The World Trade Organization (WTO) is an intergovernmental organization that regulates and facilitates international trade. With effective cooperation in the United Nations System, governments use the organization to establish, revise, and enforce the rules that govern international trade. It officially commenced operations on 1 January 1995, pursuant to the 1994 Marrakesh Agreement, thus replacing the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) that had been established in 1948. The WTO is the world's largest international economic organization, with 164 member states representing over 98% of global trade and global GDP.
In international law, the Berne three-step test is a clause that is included in several international treaties on intellectual property. Signatories of those treaties agree to standardize possible limitations and exceptions to exclusive rights under their respective national copyright laws.
International trade law includes the appropriate rules and customs for handling trade between countries. However, it is also used in legal writings as trade between private sectors. This branch of law is now an independent field of study as most governments have become part of the world trade, as members of the World Trade Organization (WTO). Since the transaction between private sectors of different countries is an important part of the WTO activities, this latter branch of law is now part of the academic works and is under study in many universities across the world.
Pascal Lamy is a French political consultant and businessman. He was the Director-General of the World Trade Organization (WTO) from 1 September 2005 to 1 September 2013 for 8 years. In April 2009, WTO members reappointed Lamy for a second 4-year term, beginning on 1 September 2009. He was then succeeded by Roberto Azevêdo. Pascal Lamy was also European Commissioner for Trade for 5 years, from 13 September 1999 to 22 November 2004 and is an advisor for the transatlantic think-tank European Horizons, as well as currently serving as the Honorary President of the Paris-based think tank, Notre Europe.
The American Bar Foundation (ABF) is an independent, nonprofit national research institute established in 1952 and located in Chicago. Its mission is to expand knowledge and advance justice by supporting innovative, interdisciplinary and rigorous empirical research on law, legal processes and legal institutions. This program of sociolegal research is conducted by an interdisciplinary staff of Research Faculty trained in such diverse fields as law, sociology, psychology, political science, economics, history, and anthropology.
Paul Schiff Berman is an American lawyer and the Walter S. Cox Professor of Law at The George Washington University School of Law. He has held several other positions at the University including Vice Provost for Online Education and Academic Innovation and Dean of the School of Law.
Dispute settlement or dispute settlement system (DSS) is regarded by the World Trade Organization (WTO) as the central pillar of the multilateral trading system, and as the organization's "unique contribution to the stability of the global economy". A dispute arises when one member country adopts a trade policy measure or takes some action that one or more fellow members consider to be a breach of WTO agreements or to be a failure to live up to obligations. By joining the WTO, member countries have agreed that if they believe fellow members are in violation of trade rules, they will use the multilateral system of settling disputes instead of taking action unilaterally — this entails abiding by agreed procedures—Dispute Settlement Understanding—and respecting judgments, primarily of the Dispute Settlement Board (DSB), the WTO organ responsible for adjudication of disputes.
Steve Charnovitz is a scholar of public international law, living in the United States. He teaches at the George Washington University Law School in Washington, D.C., and is best known for his writings on the linkages between trade and environment and trade and labor rights. He is also known for his scholarship on the historical role of nongovernmental organizations in international governance.
Economic law is a set of legal rules for regulating economic activity.Economics can be defined as "a social science concerned with the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services." The regulation of such phenomena, law, can be defined as "customs, practices, and rules of conduct of a community that are recognized as binding by the community", where "enforcement of the body of rules is through a controlling authority." Accordingly, different states have their own legal infrastructure and produce different provisions of goods and services.
The Peking University School of Transnational Law is located in Shenzhen, Guangdong, China. The school started in the fall of 2008 as a part of the Shenzhen Graduate School of Peking University. It is the first law school to offer a traditional western-style Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree alongside a Chinese-style Juris Master (J.M.) degree. The program is four years and graduates will receive both the Chinese Juris Master's degree and, not accredited by the ABA, a J.D. degree. STL also offers a 3-year J.D. degree in English and a 1-2-year LL.M. degree. The school's tagline is "China's most innovative law school in China's most innovative city"
The Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) is an international legal agreement between all the member nations of the World Trade Organization (WTO). It establishes minimum standards for the regulation by national governments of different forms of intellectual property (IP) as applied to nationals of other WTO member nations. TRIPS was negotiated at the end of the Uruguay Round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) between 1989 and 1990 and is administered by the WTO.
The American Journal of Comparative Law (AJCL) is a quarterly, peer-reviewed law journal devoted to comparative and transnational legal studies—including, among other subjects, comparative law, comparative and transnational legal history and theory, private international law and conflict of laws, and the study of legal systems, cultures, and traditions other than those of the United States. In its long and rich history, the AJCL has published articles authored by scholars representing all continents, regions, and legal cultures of the world. It is published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Society of Comparative Law. As of 2014, it is co-hosted and administered by the Institute of Comparative Law and the Georgetown University Law Center. It has been hosted in the past by institutions such as University of California, Berkeley School of Law, Columbia Law School, and the University of Michigan Law School. The current Editors-in-Chief are Georgetown University Law Center’s Franz Werro, and McGill University's Helge Dedek.
New legal realism (NLR) is an emerging school of thought in American legal philosophy.
Alec Stone Sweet is an American political scientist and jurist. He is Professor and Chair of Comparative and International Law at The University of Hong Kong.
Larry Catá Backer is a Cuban-American legal scholar and professor of law and international affairs. He holds a professorship at the Penn State University, and is the W. Richard and Mary Eshelman Faculty Scholar Professor of Law and International Affairs, Penn State Law and School of International Affairs, Pennsylvania State University (2001–), Ashgate Publishing Globalization Law & Policy Series editor (2010–), and the executive director of the Washington-based NGO Coalition for Peace and Ethics (2006–).
Chantal J.M. Thomas, Cornell Law Professor at Cornell Law School, directs the Clarke Initiative for Law and Development in the Middle East and North Africa. Thomas teaches in the areas of Law and Development, Law and Globalization, and International Economic Law and is active in the areas of human rights and social justice, particularly in the Middle East.
Sean David Murphy is an American international law scholar currently serving as the Manatt/Ahn Professor of International Law at the George Washington University Law School in Washington, D.C., where he has been teaching since 1998. His primary areas of scholarly research are public international law, foreign affairs and the Constitution of the United States, international organizations, international dispute settlement, and law of the sea. Murphy served for ten years on the Board of Editors of the American Journal of International Law and is a former president of the American Society of International Law. In 2016, the United Nations General Assembly re-elected Murphy to serve as a Member of the U.N. International Law Commission (ILC). He was named by the ILC as Special Rapporteur for Crimes Against Humanity, a topic on which he has lectured widely.
Rohinton P. Medhora is a Canadian economist. His fields of expertise are monetary and trade policy, international economic relations, and development economics. He is a Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI) distinguished fellow and former president of CIGI.
Julien Chaisse is a professor of law at the City University of Hong Kong, specializing in international law, with a particular focus on globalization, foreign investment and on digital asset.
Sheila Rose Foster is a legal scholar, and an author. She is the Professor of Public Policy at the McCourt School of Public Policy and the Scott K. Ginsburg Professor of Urban Law and Policy at the Law Center at Georgetown University.
