918 SP International Law, Spring 2011 to Fall 2013

Course Page for Fall 2013 - Atapattu, Sumudu

The objectives of the course: To provide an understanding of the role of international law and its applicability to climate change within a framework of sustainable development; to provide knowledge of existing international mechanisms and law applicable to global climate change; to provide an understanding of the relationship between climate change and human rights; to discuss the impact on other areas such as economic development, poverty, socio-economic rights and the role of sustainable development.

Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor

Course Page for Fall 2013 - Davis, Kenneth

This course examines the legal issues created by the internationalization of markets for capital, and the removal of the historic barriers to cross-border transactions. After a brief survey of the US approach to investor protection, the course will consider a variety of topics in depth, including enforcement, insider trading, market efficiency, cross-border offerings and cross-listing on stock exchanges, and the extraterritorial application of law. A recurring theme will be the efforts underway for countries to harmonize their laws and for national regulators to cooperate with one another.

This course is being offered for the first time and students are advised to approach it as a “work in progress.” One of the advantages of that status is that there remains some flexibility to fit the structure and content of the course to the size of the class and the specific interests of the students.

Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor

Course Page for Fall 2013 - Yackee, Jason

This course provides a hands-on, experiential introduction to international commercial arbitration, the most important means of resolving international commercial disputes. Anyone interested in business law and practice or international law should consider taking this course.

The course integrates traditional classroom teaching with a substantial skills-development component. The course is organized around the Vis Moot Arbitration contest, a premier international student moot. If you would like to participate in the Vis Moot Arbitration, you must first take this course. Try-outs for the Vis will be integrated into the course.

During the first month of the fall semester we will examine in detail the rules governing international commercial arbitration. Then, in October and November, students will break out into litigation teams and each team will be responsible for researching and writing a professional-quality claimant's memorandum based on the current problem for the Vis Moot Arbitration contest. Finally, each litigation team will argue a portion of its brief orally to a panel of student "arbitrators". Students will receive three credits for the course.  The course is mandatory for students who wish to try out for UW Law School's official Vis team, which competes in the Vis contest in Vienna and Hong Kong during the spring semester.

NEW TO THIS YEAR: Lectures will be based around an inexpensive arbitration hornbook, rather than a traditional casebook, saving the students substantial money.

Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor

Course Page for Spring 2011 - Atapattu, Sumudu

International Environmental Law

Evolution of international environmental law; its sources (formal and informal) and general principles; relevance of traditional principles of international law; survey of emerging principles (sustainable development, precautionary principle, polluter pays principle, common but differentiated responsibility principle, and inter-generational equity principle); institutions and global governance; discussion of special issues of relevance - global pollution problems, international trade and intellectual property issues, its relationship with human rights law; poverty, environmental refugees and the impact of armed conflict; and discussion of the future of international environmental law.

If the majority of the students interested in the course have not had international law before, a \\"crash course\\" in international law can be a part of the IEL course.

Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor

Course Page for Spring 2013 - Atapattu, Sumudu

International Environmental Law

Evolution of international environmental law; its sources (formal and informal) and general principles; relevance of traditional principles of international law; survey of emerging principles (sustainable development, precautionary principle, polluter pays principle, common but differentiated responsibility principle, and inter-generational equity principle); institutions and global governance; discussion of special issues of relevance - global pollution problems, international trade and intellectual property issues, its relationship with human rights law; poverty, environmental refugees and the impact of armed conflict; and discussion of the future of international environmental law.

If the majority of the students interested in the course have not had international law before, a \\"crash course\\" in international law can be a part of the IEL course.

Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor

Course Page for Spring 2012 - Yackee, Jason

Over the past twenty years, global flows of foreign direct investment (FDI) have increased at an astounding annual growth rate of over 25 percent. Multinational corporations (MNCs) and their overseas investment activities are an immensely important and often contentious aspect of globalization. This seminar analyzes the developing global legal framework for regulating relations between foreign investors and the states hosting their investments. The course focuses on the international law relevant to the resolution of investment disputes much more so than on the law of “doing deals.” This is a litigation course, not a transactional course. The course also slights the important subject of how international investment disputes are settled between private parties. That latter subject occupies the bulk of most standard courses in international commercial arbitration, which I teach in the fall semester, and will not be covered here.

Over the course of the semester we will examine the sources of international legal rules governing the treatment of FDI and including primarily Bilateral Investment Treaties, or BITs, and Chapter 11 of NAFTA. We will also spend considerable time studying the ways in which investment disputes are settled, paying particular attention to international arbitration before the World Bank’s International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID).

Final grades will be based entirely on a substantial writing project.

The seminar may be taken pass-fail. There are no prerequisites to the course, though familiarity with principles of public international law may be helpful.

There is no casebook assigned, as there are no high-quality casebooks in this field. Instead, you should purchase the coursepack from the law school’s copy shop. The first half of the coursepack will be available for purchase at the beginning of the semester

Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor

Course Page for Spring 2013 - Kelly, Kevin

Selected Problems in International Law: Law of Armed Conflict
When is it lawful for a nation to go to war and, notwithstanding this question, how may a war be lawfully fought?  Where do these two questions come from, and how are they to be answered?   Even before the attacks of September 11, 2001 and the subsequent debates over military tribunals for accused terrorists and the combatant status of captured Taliban fighters and Al Qaeda members, the laws and customs governing armed conflict and the conduct of military operations were receiving attention unprecedented since the Nuremberg and Tokyo war crimes trials. For example, the post-Cold War increase in American military operations has led, within the US armed forces, to a greater focus on international legal norms and requirements; the civil wars in the Balkans and Rwanda have resulted in the first viable war crimes tribunals since the end of the Second World War; and a
permanent International Criminal Court to address war crimes, genocide, and crimes against humanity has been established in the Hague. This course will address these topics, as well as: the nature of modern warfare and its impact on the on-going development of the laws of armed conflict; the Just War tradition; international law and custom governing warfare, military operations,
and humanitarian intervention. If there is time we will also discuss domestic War Powers (presidential and congressional).

Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor

Course Page for Spring 2013 - Yackee, Jason

Topics reflect interests of instructor and students.

Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor