International Economic Law and Policy Blog

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Simon Lester

Delineating the Outer Limits of Investment Treaties

In an ASIL Insight entitled "The Australian Trade Policy Statement on Investor-State Dispute Settlement," Jürgen Kurtz writes: States can protect domestic policy space in an investment treaty by clearly delineating the outer limits of substantive obligations and/or crafting exceptions for state conduct. For instance, the investment chapter

The Purpose of International Investment Agreements

From a paper by Anne Van Aaken and Tobias A. Lehmann, entitled "Investment and Sustainable Development: Developing a New Conceptual Framework": It is already questionable whether the only purpose of [International Investment Agreements] IIAs is the protection of investment. Rather, as most preambles reveal, protection of investment is

The Debt Deal and Farm Subsidies

Jim Bacchus recently called for cutting farm subsidies as a way to reduce the U.S. budget deficit and give a boost to the Doha Round. So what happened with farm subsidies in the debt deal? Well, it remains to be seen, from what I've read so far.

U.S. Fuel Efficiency Standards: Trucks vs. Cars

From Reuters: The Obama administration has reached a compromise with automakers on a new fuel economy target for cars and trucks, ending months of negotiations on this pivotal mandate for the auto industry. Automaker fleets will now have to average 54.5 miles per gallon by 2025, according to people

Deep vs. Shallow Integration in Trade Agreements

From the press release for the World Trade Report 2011: Deep PTAs More and more PTAs are deep rather than shallow agreements. They include a wide range of issues beyond tariffs, such as services, investment, intellectual property protection, and competition policy. These policy areas involve domestic regulations (or behind-the-border measures)

Bilateral vs. Multilateral Trade Agreements: The U.S. View

Via Larry Friedman, I see the following from a speech by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Hong Kong: we are pursuing new cutting-edge trade deals that raise the standards for fair competition even as they open new markets. For instance, the Korea-US Free Trade Agreement, or KORUS, will eliminate

Norway on the Right to Trade

Following-up on the WTO's quick summary of the March 25 DSB meeting mentioned here, here's more from Norway on its right to trade in seal products, from the full DSB minutes: 86. The representative of Norway said that, at the present meeting, her country was requesting

ASIL IEcLIG Call for Papers

From the ASIL IEcLIG: International Economic Law Interest Group (IEcLIG) of American Society of International Law (ASIL) Call for Papers Post - Crisis International Financial Regulation: Fragmentation, Harmonization and Coordination The challenges of the 2008 financial crisis were severe and prolonged. The international regulatory community struggled to contain, manage and

Optimal Tariffs, Trade War Tariffs and Trade Policy Cooperation

Via Jonathan Dingel, economist Ralph Ossa looks at the gains from trade policy cooperation: What are the optimal tariffs of the US? What tariffs would prevail in a world-wide trade war? What are the gains from international trade policy cooperation? And what gains can be expected from future reciprocal trade

Unilateral Carbon Border Measures

Here's the abstract of a paper called "Unilateral Carbon Border Measures: Key Legal Issues", from frequent commenter Anuradha R.V.: Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) have been engaged in discussions on the future of the climate change regime. While the