin? Do you bring a claim in a Colombian court? Do you file suit in the United States? Does it make a difference? What causes of action can you bring? What law governs? If you do bring suit abroad, can you get information from the United States? As globalization in business increases, the need for cross-border litigators equally increases.

This simulation course, taught around a hypothetical fact pattern, is designed to be a hands-on introduction to initiating and defending against a cross-border litigation. Students will become familiar with topics unique to cross-border litigation, such as what law applies to your client’s claim, where can you bring this claim, and how to obtain discovery in the United States for a legal proceeding abroad. Students will learn practical skills such as factual investigation, legal drafting and reasoning, and oral advocacy.

The course is divided into three parts: Part I will focus on initiating a cross-border litigation, including the strategy motivating where to file and what to allege. The course will begin by giving students an opportunity to interview their “client” and gather factual information to support their client’s potential claims. At which point, the class will be divided into two groups. Group 1 will decide to file their claims in the United States and prepare a Complaint seeking a preliminary injunction while Group 2 will decide to file their claims elsewhere, but still use the U.S. Courts to help with discovery, and prepare a 1782 Application.

Part II of this class will focus on defending against the initiation of a cross-border litigation. Group 2 will prepare a Motion to Dismiss Group 1’s Complaint, and an opposition to the preliminary injunction, while Group 1 will prepare an opposition to Group 1’s 1782 Application.

Part III of this course will focus on oral advocacy. Each student will be required to give an oral argument related to either the Motion to Dismiss the Complaint or the 1782 Application.

The status of women in the Islamic world is one of the most controversial and provocative topics. While many studies conducted by Western scholars, as well as by feminist Muslim-Arab activists, attribute women oppression in Muslim countries to Islam, Muslim scholars argue the opposite; Islam initiated a huge revolution in women's legal and social position, Islam instituted and promoted dramatically women’s status in all aspect of life.  Yet traditional social factors, deeply rooted in the customary law of these societies hinder the application of the Islamic reforms and principles.

The Qura'an – as the very word of God, and the Sunna - the prophet's heritage, have enshrined women's rights in all aspect of life such as: equality in the marriage contract, dowery, maintenance, lodging, health care, respect, guardianship and custody, dissolution of the marriage contract (without the husband's consent), inheritance rights, political and public involvement, education, abortion (in certain circumstances) and more.

In this course, we shall examine the status of women in the holy texts compared to actual practices. We shall touch upon the Islamic theory of Jurisprudence, the sources of the Islamic law and the techniques of renewal. Then, we shall explore women's status as it is instituted by these sources and its development in present day Muslim countries.

Special attention will be given to the unique experience of promoting women’s rights initiated by the High Sharia'a Court of Appeals in West Jerusalem, for the Palestinian Muslims who live in a non- Muslim state - Israel.

In this course we aim to:

• Introduce the history of pre-Islamic Arabia, of the early Islam and the status of women in those times.
• Review women's rights enshrined in the sources of the Islamic law
• Learn about the obstacles that impede progress in promoting women's rights.
• Critically reflect upon and challenge the viewpoints of various scholars from both sides; feminist / activists and Islamic scholars.
• Discuss the proper ways of promoting women's rights in Muslim countries.

By the end of the course students should:

• Have knowledge of pre-Islamic and post-Islamic status of women.
• Have knowledge of the Islamic sources of jurisprudence.
• Get familiar with social and other conditions of which hindered promoting women’s rights.
• Be able to critically assess various scholars’ views of women status.
• have a firm understanding of the basic concepts of Islamic Sharia’a regarding women rights.

International tax treaties determine why hedge funds are located where they are, how motion pictures are financed, whether the dispatch of employees abroad is economical, and why financial assets follow prescribed international paths. They determine why Netherlands and Luxembourg have a large positive balance of trade with the United States, and why recording studios are established in the Caribbean. They determine whether bank accounts in Switzerland and Liechtenstein are really secret. While tax treaties ostensibly are only about dividing up tax bases between countries and exchanging information between sovereigns, in reality they channel the flow of investment and development in the global economy.

This course assumes that students have some familiarity with basic tax treaty concepts and examines how provisions of the OECD Model Treaty and the United States Model Treaty are used by tax practitioners to achieve specific business objectives. Students will acquire an understanding of how treaty provisions help shape economic and financial decisions in different industries and economic sectors. The course uses examples drawn from actual practice to illustrate the creative use of tax treaty provisions. It is designed to be an interactive experience, with students working on case studies, discussing alternative approaches, and using different jurisdictions and changes in the form of the underlying transaction to achieve desirable tax results.

Learning objectives:

This course is intended to teach the concepts underlying the United States Model Tax Treaty and the OECD Model Tax Treaty. By the end of the course, students are expected to understand how tax treaties are organized and be able to apply the model tax treaties to factual situations in which the tax treaties are applicable.

At the same time, the course is intended to challenge the student to be aware of the ethical challenges and risks of practice in the area of international taxation. More and more, tax authorities are not only looking to penalize a taxpayer for improper tax planning, but also the tax advisor who recommended the course of action followed by the taxpayer. By the end of the course, students are expected to be able to understand where the borders of ethical behavior are when developing international tax structures and to be able to analyze risks to the clients and themselves when working in this area.

Finally, the course is intended to reinforce principles of close reading and attention to the specific wording used in the tax treaties and cases interpreting the tax treaties. By the end of the course, students are expected to be able to read and understand why specific words are used in tax treaties and the significance of these words.

This is a basic tax treaty course. It will cover fundamental tax treaty concepts such as residency, permanent establishment, business profits, limitation on benefits, and relief from double taxation (including operation of the U.S. foreign tax credit rules). There will be an overview of treaty provisions that apply to investment income and income from the performance of services. In addition, students will learn about the interaction of tax treaties with U.S. domestic tax law, the role of international organizations in interpreting tax treaties, procedures for resolving tax treaty disputes through the competent authority process, and strategies for researching tax treaties. This course is designed for students with little or no background in tax treaties. However, students will be expected to have a basic understanding of the U.S. tax rules that apply to foreign persons who receive income from the United States and U.S. persons who receive income from abroad. The course will be based primarily on the United States Model Income Tax Convention, together with selected case law and administrative authority. We will also look at selected provisions of the OECD Model Tax Convention.

________________________________
[1] Although we will typically use the term “woman” to refer to a person who gets pregnant, and mother as a person who gives birth, we honor and recognize that not all people who become pregnant identify as women.

As the principal judicial organ of the United Nations, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) plays a central role in the development of international law and the peaceful settlement of international disputes.  When it was established, it was the only international judicial tribunal in the UN system and (for most purposes) the only international court for the settlement of inter-state disputes.  Over time, its authoritative decisions (judgments, advisory opinions, provisional measures orders) have addressed (and established the rules in) many fundamental areas of public international law.  The substantive content of the ICJ’s jurisprudence is now extensive. Collectively, its decisions form an essential part of the still-evolving structure of international law.  

In introductory international law courses, however, most students gain (at best) only a superficial understanding of the Court and its organization, procedures and substantive jurisprudence.  Few textbooks or treatises offer more than excerpts or summaries of what their authors consider the ICJ’s most important decisions. Moreover, the emergence of other international tribunals (for instance those associated with regional organizations or with specific areas such as human rights or international criminal law, as well as other specialized bodies) has expanded the corpus of authoritative decisional law in the international law field.

Nonetheless, the ICJ remains the pre-eminent judicial actor in the development of key areas of public international law.  The Court’s decisions (and the principles on which they are based) are frequently invoked in other disputes, in international negotiations, and in academic writing.  They continue to play a critical role in helping the international community settle its disputes on the basis of law.  States continue to look to the Court to maintain the rule of law in the most critical circumstances.  In February 2022, for instance, Ukraine initiated proceedings against the Russian Federation challenging the latter’s claims that genocide had occurred in the Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts of Ukraine, seeking to establish that Russia had no lawful basis to take military action against it on the basis of those false claims, and asking the Court to issue “provisional measures” to preserve Ukraine’s rights and to compel Russia to halt all military actions in Ukraine.

Learning Outcomes:

1. The goals of the seminar are both substantive and experiential: (i) to acquaint you with the structure, jurisdiction, procedure, and jurisprudence of the International Court of Justice, including its evolving role in the international legal community, (ii) to provide you the opportunity to research and master a specific legal issue of your choosing, and (iii) to give you experience in writing about (and presenting) your chosen topic and conclusions at an advanced level.
2. To provide helpful background and tools to use in dealing with questions of international law as they arise in whatever area you eventually practice in, as well as an appreciation of how to deal with decisions, judgments and conclusions of international judicial tribunals in general, in order to provide you a better understanding of the evolving nature and function of law in the global society.
3. To develop your ability to think critically about a particular problem, to engage in focused, sustained, in-depth research involving a range of domestic, foreign and international legal materials, to engage in complex legal analysis, to advance your knowledge relevant to the paper topic including possible problem-solving alternatives, and to advocate effectively for a particular thesis or solution.
4. To help you sharpen your ability to write clearly, concisely and thoughtfully about complex issues and to practice and refine oral advocacy and public speaking skills through in-class presentations on your research topics make an effective oral presentation about the problem you have chosen to consider and the solution you propose to offer.

Overview

It is commonly assumed that law imposes virtually no constraints on the President when he or she decides whether and when to use military force overseas.  In fact, however, nothing could be further from the truth.  There is an enormously detailed and complex corpus of laws, foreign and domestic, that constrains and guides (and sometimes authorizes) the use of force.  Therefore, the legal decision-making process within the Executive branch on such matters is as difficult and challenging as in virtually any other area of federal action.  The purpose of this seminar is to introduce students to the most important of the myriad legal questions that confront decisionmakers and their attorneys whenever the Executive branch contemplates a possible use of force.  The U.S. domestic laws we will examine include, among other things, the constitutional allocation of “war” and other military-related powers between Congress and the President; statutory authorizations and limitations; presidentially-imposed constraints; and covert action authorities and limitations.  We will then examine the principal international-law limits on the use of force, with particular attention to the jus ad bellum (the prerequisites for the decision to use force in the first instance, particularly as prescribed by the United Nations Charter), and the jus in bello (a/k/a the “laws of war,” or international humanitarian law) that governs the conduct of fighting—that is, how force may be used.  In light of the recent conflicts in Ukraine and in Israel and Gaza, we will almost certainly discuss the most pressing and vexing legal questions associated with those ongoing actions.  We will also study “test” cases, such as the Cuban Missile Crisis, the 2000 NATO campaign in Kosovo, strikes by the United States in Syria in recent years, and the 2011 Libya campaign, to illustrate the complexity of the issues.     

Learning Objectives:

Students should become familiar with the vast array of domestic- and international-law questions involving the use of force.  They should also develop a rich understanding of the legal issues that government decision-makers and legal advisors must consider in the course of deciding whether and how the United States (and other nations) can and should use force abroad (and in the United States).  Students will be expected to learn how to assess the reading materials critically, to identify unresolved questions, and to constructively respond to and critique views of their colleagues.  Students who enroll for three credits will demonstrate an ability to produce an original research paper of high quality.

This seminar examines how the law creates and regulates money. Money is at the very core of economic exchange, and serves both as a tool and as a subject of economic policy and regulation. This seminar will emphasize historical and international comparisons to examine what is money, how it is used by economic and political actors, and how it is regulated. Topics to be covered include monetary policy and central banks, legal tender, the gold standard and currency indexation, bank money, shadow banking and near-money, alternative currencies, payment systems, money and nation-building, currency regimes, monetary unions, financial crises and money laundering.

The Doctors Trial considered the fate of twenty-three German physicians who either participated in the Nazi program to euthanize persons deemed "unworthy of life" (the mentally ill, mentally retarded, or physically disabled) or who conducted experiments on concentration camp prisoners without consent. The Doctors Trial lasted 140 days. Eighty-five witnesses testified and almost 1,500 documents were introduced. Sixteen of the doctors charged were found guilty. Seven were executed.

The Doctors Trial provides a significant and important example of human rights violations and serves as a lesson in law and bioethics vital to understanding how law evolved from an initial eugenics policy to and including the horrible examples that framed human atrocities during WW II. 

This course will highlight examples from Jeanne Guillemin's "Hidden Atrocites, Japanese Germ Warfare and American Obstruction of Justice at the Tokyo Trial", Joel Dimsdale's  "Anatomy of Malice" examining the psychological assessments necessary for the trials, and Vivien Spitz's "Doctors from Hell", delving deep into the actual court transcripts from the proceedings. Ben Ferenz's work, one of the actual prosecutors at the trials, will also be included as insight into this tragic period. 

This seminar examines the role of the United States in shaping international human rights law and advancing the realization of these rights both at home and abroad. The US role since World War II is significant but also complicated, marked by leadership but also ambivalence.  The US stance toward international human rights has always been deeply shaped by human rights struggles at home -- over racial injustice, gender discrimination, and economic inequality – and by US ambivalence about participating in various multilateral treaties and institutions.  Increasingly, advancing human rights at home and abroad are profoundly interconnected, especially as the United States and the world confront urgent problems of climate change, Covid 19, economic inequality and other threats to human dignity that cross borders and affect us all.

With the United States so deeply divided politically, how can US leaders best move ahead to protect human rights at home and to advance human rights abroad? Do the foundations of international human rights law – rooted in the universal affirmation of inherent human dignity and equality – provide new promise going forward, and can greater empathy and common purpose be nurtured across political divides at home and abroad? What tangible mechanisms and strategies can best address the most urgent human rights challenges today? Who will be the key actors in these efforts, and what roles can state and local governments, civil society organizations, individuals and local groups and others play, in addition to the longstanding role of the federal government? Does the US system of federalism offer promising avenues for progress on urgent human rights issues or do deep divisions within the United States today undercut the prospects for consistent US leadership abroad? This seminar will explore these questions systematically. Students will write a substantial seminar paper within the subject matter scope of the seminar.

Successful management of globalization has emerged as the central challenge of our time. Globalization has been blamed for many of our social and economic problems from inequality to stagnant growth. The international regulatory failures exposed by the financial crisis of 2008-2009 have called into question not only the regulatory framework for financial stability, but also the entire framework of international norms and institutions known as Bretton Woods that have been the pillars of global economic regulation. The accompanying collapse in public trust in government experts and private elites has complicated efforts to address these challenges. Populist candidates have swept elections, particularly in the US and UK, based on platforms to reverse the course of international integration. Meanwhile, China and Russia have doubled down on leaders that embrace a return to state controlled economies and traditional notions of regional hegemony. Are we at an historical turning point characterized by GLEXIT – the abandonment of globalization – or will these challenges lead to a Globalization 2.0?

The purpose of this seminar is to look at the role of international economic law in managing globalization, both in terms of extracting the benefits and in addressing the consequences, particularly those negative effects that have fed the backlash. The focus of the seminar will be on the central regulatory regimes governing international economic activity: trade, monetary, investment, finance, competition, tax, sovereign debt and corruption. We will examine the fundamental character and role of legal norms, regulatory systems and international institutions in a world characterized by interdependence and conflict.

This is a research seminar in which the initial eight weekly classes will present a survey of regulatory regimes designed to give students a framework for what have historically been somewhat distinct “silos” but which each illustrate the recurring tensions between fragmentation and coherence. We invite student involvement in the specific topics in the field on which we focus. Each student will be asked to provide short papers responding to the readings for each of the initial sessions. Students will be expected to write a research paper on a relevant topic under the guidance of one of the professors and to make a short presentation to the class during the last third of the course. In their research paper, students will be expected to identify a contemporary, global economic regulatory issue and propose solutions drawing on insights from the seminar (and their broader studies) to analyze the problem, propose and defend possible solutions.

The seminar will be taught by professors with a wide range of experience in academia, private practice and government service. Distinguished outside experts will also be called upon to address particular topics within this framework. 

A number of broad themes will be developed to help unravel the complexity of global regulation:

• What is the role of legal norms in creating efficient and sustainable global markets? Do some problems lend themselves to different types of norms (e.g. soft versus hard law)? What about governance, the formality of legal norms (and institutions) and the role of national sovereignty and subsidiarity?
• Why do the different global economic regulatory regimes look so different? Why has trade evolved with an advanced set of norms, dispute settlement and enforcement?
• How have crises and systemic failures contributed to the development of legal regimes? Do crises lead to sustainable and effective regulatory regimes?
• What role does trust play in the character of legal regimes? Can international economic law be viewed as the objectification of trust? How can trust be sustained when global issues engage citizenry across the most diverse context imaginable?

This course examines how societies address widespread atrocities and serious crimes, e.g., crimes against humanity, genocide, human rights violations, and other abuses, through transitional justice mechanisms.  These violations often occur in conflict situations, but also can arise through repression, particularly of marginalized groups.  Broadly defined, transitional justice mechanisms are processes that provide acknowledgment, recompense and solace to victims through various accountability measures, with a long-term goal of reconciliation and/or an acknowledgement of the abuses and the adoption of measures to address the victims and steps to prevent the recurrence of the abuses/violations. The mechanisms are labeled “transitional” because they are typically implemented during or following atrocities and widespread abuses. In this regard, the crimes committed are of a scale that the judicial system, by itself, is unable to address.  The abuses require a broader and different approach. The focus in transitional justice processes is both on victims and on accountability measures that address the society as a whole. Transitional justice mechanisms can include the criminal justice system (e.g., international, national, local), as well as other non-legal approaches to justice and accountability, including truth-telling processes, reparations, reforms, memorialization. In particular, we will examine approaches to abuses and atrocities through a gender lens as well as a specific consideration of children and marginalized groups (e.g., racial, indigenous groups). In some cases, amnesties have been utilized (controversially in, e.g., South Africa). We will critically examine the underlying issues of how peace processes and transitional justice interact and support each other – and in some cases are not productive or fail.

Learning Objectives:  The course has multiple objectives; these include:

• Understanding how transitional justice mechanisms work in practice and how they may support victims and also lead to reforms that target human rights abuses on a societal scale. Examining some of the 40+ transitional justice processes that have occurred and the methods that have been employed. We will evaluate the efficacy of these processes. Ultimately, do these processes move the society to adopt and ensure human rights standards are protected/enforced?
• Understanding consultation processes that are engaged for societal input, particularly among marginalized groups, as a means of determining what process and/or mechanisms, e.g., truth commissions, prosecutions, reparations, reforms, memorialization, will be adopted and adapted to the country.  There will be, in some cases, proposals of the use of amnesties (e.g., South Africa) or innovative approaches, e.g., the Colombian Special Jurisdiction for Peace.
• Examining implementation problems and roadblocks/difficulties/challenges regarding the role of truth commissions or truth-seeking processes, the adoption of reparations, reforms and various criminal justice approaches (see below).
• Assessing strategies for working with victims and affected communities to address the violations that they have suffered. In this regard, memorials that recognize abuses, discrimination or the struggle for justice for victims and recall the violations, which may support memory and stand as markers to prior violations – how important are these efforts? 
• Finally, assessing the role of transitional justice in the United States, given the deep fissures in American society, what relevance do these experiences, both in a range of countries, but also in the United States, e.g., the Truth Commission in Greensboro, North Carolina.

This course focuses on transnational legal problems.  Transnational legal problems are problems that involve citizens of more than one country or involve activities that take place or have effects in more than one country.  Transnational legal problem-solving skills are important not only for lawyers working in the fields of human rights, international business, international dispute resolution and other distinctly “international” areas of practice.  They also are important for lawyers that do not have an international focus, because transnational legal problems frequently arise in diverse areas of law thought to be “domestic”—such as family law, environmental law, product liability litigation, civil rights litigation, criminal law, corporate law, and others.

Course Goals

The primary goal of this course is to give you an opportunity to learn how to analyze and advise clients on three fundamental issues that surround virtually any transnational legal problem:

• What is the applicable law?  National law?  If so, U.S. law or foreign law?  International law?  Private rules?
• What transnational dispute resolution methods are available and most appropriate?  Litigation in a national court?  If so, a U.S. court or a foreign court?  An international court?  Through alternative dispute resolution methods, like arbitration?
• How can the outcome of a transnational dispute resolution process be enforced?

Another goal of the course is to provide a foundation for students wishing to pursue advanced study of international, transnational law or comparative law, including international litigation, international arbitration, international trade, international investment, human rights, or international business transactions.

Attorneys practicing law in another country face a variety of unique challenges. There are obstacles in local laws, admission requirements and immigration regimes. Attorneys must navigate developing client relationships in different cultural settings and tackle cultural and/or language barriers to serve those clients. Attorneys and law firms face international and foreign legal issues in representation of their domestic clients. Law firms increasingly have offices staffed around the globe, and are innovating and experimenting with client delivery service models. Rules and norms of professional conduct can vary based on country and practice setting.

This field study is open only to students taking part in summer legal work in a country other than their home country. It is designed to foster deeper engagement and exploration of an aspect of their transnational legal practice through development of a scholarly paper and substantive presentation.

Students must submit a proposed paper topic on an issue of international law or international legal practice related to their summer employment/internship in order to be enrolled in this course. The topic and final paper may be related to but must not directly overlap with legal issues explored and worked on during the summer as part of the student's employment or internship. Students are encouraged to include a comparative element and/or to explore diverse aspects of the transnational legal professional experience. Students will be required to submit an outline, conduct an interview, create an audio or visual presentation of their topic, and provide feedback to others, in addition to writing their research paper. The final paper must be a minimum of 3,000 words, excluding footnotes.

Understanding and dealing with U.S. export control and sanction laws have become increasingly important skills for lawyers advising clients who compete in the global economy, including manufacturers, service enterprises, financial institutions, and companies licensing their technology abroad.  This course surveys the federal laws and implementing regulations governing the export and re-export of goods, services, technology and software from the United States or by persons subject to U.S. jurisdiction, the extraterritorial reach of re-export controls, prosecution strategies, restrictions on dealings with or in sanctioned countries, prohibitions against dealing with blacklisted parties, and other sanctions that apply to non-U.S. companies and individuals.

The course is designed to impart the practical skill sets and strategies you will need to use and understand the complex regulatory regimes underpinning U.S. export controls and sanctions, and to communicate effectively with the relevant government actors.  The applicable laws include statutes such as the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, Trading with the Enemy Act, the Export Control Reform Act, and regulations issued by federal agencies such as the U.S. Departments of Commerce and Treasury. Our study of these rules will include review of case law, agency guidance and prior government enforcement actions.

The course will also focus on the enforcement environment, including the trend of ever-increasing fines.  We will discuss defense strategies and the potential for global settlements with the Departments of Justice, Treasury, and Commerce.
Finally, the course will emphasize developing the working knowledge necessary for hands-on practice and problem-solving in this field.

Understanding and dealing with U.S. export control and sanction laws and regulations have become increasingly important skills for lawyers advising clients who compete in the global economy, including manufacturers, service enterprises, financial institutions, and companies licensing their technology abroad. This course provides an in-depth survey of the federal laws and implementing regulations governing the export and re-export of goods, services, technology and software from the United States or by persons subject to U.S. jurisdiction, the extraterritorial reach of re-export controls, restrictions on dealings with or in sanctioned countries, prohibitions against dealing with blacklisted parties, and other sanctions. 

The course is designed to impart the hands-on, practical skill sets needed by those who wish to practice in the increasingly in-demand area of export controls and sanctions compliance, including the skills needed to use and understand the various complex laws and regulations systems that implement U.S. export controls and sanctions, such as the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, the Trading with the Enemy Act, the Arms Export Control Act, and the Export Control Reform Act, as well as regulations issued by various federal agencies, including the U.S. Departments of Commerce, Treasury, and State. 

This course also will provide the skill sets necessary to communicate effectively with licensing agencies, how to approach foundational determinations of agency jurisdiction and classification, and how these issues affect direct investment in the United States as regulated by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States.

The course also will focus on the civil and criminal enforcement environment, including the trends of ever-increasing fines and global settlements with the Departments of Justice, State, Treasury, and Commerce. 

Concentrates on the U.S. taxation of foreign persons and foreign investments in the United States. The course covers the U.S. taxation of passive and business income of nonresident aliens and foreign corporations, the source rules, the principles and application of U.S. tax treaties, special rules governing foreign investment in U.S. real estate and other business, cross border financing transactions, the base erosion and anti-abuse tax, and tax planning possibilities involved in the foregoing.

Concentrates on the U.S. taxation of U.S. persons and businesses earning income outside of the United States. The course examines, in depth, U.S. taxation of the international operations of U.S. multinational corporations. It covers the GILTI rules, the foreign tax credit provisions, Subpart F, repatriation, and overall strategic tax planning, including the significant new U.S. international tax rules and other changes introduced by the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.

Objectives and Overview

Addressing corruption has become a global priority. The growing number of high profile cases involving the abuse of public power for private gain has generated moral outrage, particularly at a time of rising inequality.  Moreover, there is an emerging consensus that systemic corruption not only undermines a country’s economic performance but can also lead to political instability and armed conflict. The Course will examine the societal impact of public sector corruption and the efficacy of the criminal, regulatory and administrative steps that are being taken to address it, both at the national level and international levels.  The Course will be interdisciplinary, focusing on the legal, political, economic and institutional dimensions of this highly complex problem.       

Finding a universally accepted understanding of what we mean by “corruption” can prove elusive, and the course will begin by examining how lawyers and social scientists have approached this question. The course will then identify the environments that typically enable corruption to flourish, including natural resource economies and countries that are in economic and political transition. It will also assess the debilitating impact that corruption has on overall economic performance, inequality, poverty, political stability and national security.

Taking into account the above considerations, the course will identify the key ingredients of an effective anti-corruption strategy, emphasizing the importance of a holistic approach that includes not only effective criminalization and prosecution but also comprehensive regulatory and administrative reform.  While legal obligations and best practices have been established at the international level that include many of these ingredients, evidence indicates that meaningful change only takes place when domestic conditions for reform are in place, which are often precipitated by a crisis. In that context, the course will include case studies of reform based, inter alia, on the experience of the IMF, focusing on the anti-corruption program implemented by Indonesia.  Importantly, the course will also assess international efforts to address both the “supply” side of corruption (the provision of bribes to public officials by large corporations) and the problem of “concealment” (when banks in major jurisdictions assist in the laundering of the proceeds of corruption of foreign officials).  These issues will be addressed through a close study of the OECD’s Anti-Bribery Convention and the 40 Recommendations on Anti-Money Laundering and Combatting of the Financing of the Financial Action Task Force. Corruption within the political system will also be examined, including explicit bribery of politicians, conflicts of interests, and private financing of political campaigns (sometimes referred to as “legalized corruption”). Finally, the course will assess the merits of proposals to establish an International Court on Corruption.

Learning Outcomes

By the end of the course, students will have gained an understanding of those crimes that the international community does (and does not) generally accept as constituting corruption - and why there continues to be a debate on this important definitional question. They will also gain insight into the political and economic circumstances that most typically give rise to corruption and the debilitating impact that this problem can have on society. In terms of the design and implementation of an anti-corruption strategy, students will learn about the key elements of the most relevant anti-corruption conventions and international best practices, including the UN Convention Against Corruption. They will have sufficient knowledge to discuss in depth both the efficacy and limitations of these instruments, taking into account the importance of the domestic political environment.  Students’ understanding of these issues will be enhanced by in-depth case studies of corruption reform efforts, including in the context of IMF-supported programs. To that end, students will have an opportunity to discuss with IMF staff past and ongoing cases of reform.

US Health Law and Diplomacy in a Global Context aims to introduce US health law and policy through comparative and international lenses. The course will provide interested students with a broad introduction to key areas of domestic health law (health coverage, public health, product regulation, social determinants outside the health sector), including divisions of responsibility at the federal, state, and local levels in the unique health policy environment of the US. The course will also provide a basic comparative framework for understanding the US health law and policy systems within the broader experience of high-income countries and other health systems. Moreover, this course will explore the role that the US plays in shaping and engaging in global health law through international law, federal assistance programs, and participation in international organizations. This element of the course will focus on the Constitutional and legal context for US foreign policy relating to health, including critical issues relating to the US role in the World Health Organization. Throughout the course, special attention will be paid to way in which law impacts health, more broadly the notion of “legal determinants of health” as articulated in the final report Lancet- Georgetown Commission on Global Health and Law.

Mass atrocities and conflicts have an enormous impact on victims. Since Nuremberg, policymakers and lawyers have led the way in developing new legal frameworks, definitions, and legal processes to break the cycle of impunity. While painstaking and important progress has been made, particularly focusing on criminal prosecution and documentation, the voices of those most affected by atrocities - victims, survivors, and their communities - tend not to be solicited or given sufficient weight when policymakers design responses to atrocities. The disproportionate political and financial focus on holding perpetrators accountable risks neglecting other measures survivors prioritize, like reparations, truth-telling, memorialization, and searching for missing persons, let alone informal justice and healing processes. This 1-credit seminar will provide Georgetown law students the opportunity to consider how decision-makers can set justice priorities so that victims caught amidst conflict and mass atrocities are not an afterthought, but are placed at the center. We will explore 1-2 specific case studies.

Course Goals/Student Learning Outcomes:

● Understand the arc and architecture of the international justice movement, the current gaps and critiques of the field, and where the field seems to be going.
● Understand the complex landscape of actors, organizations, and institutions, as well as their roles, influence, and interests
● Develop sensitivity to and awareness of how to prioritize the experiences of affected
communities and their perspectives on justice as part of a holistic effort to seek accountability
● Gain a detailed understanding of the multiple strategies and activities necessary for meaningful and holistic justice for atrocities, beyond criminal accountability
● Learn about the strengths and limitations of different types of mechanisms designed to facilitate transitional justice and victim-centered justice processes that enable communities affected by atrocities and conflict to move toward more stable political and social arrangements
● Understand the legal, political, social, jurisprudential, and ethical dimensions of efforts to seek justice for atrocities

This intensive, Week One simulation course is designed to provide students with a basic understanding of how to defend clients in the early stages of an international criminal scandal investigation. The course requires students to work in teams to defend a fictitious foreign celebrity client in an investigation conducted by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York. Through role-plays and practice-based exercises, students will handle assignments of the exact type associates at leading white collar practices might be called upon to complete. Among other things, students will learn to:

• Work collaboratively as a member of a defense team
• Analyze a criminal case against a high-profile international client, isolate points of weakness in the prosecution’s case, develop important interview questions for the client, and create a strategic research and defense plan
• Explore typical issues arising in high-profile international criminal investigations, including press, jurisdiction, and statute of limitations
• Gain basic understanding of substantive U.S. crimes arising in the context of international criminal investigations, such as mail and wire fraud, bribery, money laundering, and conspiracy
• Conduct fast-paced legal research, and draft high-quality written work product
• Present and defend findings orally, and prepare a witness for interview by the U.S. Attorney’s Office

Assignments students will complete during the course of the week will include drafting an initial press release, conducting “flash” research, delivering an oral presentation and responding to real-time questions, preparing a PowerPoint presentation, drafting persuasive talking points for use in a meeting with a federal prosecutor, and preparing a client for interview by that prosecutor.

Week One Teaching Fellows work with faculty to facilitate the first-year Week One simulation courses offered in January. Fellows will work in teams of two to six fellows for their specific Week One class. The description of the course is available on the Curriculum Guide here. Teaching Fellows receive 1 pass/fail credit toward their Spring course load.

Teaching Fellows should expect to meet with their faculty for two full-day training sessions, one before the exam period in December, and the second on Saturday, January 4, 2025, to review course topics, goals, simulation structure, and receive training on their role throughout the course. Readings will be assigned.

Fellows then attend all of the class sessions during Week One and assist in facilitating discussion and small-group work amongst the students enrolled in the course. For example, fellows may moot students as they prepare for a mock oral argument or client presentation, or play the witness in a key witness interview. Fellows also meet and consult regularly with faculty during the course to discuss student progress and course logistics. They should expect to participate in a daily debriefing for approximately 15-30 minutes after each class.

At the conclusion of Week One, fellows must complete a 6-8 page reaction paper assessing how the course worked, overall student experience, and how the course could be improved (e.g., legal issues, factual issues, structure of exercise). 

The law of work is an increasingly important aspect of the global economy. Knowledge of this subject is useful in representing companies, unions, employees, governments and non-governmental organizations. Themes developed in the course also are central to understanding the relationship between law and globalization more broadly. We will study hard and soft law in the various forms in which it operates trans-nationally, including domestic law with foreign effects; public and private international law, such as human rights and trade law; and private codes of corporate social responsibility. The International Labor Organization (ILO), which is a touchstone in the course, is an especially interesting institutional case study: It is the world’s oldest international organization, with 180 member countries giving it near-universal representativeness, and its inclusion of governing roles for civil society groups – unions and employer associations – makes it unique among international institutions. Attention will be given to subordination of documented and undocumented migrants, women, and child laborers.

This Week One simulation will introduce students to the science and impacts of climate change, including effects on health such as heat stress, vector-borne disease, and food security. It will provide students an opportunity to develop positions, advocate, conduct a simulated negotiation, and receive feedback to improve skills. The negotiations will take place as part of the World Health Organization’s World Health Assembly. Students will represent countries and important civil society institutions in negotiating and crafting an international agreement pertaining to climate change and global health. They will have the opportunity to conduct research for their assigned country or organization, interview experts, develop strategy, negotiate, receive and incorporate feedback, and draft resolutions, treaties, or other legislative language. Our approach will allow students to go through not merely an academic negotiation exercise but to develop language that might be useful in the real-world context of the World Health Assembly.

The course analyzes the World Trade Organization (WTO) and its agreements, including the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), and the substance and status of negotiations to amend the agreements. It concentrates on the coverage of the agreements, based on their text and interpretive guidance from key dispute settlement decisions. The course also reviews the relevant economic, policy and legal aspects of the international trading system.