This book offers a comprehensive examination of preferential trade agreements and considers the features of specific regional and bilateral trade agreements without drawing upon systematic features and trends. It shows the latest state of knowledge on the topic and will be of value to those interested in international trade and economic law.

The multilateral trade agreements in the Annexes to the Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization provide a comprehensive structure for international trade. Why would trading partners in different countries feel the need to go outside this framework in order to set up preferential trade arrangements? This book considers the structure of the World Trade Organization's agreements and the types of preferential trade arrangements, and deliberates the value of the latter in the light of the operation of the former. Preferential Trade Agreements and International Law offers a comprehensive examination of preferential trade agreements and considers the features of specific regional and bilateral trade agreements without drawing upon systematic features and trends. It shows the latest state of knowledge on the topic and will be of value to researchers, academics, policymakers, and students interested in international trade and economic law.

The European Union banking and securities legislation immediately before the global financial crisis is described in detail. Two significant inputs to the post-crisis legislation are considered in this book the international regulatory response through the Group of Twenty (G20) countries and the Financial Services Board, and the European Supervisory Authorities which comprise the European Banking Authority, a European Securities and Markets Authority and a European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority. Aspects of the post-crisis securities and banking legislation are described with a comparison made with the pre-crisis legislation, in places in which this is possible. The securities legislation, in particular, has shown a considerable increase in its volume and contents in the last few years, and some of these provisions are reported and discussed. The final chapter considers the European Commissions plans for the completion of the Economic and Monetary Union, from the British perspective in light of the speech made by the then British Prime Minister, the Right Honourable Margaret Thatcher MP, at Bruges in September 1988. The global financial crisis exposed vulnerabilities in the Economic and Monetary Union, which the Commission is attempting to address with plans for further integration. It is not clear that this is wholly in the interests of Europes citizens.

Some years ago, while a Senior Lecturer-in-Law at BPP University, one of my Master of Laws' students asked if he could write a dissertation in Maritime Law. He wanted to do a survey of the rules of both Admiralty Law and the Law of the Sea. The department contained no specialist in either of these fields, and I taught neither. As he could not be dissuaded from this plan, I had to undertake a rapid, informal, self-directed learning programme in the subjects in order to gain sufficient professional skill to be able to supervise, and, later, assess the dissertation. His project was surprisingly good -- and I had my first contact with rules concerning territorial seas, contiguous zones, exclusive economic zones, continental shelves and high seas. My interest in these topics grew and, eventually, flourished in the project of this monograph. The book covers the laws in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea 1982 that concern baselines and boundary delimitation, together with cases which relate to these topics. There is also a major input to the monograph from procedural matters pertaining to the International Court of Justice, the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea and arbitration under Annex VII to the Convention, with an example case provided for each of these mechanisms. As States Parties to the Convention may make a Declaration under its Article 287 for the settlement of their disputes by one or more of these methods -- together with special arbitration under Annex VIII to the Convention for four issues specified therein -- this Article, together with the methods and the remainder of Part XV of the Convention, are core material for a systematic review of the Law of the Sea. In instances in which it is possible, comparisons are made between: (i) the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea and its predecessors, i.e., the Geneva Conventions from 1958, and (ii) the rules of the International Court of Justice and those of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea. In essence, the Convention builds upon its precursory instruments, which tend to be simpler than the former, and the procedural rules for the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea are similar or identical to those of the International Court of Justice, other than a few provisions that are new or materially modified from the terms of the Court, but with the necessary changes from the latter being made. The cases at this level are fewer than in black-letter subjects of the law, but tend to be complex and, for the legal scholar, very interesting. This is especially true of the South China Sea Arbitration, which was a judgment of pioneering brilliance from an Annex VII arbitral tribunal composed of one academic and four experienced judges, to which a substantial literature has-in the short period since this case's resolution -- been devoted. The very best of luck with your reading!

One of the fundamental freedoms of the European Union's Internal Market is the free movement of capital. National barriers to the cross-border movement of capital and payments are prohibited, not only between Member States of the Union, but also between these States and third countries. The book investigates to what extent Estonia, Poland and Latvia have implemented laws that comply with this principle. It compares and contrasts the similarities and differences between these three Member States in how their legislation and regulations affect such free movement.The research investigates whether there is an association between the national legal restrictions to the free movement of capital and cross-border capital flows to and from Estonia, Poland and Latvia. It reports the views of executives in the business sectors most affected by these restrictions as to the importance of the free movement of capital to their companies, as to whether the European Union's regulatory framework supports the free movement of services and the freedom of establishment, and as to whether the national law limits these freedoms.