Simon Lester

This is from Tim Lee of the Washington Post: This spring, the Supreme Court will weigh in on the patentability of software for the first time in a generation. In the 1970s, the high court placed strict rules on software-related patents. But since then, a lower court has effectively overruled

From the NY Times: The regulation of e-cigarettes in Europe is part of a broader overhaul of the region’s tobacco rules, which have been in place since 2001. The rules adopted on Wednesday go further than United States laws. Along with the e-cigarette changes, they will require that the

The Georgetown International Trade Update is this week: http://www.law.georgetown.edu/continuing-legal-education/programs/cle/international-trade-update/agenda/index.cfm As usual, there's a lot on the agenda, but this one intrigues me the most: Luncheon Address: A Conversation with Jan Woznowski on Trade Law, WTO Litigation, and

From Politico: First lady Michelle Obama will unveil a proposal Tuesday that would ban marketing junk food and sodas in schools — an unusually aggressive position for the administration that could draw the ire of school districts, food companies and conservatives. Schools would no longer be able to house vending machines

Regulatory cooperation is a hot topic these days, one that I've mentioned a few times on this blog.  Next week at NYU they will be talking more about it: NYU's Global Administrative Law Project will be hosting a symposium at the end of next week, Feb

From a new paper by Thomas Schultz and Cedric Dupont: We consider three main hypotheses about the functional effects of investment arbitration. They form three models or candidate-theories of the functions that investment arbitration may empirically have: (1) investment arbitration serves to champion and strengthen the interests of economic powers

From the FT: The US has proposed that EU regulators be required to publish the proposed texts of regulations and open them to public comment. It also wants regulators to be required to consider comments and explain why they had adopted – or failed to adopt – outside suggestions when they finalise

U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman recently gave a speech at the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank. One of his goals seemed to be to convince people on the left of the political spectrum that trade is not something to be feared. In doing so, he focused

From Transnational Dispute Management: The formidable scale and pace of economic and legal development in the Pacific Rim region offers considerable opportunities, but also carries certain risks. The forthcoming Pacific Rim TDM Special Issue will collect views of experienced practitioners, academics, and policymakers on key economic and legal opportunities and

A while back I asked: if NAFTA gets subsumed in the TPP, would that satisfy Obama's campaign pledge to renegotiate NAFTA? It appears that maybe U.S. Trade Rep. Froman is thinking along the same lines: “As a candidate for President, then-Senator Obama said he would renegotiate NAFTA,