Restoring Justice in Colombia is based on research, observations, and dialogues with the volunteers who carry out community justice in a country struggling with violence, social inequality, and massive displacement of persons. The program 'Conciliation in Equity' provides free legal services to those most in need of the resolution of conflicts. The book covers both the legal processes and the social process involved. It explains cultural and historical contexts, and gives examples and images that bring the program to life.

This is the third volume in the series Swedish Studies in European Law, produced by the Swedish Network for European Legal Studies, a national network comprised of Swedish universities focusing on recent legal developments within European Union law. In this volume, Swedish researchers with specific interests in European Market law - intellectual property rights, competition, and marketing law - have joined forces to review recent Swedish legislation and case-law of particular European interest in national Swedish Courts or the Court of Justice of the European Union. The volume also includes comments on general EU developments from a Swedish perspective. The articles focus upon a number of significant recent developments, including an essay on a proposed reform to the Swedish Copyright Act, a report of the recent Swedish decision concerning the Mini-Mag, two different analyses of the future for illicit file sharing following the recent Pirate Bay litigation, and essays on refusal to supply and the new Unfair Commercial Practices Directive and its implementation in Sweden. The articles are original analytical contributions to doctrinal debates and questions.

The twenty-third volume of the "Comparative Law Yearbook of International Business contains chapters relating to agency and distribution, finance and investment, intellectual property, sports law, technology, and general commercial issues. The spread of jurisdictions treated includes Argentina, Canada, the Dominican Republic, Egypt, Italy, Panama, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Switzerland, the United States, and Venezuela. The range of subjects and jurisdictions in volume twenty-three attests to the diversity and scope of international business practice.

The global financial and economic crisis which started in 2008 has had devastating effects around the globe. It has caused a rethinking in different areas of law, and posed new challenges to regulators and private actors alike. One of the emerging issues is the apparent eclipse of boundaries between different legal disciplines: financial and corporate lawyers have to learn how public law instruments can complement their traditional governance tools; conversely, public lawyers have had to come to understand the specificities of the financial markets they intend to regulate. While commentary on financial regulation and the global financial crisis abounds, it tends to remain within disciplinary boundaries. This volume not only brings together scholarship from different areas of law (constitutional and administrative law, EU law, financial law and regulation), but also from a variety of backgrounds (the academy, practice, policy-making) and a number of different jurisdictions. The volume illustrates how interdisciplinary scholarship belongs at the centre of any discussion of the economic crisis, and indeed regulation theory more generally. This is a timely exploration of cutting-edge issues of financial regulation.

Proportionality embodies a basic concept of fairness to strengthen the protection of individual rights at both the national and supranational level. The purpose of this book is to examine the impact of the principle of proportionality in the legal systems of Germany, France and the European Community, where the principle of proportionality plays a pivotal role in balancing the rights and obligations of the individual. The definition of proportionality as used in this work is quite broad: measures adopted by public authorities should not exceed the limits of what is appropriate and necessary in order to attain legitimate objectives in the public interest. As many important general principles of law as applied by the Court of Justice have been borrowed from German and French law, and a comparative study of the various forms which this principle has assumed in both German and French public law is presented. The areas of substantive law examined are the law of the common agricultural policy and the free movement of goods. The fundamental question is also raised as to whether proportionality allows judges to interfere with official decisions, thus breaching the principle of the separation of powers. This work argues that proportionality involves the state-citizen relationship and could be considered as a response to the historical experience that public authorities, national and supranational, function with the tendency to impair freedom of the individual.

Complicity in International Law aims to analyze questions arising from a state’s complicity in conflict with another state or an international organization. On the basis of international legal provisions, a state that assists the illicit fact of another state or an international organization in turn commits an offense if it is aware of the main fact and is bound by the same obligation. International law offers adumbrates the outcome of a codification process undertaken by the International Law Commission. The practice and its consequences, and the reflections of the doctrine, have matured with regard to the original hypothesis. Several cases of participation in the unlawful conduct of others, for example in facilitating the illicit use of the armed force, or of financial support to states responsible for human rights violations, have been recorded since the period immediately following World War II. International doctrine has long shown great interest in the theme of competition of several subjects in an international illicit act. This is a new phenomenon, given that until recently the issue had been the subject of in-depth analysis in a small number of works, few of which have been monographic in nature. Complicity in International Law will address the issue comprehensively.

This volume presents an overview of the essential aspects of the legislation, regulation and legal practice affecting due diligence in corporate acquisitions in various countries around the world. Every report highlights the key features of the due diligence regime, including: whether or not there exists a legal obligation to perform due diligence; a lawyer's duty of care and consequences of breach; rules regarding general scope and standard of due diligence; standard due diligence checklists with separate commentary on the most important aspects; European legislation and regulation where appropriate; the role of outside experts; and the form of the due diligence report. This work aims to be of practical and comparative value to lawyers active in the corporate law field.

The book provides a comparative analysis of the law relating to remedies for breach of contract. It examines different remedies such as specific performance and damages,doing so from the viewpoint of different legal systems, principally the English, American, German, French and Israeli. Each essay is written by a recognised specialist in his or her own field. Topics covered include the relationship between substantive rights and contract remedies, the recent reforms of the law relating to breach of contract in Germany, the remedies in the context of a third party beneficiary and the extent to which a claimant can choose the remedy which he or she deems to be the most appropriate. The book also makes use of a range of techniques, particularly economic analysis, when examining the legal rules. The book contains an introductory essay written by the editors and an essay by Professor Friedman, which deals with the relationship between substantive rights and contract remedies.

This book focuses on the separatist trend in Hong Kong, which it approaches by drawing on historical studies, political analysis, social studies and legal analysis. It offers a comprehensive and interdisciplinary guide to the topic, addressing the historical evolution of "Hong Kong Nativism," the theoretical connotations and fallacies of "Hong Kong Independence," and the legal measures taken to forestall it. Written by mainland scholars who approach the subject matter from a legal perspective, the book offers revealing insights for all students and researchers who are interested in Hong Kong Basic Law and the current political situation in Hong Kong.

Authorities in the fields of environmental and international law and policy, political science, environmental technology, and public administration compare and contrast the ways in which the United States and the European Union handle similar environmental issues. The contributors critically analyze the influence of culture and history on the way apparently "similar" developed democracies handle the same problems; they examine the center-state relationship as it applies to EU member countries in contrast to states within the United States; they look at the challenge of transboundary, international, and global environmental problems, and how these relate to the still-emerging geopolitical reconfigurations involved in such structures as NAFTA and the EU; and they examine how transnational resources are handled in the North American and EU contexts. Randall Baker has assembled leading experts who examine significant issues for policymakers and environmentalists in North America and Western Europe.

International tax practice demands a constantly renewed understanding of tax treaty provisions and how they are applied. Practitioners working with Western European taxation must master the further complexity introduced by the interplay between Community law and national law, especially as it affects the administration of tax law in the various countries. This text is a detailed survey of tax treaty interpretation in the 15 EU states plus Norway. Presented as 16 national reports by authorities from each country, the analysis provided is the result of a conference sponsored by the European Commission and held in Rust, Austria, in January 2001. Each report gives an organized, in-depth summation of the discussion as it related to the country in question, amalgamating the research and commentary brought to the conference by sixty experts in all. "Tax Treaty Interpretation" builds on the 1993 analysis of Klaus Vogel and Rainer Prokisch for the International Fiscal Association (IFA), and takes full account of such developments as the following: court decisions since 1993; the OECD report on partnerships; changes in administrative practice at the national level; and recent Community law affecting taxation and tax practice.

Constitutionalising Secession proceeds from the question, 'What, if anything, does the law have to say about a secession crisis?' But rather than approaching secession through the optic of political or nationalist institutional accommodation, this book focuses on the underpinnings to a constitutional order as a law-making community, underpinnings laid bare by secession pressures. Relying on the corrosive effects of secession, it explores the deep structure of a constitutional order and the motive forces creating and sustaining that order. A core idea is that the normativity of law is best understood, through a constitutional optic, as an integrative, associative force. Constitutionalising Secession critically analyses conceptions of constitutional order implicit in the leading models of secession, and takes as a leading case-study the judicial and legislative response to secession in Canada. The book therefore develops a concept of constitutionalism and law-making - 'associative constitutionalism' - to describe their deep structure as a continuing, integrative process of association. This model of a dynamic process of value formation can address both the association and the disassociation of constitutional systems.

Comparative Constitutional Studies takes a rich area of research and teaching and makes it attractive for the classroom setting and beyond. Every constitution has an interesting story to tell, and for this book Gunter Frankenberg has selected vibrant examples that encourage readers to practise realism, demonstrate critical spirit and examine the dark side of framers' reports and normative theories. This book deals with textbook hegemons, made in Philadelphia, Tokyo, Paris and, more importantly, with other constitutions from the global south, often classified as also-ran. Constitutions reflect conflicts and experiences, political visions and anxieties, ideals and ideologies, and Frankenberg's interdisciplinary approach serves as an excellent introduction to a new transnational conversation in comparative constitutional law. Its fresh perspective will make this book as an excellent resource for scholars and students of comparative constitutional law, political science, sociology, and anthropology.

The survey underpinning this invaluable work was inspired by an increasing appreciation within the EU of the need to achieve some degree of direct tax harmony. The essential starting point for such an undertaking is a set of standardized rules for the computation of EU-wide income. Company law developments point to the International Accounting Standards (IAS) / International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) financial statements as a basis from which to work. IFRS are now required for published group accounts and are allowed for single-company financial statements. However, as explained in the text, there are serious drawbacks to basing any form of national taxation on IFRS as they stand. IFRS are not designed with tax policy objectives in mind and change too frequently to satisfy any claim to tax legal certainty. Public debate is hampered by a general lack of knowledge of tax accounting customs in other countries, especially as reliable works are often only available in the local language. This comprehensive survey conducted by the universities of Goettingen, Mannheim, and Erlangen-Nuremberg with the support of PricewaterhouseCoopers fills that gap. For the first time, details of the tax computations for corporations from all twenty-five member states of the EU have been collated in a common format and are compared with the IFRS treatment. The book is an invaluable reference work providing the practitioner with a broad range of information on the tax accounting rules in all EU countries. The reader seeking a general impression of the scope of the problem will quickly see the amount of adjustment needed if IFRS is taken as a starting point for designing a set of common tax accounting rules. The reader seeking a basis for taking an active part in the public debate will find a wealth of detail in the Appendices showing exactly how each country computes taxable income and grants tax incentives. The work, unrivalled in the literature, addresses a major knowledge deficit; its tabular form presentation allows exact comparison between all EU countries as well as between the present rules of any one country and the IFRS requirements.

This book is dedicated to a fundamental conflict in modern states: those persons holding public office are no more than ordinary citizens. Therefore, their activities must - as a matter of principle - be subject to full judicial control. But at the same time, democratically legitimated politicians need some discretion in their decision-making. Allegations of politicians committing criminal offences in office quickly attract a great deal of media attention. Even politicians themselves frequently use such allegations to discredit their political opponents. However, to date this topic has not been fully addressed on an academic level. This book is a first step in this direction. The individual contributions cover topics such as: "bad" political decisions that result in a waste of taxpayers' money corruption and conflicts of interest in political decision-making immunities and procedural obstacles to the effective prosecution of politicians abuse of criminal law and criminal proceedings in the political arena criminal liability for decisions taken in situations of state emergency the role of criminal law in public opinion. Leading experts examine these and other issues from a comparative perspective.

The Contract is the core tool of governance in a free market economy. An EU Contract Law Code is now on the political agenda because all three legislative bodies in the EU and most member states favour it in principle. In its communication of July 2001, the Commission proposed three major options: to enhance the existing EC Contract Law by eliminating inconsistencies; introducing a European Code which substitutes national laws; and introducing a European code which only supplements national laws. This book achieves three things: For the first time, European academia is discussing these three options in an extensive and systematic way - with pros and cons, in a transparent and systematic way, along broad lines and often also important details. The book contains the views of all protagonists - from all those who really drafted the models to all those who illustrated the potential of decentralized rule-making and invented the very idea of an Optional Code. And it is the first book in which the optional Code, which is the alternative most likely to come, is thoroughly analysed at all. The book also contains a full map of design possibilities. It is the executive summary of what European academia thinks of the future of European Contract Law and a European Code. It is the Academic Green Paper on European Contract Law.

This Yearbook reviews significant legal developments in international commerce and offers an important forum for legal practitioners to address and compare practical legal issues of direct interest to their areas of specialisation. Each volume of the Yearbook features a comprehensive range of articles written for and by leading practitioners and advisers working in the international business sector. Volume 16 addresses key issues in general commercial law, company law, environmental law, foreign investment and litigation, procedure and dispute resolution. The Yearbook is published under the auspices of the Center for International Legal Studies.

This book examines how the modern criminal trial is the result of competing discourses of justice, from human rights to state law and order, that allows for the consideration of key stakeholder interests, specifically those of victims, defendants, police, communities and the state.

The Role of Customs in International Treaties concentrates on issues of friction between member states of the United Nations. In view of the role played by the United Nations in resolving international disputes, Dimitris Liakopoulos hypothesizes that ""practical guides"" based on custom often catalyze the positions taken by states, courts, scholars, and other actors, constituting an ""orthodox"" position against which formulaic legal opposition will become predictably more difficult. In addition to reiterating what some would say are obvious, on some particularly controversial issues, the United Nations has essentially chosen not to take a position and allowed customs to define conflict resolution.

The essays in this collection are based on papers originally presented at the sixth meeting of the European-American Consortium for Legal Education, held at the University of Helsinki, Finland in May, 2007. EACLE is a transatlantic consortium of law faculties dedicated to co- eration and to the exchange of ideas between different legal systems and cultures. Each year the EACLE colloquium considers a speci?c legal qu- tion from a variety of national perspectives. The 2007 initiative on "The Internationalization of Law and Legal Education" was coordinated by the staff of the University of Helsinki Faculty of Law and the Academy of F- land Centre of Excellence in Global Governance Research. We would like to thank those who attended the 2007 meeting for their insightful remarks, and for their inspiration, suggestions, and encouragement in making this volume and the EACLE consortium so effective in fostering greater trans- lantic cooperation on law and legal education. Thanks are also due to the faculty, staff and students of the Center for International and Comparative Law who prepared this volume for publication, and particularly to Morad Eghbal, James Maxeiner, Kathryn Spanogle, Jordan Kobb, Astarte Daley, Suzanne Conklin, P. Hong Le, P- tima Lele, Nicholas McKinney, Shandon Phan, T.J. Sachse, Katherine Si- son, Toscha Stoner-Silbaugh, Bjorn ] Thorstensen, Ryan Webster, and Cheri Wendt-Taczak."

Competition and diversity in media and communications are fundamental to a healthy economy and democracy. In India and internationally there is no consensus on the exact manner and scope of interventions that are appropriate to protect competition and pluralism in media markets. Many emerging economies including India are seeking to adopt their own regulation in this area taking their lead from the UK. The issues have been brought into sharp focus in India in recent years. First, the enactment and implementation of modern - but sector neutral - competition law under the Competition Act 2002 has caused a step change in regulation towards an economics and effects-based approach. Second, in 2013 the India telecoms regulator launched controversial reform proposals to apply a media-specific approach to ownership regulation. As academics, lawyers, businesses, regulators and policy-makers in India cast a glance at the international experience, this book examines the legal, economic and policy issues relating to regulation of ownership and control of media markets. The focus of comparative assessment is on examples from the European Union, EU Member States and the US.