Simon Lester

Why is it that so many of the good discrimination cases are about products like alcohol and cigarettes?  Here's another one that is in its early stages but might lead to a formal complaint at some point: The [Indonesian] government has warned the United States Trade Representative against

This seems like a sensible approach to me: US and EU pressure on China to revalue the renminbi create the mistaken impression that there is an unavoidable conflict of interests. A switch by China to a more flexible exchange rate regime, accompanied by a shift to a new nominal anchor,

Over at the Conglomerate, David Zaring identifies "which American arbitrators are most likely to handle ICSID disputes": Charles Brower is our iron man, with 6 concluded and 6  pending arbitrations under his belt. He is an emeritus White & Case partner. Michael Reisman (Yale, 4 pending)), and Andreas

Writing in Foreign Policy (subscription required, I think), Moisés Naím says: China, India, the former Soviet Union, and many other countries launched major reforms that deepened their integration into the world’s economy. In developing countries alone, import tariffs dropped from an average of around 30 percent in the 1980s

Should those concerned with sovereignty be worried about a powerful, sovereignty-impinging "North American Union," as some groups apparently are, emerging from the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP), which provides a framework for cooperation between Canada, Mexico and the U.S.? Over at Opinio Juris, Julian Ku is

August 17, 2007 Press Release The Society of International Economic Law: Inaugural Conference, July 15-17, 2008 Members of the international economic law community have created a new organisation called the Society of International Economic Law (SIEL). The organisation will foster co-ordination, collaboration and debate between International Economic Law

As a trade lawyer, it's exciting for me to see GATT Article XX invoked, implicitly anyway, in the U.S. Presidential campaign: Presidential Candidate Chris Dodd called for suspending all imports of toys and food from China  ... "This is an issue of safety," said Dodd. "

The always interesting Dani Rodrik proposes the following: A broadened safeguard agreement—call it an agreement on social and developmental safeguards—would enable countries to opt out from their international obligations under specified circumstances. The process for obtaining such an exemption would be a domestic one, as in the case

Bloomberg reports: Canada filed a complaint against Belgium at the World Trade Organization, in an effort to reverse the European Union country's ban on seal products. ... ``This government believes that the Belgian ban on the importation and marketing of seal products is a violation of Belgium's