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Simon Lester

Chinese Price Fixing

The Wall Street Journal reports on a civil antitrust complaint accusing four Chinese vitamin makers of price fixing. China's Ministry of Commerce got involved in the case, putting forward a defense of sovereign immunity: In its filings and oral arguments, the ministry broadly asserted sovereign immunity in its

Trade in Everything: Legal Services

From the WSJ law blog, it looks as though the impact of trade is becoming a little more personal for us lawyers: The WSJ reports today that outsourcing legal work to India continues to be a booming business. As the economy has soured, the business has only picked up, since

The Auto Bailout: The Other Subsidies

Most of the recent auto bailout focus has been on subsidies requested by the Big Three. But there is also the matter of the state tax incentives given to foreign automakers to set up factories there: The United Auto Workers Union boss [Ron Gettelfinger] also hit out at those US

Two Canadian Views of North American Integration

Anne McLellan of the University of Alberta: ... the treaty needs a revamp, she says, and should be expanded. The transition period where the three countries were losing jobs to each other is long over, and trade between the U.S. and Canada reached over a trillion dollars last year. Other

The Auto Bailout: What People Are Worried About

There are a lot of subsidies for the auto industry being proposed, and in response many concerns about these subsidies have been noted. In terms of trade issues, most of these concerns are unlikely to turn into formal complaints. Rather, as noted previously here, they are probably just being put

WTO Scholars' Forum: WTO Dispute Compliance

Professor Mary Footer (University of Nottingham) ‘Compliance with WTO Dispute Settlement Decisions: Some Reflections on Recent Developments’ Wednesday 3 December 2008, 4-5.30pm, UCL Laws, Moot Court To register free of charge please contact Forum administrator, Ann Tucker, ann.tucker@ucl.ac.uk Summary While it is understood that

European Respect for WTO Law

In the Wall Street Journal, Jack Goldsmith and Eric Posner ask, "Does Europe Believe in International Law?" Their answer: "Europe's commitment to international law is largely rhetorical. Like the Bush administration, Europeans obey international law when it advances their interests and discard it when it

About

About this blogThis blog offers commentary on current developments and scholarship in the field of international economic law and policy. It was started in January 2006 by Joel Trachtman and Simon Lester, and is managed by WorldTradeLaw.net with contributions by the authors listed on the main page. Simon Lester

Obama Takes on Farm Subsidies

Well, a portion of them, anyway. From a speech he gave today: We will go through our federal budget -- page by page, line by line -- eliminating those programs we don’t need, and insisting that those we do operate in a sensible cost-effective way. Let me give you one

What Kind of USTR Do We Want?

Politico reports on the Obama administration's possible choices for U.S. Trade Rep. The article distinguishes between a "technocrat" choice and a "political" choice, indicating that the business community prefers the latter. The technocrat options mentioned are Dan Tarullo of Georgetown Law Center and