It is often argued that international financial regulation has been substantially strengthened over the past decades through the international harmonization of financial regulation. There are, however, still frequent outbreaks of painful financial crises, including the recent 2008 global financial crisis. This raises doubts about the conventional claims of the strengthening of international financial regulation. This book provides an in-depth political economy study of the adoptions in Japan, Korea and Taiwan of the 1988 Basel Capital Accord, the now so-called Basel I, which has been at the center of international banking regulation over the past three decades, highlighting the domestic politics surrounding it. The book illustrates that, despite banks' formal compliance with the Accord in these countries, their compliance was often cosmetic due to extensive regulatory forbearance that allowed their real capital soundness to weaken. Domestic politics thus ultimately determined national implementations of the Accord. This book provides its novel innovative study of the Accord through scores of interviews with bank regulators and analysis of various primary documents. It suggests that the actual effectiveness of international financial regulation relies ultimately on the domestic politics surrounding it. It implies as well that the past trend of international harmonization of financial regulation may be illusory, to at least some extent, in terms of its actual effectiveness. This book may interest not only political economists but also scholars working on the intersection of law, economics and institutions.

Set against the backdrop of the recurring waves of financial scandal and crisis to hit Canada, the US, the UK, and Europe over the last decade, this book examines the struggles of securities enforcement agencies to police the financial markets. While allegations of regulatory failure in this realm are commonplace and are well documented in policy and legal scholarship, James Williams seeks to move beyond these conventional accounts arguing that they are based on a limited view of the regulatory process and overlook the actual practices and dilemmas of enforcement work. Informed by interviews with police, regulators, lawyers, accountants, and investor advocates, along with a wealth of documentary materials, the book is rooted in a uniquely interdisciplinary social science perspective. Peering inside the black box of enforcement, it examines the organizational, professional, geographical, technological, and legal influences that shape securities enforcement as a distinctly knowledge-based enterprise. The result of these influences, Williams argues, is the production of a very particular vision of financial disorder which captures certain forms of misconduct while overlooking others, a reflection not of incompetence or capture but of the unique demands and constraints of the regulatory craft. Providing a very different, and much needed, account of the challenges faced by regulators and enforcement agencies, this book will be of enormous interest to current research on enforcement, regulation, and governance both within and beyond the financial realm.

This book is about fiduciary law's influence on the financial economy's environmental performance, focusing on how the law affects responsible investing and considering possible legal reforms to shift financial markets closer towards sustainability. Fiduciary law governs how trustees, fund managers or other custodians administer the investment portfolios owned by beneficiaries. Written for a diverse audience, not just legal scholars, the book examines in a multi-jurisdictional context an array of philosophical, institutional and economic issues that have shaped the movement for responsible investing and its legal framework. Fiduciary law has acquired greater influence in the financial economy in tandem with the extraordinary recent growth of institutional funds such as pension plans and insurance company portfolios. While the fiduciary prejudice against responsible investing has somewhat waned in recent years, owing mainly to reinterpretations of fiduciary and trust law, significant barriers remain. This book advances the notion of 'nature's trust' to metaphorically signal how fiduciary responsibility should accommodate society's dependence on long-term environmental well-being. Financial institutions, managing vast investment portfolios on behalf of millions of beneficiaries, should manage those investments with regard to the broader social interest in sustaining ecological health. Even for their own financial self-interest, investors over the long-term should benefit from maintaining nature's capital. We should expect everyone to act in nature's trust, from individual funds to market regulators. The ancient public trust doctrine could be refashioned for stimulating this change, and sovereign wealth funds should take the lead in pioneering best practices for environmentally responsible investing.

The main aim of this book is to assess the importance of international rules for foreign direct investment and the major challenges to international harmonization of those rules. Particular attention is paid to the most controversial and contentious issues with the view of appraising the prospects for establishing global rules. The book is divided into three parts; the first part includes papers assessing the role of national and international legislation with further distinction being made between bilateral, regional and multilateral legal frameworks. The second part addresses regulatory issues of technology transfer, labor, environment, subsidies and investment incentives, national security, public services and sovereign wealth funds. The final part looks at the experience of some international fora in addressing these issues and at some theoretical and conceptual problems of rule harmonization. The papers have been written by legal and economic scholars from leading universities.

During the last ten years the Islamic banking sector has grown rapidly, at an international level, as well as in individual jurisdictions including the UK. Islamic finance differs quite substantially from conventional banking, using very different mechanisms, and operating according to a different theory as it is based on Islamic law. Yet at the same time it is always subject to the law of the particular financial market in which it operates. This book takes a much-needed and comprehensive look at the legal and regulatory aspects which affect Islamic finance law, and examines the current UK and international banking regulatory frameworks which impact on this sector. The book examines the historical genesis of Islamic banking, looking at how it has developed in Muslim countries before going on to consider the development of Islamic banking in the UK and the legal position of Islamic banks within English law. The book explores company, contract, and some elements of tax law and traces the impact it has had on the development of Islamic banking in the UK, before going on to argue that the current legal and regulatory framework which affects the Islamic banking sector has on certain occasions had an unintended adverse impact on Islamic banking in the UK. The book also provides an overview of the Malaysian experience in relation to some of the main legal and regulatory challenges in the context of Islamic banking and finance.

Offering a comparative case study of transitional justice processes in Afghanistan and Nepal, this book critically evaluates the way the "local" is consulted in post-conflict efforts toward peace and reconciliation. It argues that there is a tendency in transitional justice efforts to contain the discussion of the "local" within religious and cultural parameters, thus engaging only with a "static local," as interpreted by certain local stakeholders. Based on data collected through interviews and participant observation carried out in the civil societies of the respective countries, this book brings attention to a "dynamic local," where societal norms evolve, and realities on the ground are shaped by shifting power dynamics, local hierarchies, and inequalities between actors. It suggests that the "local" must be understood as an inter-subjective concept, the meaning of which is not only an evolving and moving target, but also dependent on who is consulted to interpret it to external actors. This timely book engages with the divergent range of civil society voices and offers ways to move forward by including their concerns in the efforts to help impoverished war-torn societies transition from a state of war to the conditions of peace.

This book examines the prospects for business law reform to drive economic development in developing countries. It argues that, despite statements to the contrary, cultural factors and other local conditions in developing countries are not properly taken into account in current business law reform programs. Utilizing the city of Dakar as an example, this book investigates the consequences of this lack of fit between local needs and transplanted legal models by examining the potential and actual impact of the OHADA program of law reform on local business practices. Focusing on how managers make decisions and apply appropriate norms in routine business operations, the book documents how contractual disputes arise and are solved in Dakar and the role played by formal law in these processes. By examining imported law from the point of view of the end-users of legal reforms, the book reveals the complex relationship between formal law, local cultural norms and the activities of SMEs operating in developing economies, and calls for a reconsideration of current law and development theory as well as the role of contract law in business decisions. It will be relevant to all developing countries seeking to align their laws with 'best practice' as identified by aid institutions.

This is the first book to provide a detailed and thorough conceptual analysis of the unit trust. Such analysis is not just of academic interest: it is of much practical relevance too. The author examines such topics as the nature of the unit trust, the interaction of unit holders, the manager's legal position, and the trustee and manager relationship. The book will be invaluable to all those requiring a better understanding of the unit trust.

In the wake of the global financial crisis, investors have suffered significant losses as a result of breaches of conduct of business rules in the distribution of financial instruments. MiFID II introduced new disclosure, distribution and product governance rules to strengthen the protection of investors but, like MiFID I, did not harmonise the civil law consequences for their violation. This book asks whether, in spite of the silence of the EU legislators, the MiFID II conduct of business rules may produce civil law effects, enabling investors to enforce them against investment firms before national courts and alternative dispute resolution (ADR) mechanisms. Building on the case law of the CJEU, the book shows the conditions under which the breach of MiFID II conduct of business rules should give rise to a private law remedy, and what remedies would be compatible with EU law. MiFID II and Private Law is an essential contribution to academic research in EU and financial law and will be a key text for policy-makers and legal practitioners working in the field of investor protection regulation and mis-selling litigation.

This book brings together the issues surrounding banking secrecy and confiscation of criminal proceeds. The book examines the existing legal agreements at the international, regional and national levels and their interaction in the substantive areas of confiscation, anti-money laundering and banking confidentiality laws. It looks at how these agreements have been applied in offshore financial centers and demonstrates that despite a number of legally binding UN Conventions as well as global anti-money laundering recommendations, the implementation of them is often lukewarm by those Parties who have ratified the Convention and adopted obligations, because of this the confiscation legislation is incompatible with strict banking confidentiality laws. The work draws on the experience of criminologists to offer critical insight into the legislative frameworks designed to deal with banking secrecy and confiscation in offshore financial centers. It goes on to offer suggestions for measures that may be taken by major economies to circumvent the lack of cooperation by offshore financial centers as intolerance towards money laundering grows in light of recent political and economic events. This book will be of particular interest to students and scholars of Law, Finance and Criminology.

In the wake of the global financial crisis, there has been a worldwide search for alternative investment opportunities, away from advanced markets. The African continent is now one of the fastest-growing economic regions in the world and represents a viable destination for foreign direct and portfolio investment. This book, which is the first comprehensive analysis of financial integration and regulation in Africa, fills a huge gap in the literature on financial regulation and would constitute an invaluable source of information to policy makers, investors, researchers and students of financial regulation from an emerging and frontier markets perspective. It considers how financial integration can facilitate African financial markets to achieve their full potential and provides a comparative study with the EU framework for financial integration and regulation. It assesses the implementation of effective and regional domestic infrastructures and how these can be adapted to suit the African context. The book also provides an assessment of government policies towards the integration of financial regulation in keeping with the regional agenda of the African Union (AU) and the African Economic Community (AEC).

This book brings together the work of scholars from England, France, Germany, Sweden, and the United States to examine the ways in which industrialized nations have used and are developing tax laws to help alleviate environmental problems. For each country, the contributors offer a thorough review of existing and proposed initiatives and an in-depth evaluation of their effectiveness. They also discuss the theoretical framework behind environmental tax initiatives, explain alternative systems to taxation, reveal problems in dealing with environmental concerns that are common to all of the countries studied, and suggest ways to more efficiently coordinate tax and environmental policies. Based on their research, the contributors conclude that the general tax systems of the United States and other countries unintentionally conflict with environmental policies and that no country has yet been able to adequately control automobile pollution, although some have had varying degrees of success in other areas.

The volume begins with an introduction that presents a nontechnical discussion of the current economic thinking on environmental taxes and alternatives such as direct government regulation and granting polluters limited or tradable rights to pollute. The following chapters discuss each country in turn. Each chapter first examines the institutional framework of the country--central versus regional government, how legislation is enacted and executed, the distribution of authority over environmental matters, and important environmental policy goals. Next, the compatability of the tax system with environmental goals is analyzed. Finally, there is a thorough treatment of that country's environmental tax initiatives, including an in-depth assessment of their relative success or failure. Policymakers, lobbyists, economists, and attorneys will find Taxation for Environmental Protection enlightening reading.

Historic preservation is an issue of growing importance and public commitment. Federal and state mechanisms have been established to identify and support historic buildings/sites, while local governments have been active in supporting and protecting historic resources. Communities across the country have established designation programs whereby individual buildings or districts of historical-architectural significance are accorded landmark status.

Designation activity has been accompanied by growing interest in other local incentives/disincentives to the support of historic buildings. In this regard, the property tax is viewed as either a possible powerful drawback to or a catalyst of preservation. This study examines the relationship between historic preservation and the property tax, focusing on the question of how designated buildings should be assessed for real taxation purposes.

Listokin focuses on New York City in considering the effects of historic status on property value and in evaluating assessment practices. But this book's findings are transferrable to other communities because the base conditions are similar. Many other cities have designation programs modeled on New York City's. In addition, New York's property-tax system and administrative processes resemble those found in communities across the nation. To enhance the transferability of this study's findings, Listokin refers to the national experience and literature, typically on a side-by-side basis with the New York City counterpart.

The book examines the regulation of insider dealing in the developed jurisdictions, using three of the G7 countries as guides with the aim of knowing how they have regulated insider trading and what lessons can be learnt from their failures and achievements. It looks at regulatory regimes in the US, the UK and Japan in order to consider whether these regimes can be successfully transplanted to developing countries. In order to explore insider dealing in the developing world the book focuses on Nigeria, Africa's most populous nation and second largest economy. This book examines in theoretical and empirical terms the law on insider trading away from the dogmatic approach of Western literature by presenting the subject from the prism of a developing jurisdiction in post-colonial Africa with a divergent cultural, historical, social, political and economic background. The author analyses what shape insider dealing takes in Nigeria, a predominantly illiterate society, and considers the groups involved. The books also explores how the concept of insider dealing regulation is understood amongst parties integral to its administration and enforcement such as lawyers, judges, stockbrokers, and ordinary investors. The legislation governing insider dealing regulation in Nigeria is critically examined to expose its strengths and weaknesses, and to see how foreign provisions and legislation have been incorporated. The book uses Nigerian experiences to consider its implications for other developing nations, arguing that regulatory regimes need to take into account the specific social, political, historical and economic factors of a particular locale rather than importing regulations wholesale from developed jurisdictions.

This book analyses the methodologies and functions of a systemic approach to risk governance and internal control capable of tackling the complexity of the insurance business. It focuses on the main trends currently impacting the insurance industry, characterized by new operators, new products and services, new tools, new styles of competition, and new risks. It provides tips and empirical contributions addressing the role of sound internal control and risk management models within an ongoing revision of prudential regulation to better deal with the evolving scenario where insurance activities are becoming increasingly risky and complex. The book is of particular interest to scholars and students of insurance and financial services and practitioners in the insurance industry.

The financial market events in 2007-2009 have spurred renewed interest and controversy in debates regarding financial regulation and supervision. This book takes stock of the developments in EU legislation, case law and institutional structures with regards to banking regulation and supervision, which preceded and followed the recent financial crisis. It does not merely provide an update, but anchors these developments into the broader EU law context, challenging past paradigms and anticipating possible developments. The author provides a systematic analysis of the interactions between the content of prudential rules and the mechanisms behind their production and application European Prudential Banking Regulation and Supervision includes discussions of the European banking market structure and of regulatory theory that both aim to circumscribe prudential concerns. It scrutinises the content of prudential norms, proposes a qualification of these norms and an assessment of their interaction with other types of norms (corporate, auditing and accounting, consumer protection, competition rules). It also features an analysis of the underpinning institutional set-up and its envisaged reforms, focusing on the typical EU concerns related to checks and balances. Finally, the book attempts to revive the debate on supervisory liability, in light of the developments discussed. This book will be of great value to all those interested in financial stability matters (practitioners, policy-makers, students, academics), as well as to EU law scholars.

This work contains the full text of the papers presented at the fourth Tax Law History Conference in July 2008. The Conference was organised by the Cambridge Law Faculty's Centre for Tax Law. The matters discussed are broad and include the extent to which charges levied by the Court of Wards were seen as taxes, the seventeenth century poll tax, traders, the excise and the in early nineteenth century England and the right of the Crown's right to elect between different heads of charge to income tax. There are also chapters on taxation in the reign of King John and Stamp Duties in the 18th Century. International tax matters include a history of company residence and a paper on the first UK-Australia Double Tax Agreement. Papers concentrating on other countries include papers on the history of income tax in Malta (1641-1949), the history of land tax in Australia, the history of the legal definition of charity and its application to tax law and a paper on the psychology of taxation as shown by the 1936 US Election.

Consumer credit information systems are the tools used by the majority of lenders to manage credit risk, with lenders accessing credit reference databases managed by third party providers to evaluate a consumer's credit application. So far, the subject of consumer credit reporting has been left to the predominant attention of the economic and business management scholarship and little or no consideration has been paid by lawyers. This book aims to rectify this by examining the legal framework and compliance in the European Community (EC) of such consumer information sharing arrangements which have become increasingly integrated in the credit granting practices of the Member States. The book looks at the laws which surround and affect consumer credit reporting, including bank secrecy obligations. Consumer credit reporting and its relationship to human rights is also explored, as every individual is in the EC is entitled to informational privacy. The book asks questions such as to what extent should the privacy of consumers be balanced against the aims and functions of consumer credit reporting, and how do the financial information sharing arrangements comply with the positive law, particularly the European data protection legislation?

Time itself creates advantages and disadvantages in the field of taxation. The timing of the recognition of income and expenses for tax purposes has two main implications: firstly, for the timing of the collection of tax, and secondly, for the question of quantification, i.e., how to ensure that the difference between the timing of the recognition of income or expenses, as opposed to the respective dates on which the amounts are actually received or paid, does not distort the determination of the amount of chargeable income. The time component is a weapon in the confrontation between the opposing motivations of the taxpayers and the tax authorities. In any given fiscal year, taxpayers seek to present a minimal picture of their chargeable income, by "deferring" the recognition of income or "advancing" the recognition of expenses. As opposed to this, the tax authorities adopt the opposite strategy: maximizing taxable "profit" in any given year. This book critically examines the various approaches that have been adopted in the tax systems in the UK, the US and Israel in relation to the timing of income recognition and expenses for tax purposes. It suggests an innovative tax model that identifies the advantages that arise to the taxpayer as a result of the differences between the timing of the recognition of income and expenses, and the timing of the receipt of the revenue or the payment of a liability, and taxes only that advantage.

This book explores the profound transformation that has taken place in European insurance legislation since January 2016. Expert contributions discuss the changes that have taken place in the supervision of insurance and reinsurance undertakings through an economic risk-based approach. They outline the European insurance market before going on to show how Solvency II and Insurance Distribution Directive (IDD) are expected to generate significant benefits and have a positive impact on all parties involved in the insurance industry, the supervisory authorities and the insured. They also show how Solvency II is likely to benefit the economy as a whole, promoting more efficient allocation of capital and risk in a financial stability framework. This volume will be of interest to academics and researchers in the field of insurance regulation.

Set against the backdrop of the recurring waves of financial scandal and crisis to hit Canada, the US, the UK, and Europe over the last decade, this book examines the struggles of securities enforcement agencies to police the financial markets. While allegations of regulatory failure in this realm are commonplace and are well documented in policy and legal scholarship, James Williams seeks to move beyond these conventional accounts arguing that they are based on a limited view of the regulatory process and overlook the actual practices and dilemmas of enforcement work. Informed by interviews with police, regulators, lawyers, accountants, and investor advocates, along with a wealth of documentary materials, the book is rooted in a uniquely interdisciplinary social science perspective. Peering inside the black box of enforcement, it examines the organizational, professional, geographical, technological, and legal influences that shape securities enforcement as a distinctly knowledge-based enterprise. The result of these influences, Williams argues, is the production of a very particular vision of financial disorder which captures certain forms of misconduct while overlooking others, a reflection not of incompetence or capture but of the unique demands and constraints of the regulatory craft. Providing a very different, and much needed, account of the challenges faced by regulators and enforcement agencies, this book will be of enormous interest to current research on enforcement, regulation, and governance both within and beyond the financial realm.

The Data Protection and Medical Research in Europe: PRIVIREAL series focuses on the 'Privacy in Research Ethics and Law' EC-funded project examining the implementation of Directive 95/46/EC on data protection in relation to medical research and the role of ethics committees in European countries. The series consists of five separate volumes following the complete development of the PRIVIREAL project. This volume relates to the first stage of this project concerning the implementation of the Data Protection Directive, in particular in the area of medical research. It contains reports from 26 European countries on the implementation of the Directive, or the data protection regime, all with a specific focus on issues and questions relating to medical research. Presenting a unique resource for all those involved in data protection, medical research and their implications for each other, this title provides a valuable insight into the actual workings across Europe, including both the New Member States and the Newly Associated Member States.

In the world's developing countries, foreign investment in natural resources brings into contact competing interests that are often characterised by unequal balances of negotiating power - from multinational corporations and host governments, through to the local people affected by the influx of foreign investment. The growing integration of the world economy has been accompanied by rapid and extensive developments in the national and international norms that regulate investment and its impact - including investment law, natural resource law and human rights law. These legal developments affect the 'shadow' that the law casts over the multiple negotiations that characterise international investment projects in the developing world. Drawing on international law, the national law of selected jurisdictions and the contracts concluded in a large investment project, Human Rights, Natural Resource and Investment Law in a Globalised World explores the ways in which the law protects the varied property rights that are at play in foreign investment projects in developing countries, with a focus on Africa. Through an integrated analysis of seemingly disparate fields of law, this book sheds new light on how the law mediates the competing interests that come into contact as a result of economic globalisation, whilst also providing new insights on the changing nature of state sovereignty and on the relationship between law and power in a globalised world. This book will be of interest to scholars, students and informed practitioners working in the fields of international investment and human rights law, comparative law, socio-legal studies, and development studies.

The years from 2000 to 2010 were bookended by two major economic crises. The bursting of the dotcom bubble and the extended bear market of 2000 to 2002 prompted Congress to pass the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which was directed at core aspects of corporate governance. At the end of the decade came the bursting of the housing bubble, followed by a severe credit crunch, and the worst economic downturn in decades. In response, Congress passed the Dodd-Frank Act, which changed vast swathes of financial regulation. Among these changes were a number of significant corporate governance reforms.
Corporate Governance after the Financial Crisis asks two questions about these changes. First, are they a good idea that will improve corporate governance? Second, what do they tell us about the relative merits of the federal government and the states as sources of corporate governance regulation? Traditionally, corporate law was the province of the states. Today, however, the federal government is increasingly engaged in corporate governance regulation. The changes examined in this work provide a series of case studies in which to explore the question of whether federalization will lead to better outcomes. The author analyzes these changes in the context of corporate governance, executive compensation, corporate fraud and disclosure, shareholder activism, corporate democracy, and declining US capital market competitiveness.