Academic

Ruminations 49: "Society Knows What it Wants"-- Of Markets, Status Hierarchies and Knowldge Production

Posted on May 21, 2013
In his germinal text, Henry David Thoreau expressed a contradiction that is worth exploring in some detail.  He declared: the "greater part of what my neighbors call good I believe in my soul to be bad, and if I repent of anything it is very likely to be my good behavior...

Chinese SOEs in Latin America--CSR and Culture

Posted on May 20, 2013
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Norwegian Sovereign Wealth Fund Excludes Makers of Reconstituted Tobacco Leaf in the U.S. and China

Posted on May 12, 2013
On May 8, 2013, the Norwegian Ministry of Finance published its decision to exclude the American company Schweitzer-Mauduit International Inc. and the Chinese company Huabao International Holdings Limited from the investment universe of the Norwegian Government Pension Fund Global (GPFG)...

Xi Jinping's Constitutional Vision: Speech on the 30th Anniversary of the 1982 Constitution

Posted on May 09, 2013
In the wake of the transition of leadership in China at the end of 2012, there has been a notable amount of attention paid to issues of constitutional structure and integrity.  These movements have been met with a certain amount of wariness (cf. Carl Minzner, What Direction for Legal Reform under Xi Jinping, Jamestown Foundation, Jan...

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New Paper Posted -- Towards a Robust Theory of the Chinese Constitutional State: Between Formalism and Legitimacy in Jiang Shigong's Constitutionalism

Posted on May 08, 2013
I have been considering the development of modern Chinese constitutionalism.  In particular, I have been considering the unique structures of Chinese constitutionalism beyond the constitutional document and the related issue of its legitimacy within emerging norms of transnational constitutionalism...

On the Current State of China's Qualified Foreign Institutional Investors (QFII) Programs

Posted on May 03, 2013
Chinese authorities first promulgated the Provisional Measures on Administration of Domestic Securities Investments of Qualified Foreign Institutional Investors in 2002.  It has since been revised in 2006 and 2012 ongoing. (Pix (c) Larry Catá Bacjer 2013) The QFII program is an open market program under the regulation of a national government designed to allow cross border capital markets transactions under controlled conditions...

Part XXVIII?Zhiwei Tong (???) Series: How to Restrict Power in the Cage of Regulations

Posted on May 03, 2013
 (Zhiwei Tong, PIX (c) Larry Catá Backer)For 2012, this site introduced the thought of Zhiwei Tong (???), one of the most innovative scholars of constitutional law in China.   Professor Tong has been developing his thought in part in a essay site that was started in 2010...

Legal and Political Education With Chinese Characteristics (????????????????????????????)

Posted on May 02, 2013
I have been reading article on Chinese Legal Education authored by the American scholar Carl Minzner, The Rise and Fall of Chinese Legal Education, Fordham International Law Journal, Vol. 36, No. 2, 2013. Some preliminary thoughts. (?????Carl Minzner?????????????The Rise and Fall of Chinese Legal Education?(Fordham International Law Journal Vol...

"Fazhi" ?? and ?? in China: Rule of Law; Rule by Law; Rule Through Legal System

Posted on April 30, 2013
Westerners spend a lot of time thinking about "rule of law," not just within their own domestic legal orders, but as a generalized concept of national and international law.  Rule of law and the principle of democratic organization of political power stand now as the foundation of the transnational constitutional order...

Paper Delivered at Berks County PA Bench-Bar Conference: Using the Sandusky Scandal as a Case Study--Due Diligence Requirements of Board Members in Profit and Non-Profit Organizations

Posted on April 29, 2013
On April 17, 2013, I delivered a presentation at the Berks County, Pennsylvania Bench-Bar meeting, held in Reading Pennsylvania.  There is a strong connection to Berks County for me.  My title honors W. Richard Eshelman and his spouse.  (Pix (c) Larry Catá Backer 2013) Judge Eshelman served for a time as President Judge in Berks County and before then had a distinguished career as lawyer and prosecutor who Judge Jeffrey K...

Arianna Backer on The Japanese Welfare State and Corporate Social Responsibility

Posted on April 28, 2013
Arianna Backer, a master's candidate at the University of Pittsburgh, has written an interesting paper on the relationship between expenditures by states on welfare related programs and corporate social responsibility expenditures by enterprises: The Japanese Welfare State: Private Social Expenditure in the Context of Corporate Social Responsibility: the Implications of its Rise in Relation to Public Social Spending...

Ruminations 48: Preserving Governance in the Passive Age of Mass Democracy--On the Obligations of Citizenship in the "Republic" of the University

Posted on April 27, 2013
In this increasingly democratic age, the specter of hierarchy, conformity and obedience to higher authority is corroding the inner workings of democratic institutions even as its outer manifestations ever more gloriously declare that this is truly the age of the democratically engaged individual...

Ruminations 47: The State Vainglorious

Posted on April 25, 2013
This is another in what has become a long series of aphoristic (?????????) essays, though now more in the style of epigrams (??????????), meant to provoke rather than explain. The hope is that, built up on each other, the series will provide a matrix of thoughts that together might lead the reader in new directions...

China Radio International Panel Discussion: 2013-04-23 G20 Finance Minister Meeting With Additional Commentary

Posted on April 25, 2013
On Tuesday morning I was a guest on China Radio International's (????????) "Today" show, which broadcasts live Monday to Friday on Beyond Beijing. They hold in-depth panel discussions on domestic and global news and current affairs to give the story behind the headlines...

Announcing Publication of Papers and Proceedings of the Twenty-Second Annual Meeting Association for the Study of the Cuban Economy

Posted on April 19, 2013
I am happy to announce that the proceedings of the 22nd Annual Meeting of the Association for the Study of the Cuban Economy, held August 2-4, 2012 have been published.  The ASCE is well known for producing some very well researched economic, political and governance articles, and the papers here are no exception...

Business, Human Rights and Criminal Prosecutions of NGOs

Posted on April 10, 2013
As the social and political obligations of business enterprises have broadened over the last generation or so, and as business enterprises have more aggressively moved into the public arena, seeking favors form states in the form of favorable legislation and protection for business activities from the administrative and judicial authorities of states, these same business enterprises have begun to be held to higher, and public law infused, standards of conduct...

Announcing "Democracy, Development and Institutions" A Blog Sponsored by the Development Research Center

Posted on April 08, 2013
My friend Jorge Sanguinetty and the president of the Development Research Center, recently announced the inauguration of a blog sponsored by the Development Research Center under the name of Democracy, Development and Institutions. Their objective is to contribute to a better understanding of the factors that determine the development of societies...

Statement of Larry Catá Backer to the U.N. Working Group on the Issue of Human Rights and Transnational Corporations and Other Business Enterprises?Request for Inputs and Suggestions on the 2013 Forum on Business and Human Rights

Posted on April 06, 2013
In Human Rights Council Resolution 17/4 (June 7, 2011) the Human Rights Council endorsed the Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights for implementing the "Protect, Respect, and Remedy" Framework (A/HRC/17/31) presented by John Ruggie, the former Special Representative of the Secretary General...

Haiku

Posted on April 06, 2013
Spring crimson orchids; a reward for patient care; morning coffee break.

Conference--Business and Human Rights: Moving Forward, Looking Back--Call for Papers

Posted on April 05, 2013
I am delighted to pass along a call for papers to what is expected to be a truly path forging conference: Business and Human Rights: Moving Forward, Looking Back.(Anthony Ewing, Teaching Business and Human Rights: Challenges and Opportunities, Institute for Human Rights and Business, 19 Oct...

David Bennett -- Reflections on U.S. Policy in Sub Saharan Africa

Posted on April 04, 2013
Sub-Saharan Africa remains a flashpoint. The political challenges facing the region includes issues of political stability, inter-ethnic strife, corruption, the development of multi-lateral organizations, the challenges of globalization, and environmental and human rights issues tied to the contest for control of Africa's natural resources by competing groups of powerful developed states in Europe, the Western Hemisphere and Asia...

Ruminations 46--Epigrams on Governance and the Human Condition

Posted on March 30, 2013
This is another in what has become a long series of aphoristic (?????????) essays, though now more in the style of epigrams (??????????), meant to provoke thought rather than explain it. The hope is that, built up on each other, the series will provide a matrix of thoughts that together might lead the reader in new directions...

Nabih Haddad on the Contradictions of Extraterritoriality and International Approaches to Business and Human Rights

Posted on March 30, 2013
I have suggested that though expedient (because it appears efficient), extraterritoriality as a means of extending human rights at across borders will benefit powerful states and constitutes in its most abusive practice a form of "legal imperialism."  I have also suggested that this principled approach creates an ?extraterritorial application of the (favored) laws of certain jurisdictions (usually from developed states); the development of substantive rules of corporate responsibility as international law (usually reflecting the position of developing states though serving the policy objectives of portions of developing-state elites); and privatization of corporate regulation beyond the traditional scope of corporate governance...

Corporate Social Responsibility With Chinese Characteristics Part 3: Wang Maoling on CSR and the Communist Party Line in China--?????????????????

Posted on March 29, 2013
I have been considering issues of corporate social responsibility in China. See Corporate Social Responsibility with Chinese Characteristics, Law at the End of the Day, Nov. 9, 2011; Corporate Social Responsibility With Chinese Characteristics--Part II, Law at the End of the Day, July 9, 2012...

Presentation to Japan America Society of Pennsylvania--"The Trans-Pacific Partnership: Japanese Strategic Diplomacy or Chinese Containment"

Posted on March 19, 2013
The Japan-America Society of Pennsylvania (JASP) is an association of individuals, corporations and organizations in the state of Pennsylvania and its surrounding regions that was established in 1986. Its purpose is to promote understanding and enlightened relations between the United States and Japan...

European Commission Action Plan on Company Law and Corporate Governance

Posted on March 18, 2013
This from Jeremy Miller, ECGI Director of CommunicationsOn 12 December 2012, the European Commission published the Action Plan which outlined the initiatives that the Commission intends to take in order to modernise the company law and corporate governance framework...

Michael Komesaroff on Chinese Investments in Afghanistan and the Changing Face of Global Mining

Posted on March 17, 2013
Michael Komesaroff, principal of Urandaline Investments, a consultancy specializing in China?s capital intensive industries, and a former executive in residence at the School of International Affairs, Pennsylvania State University, has produced an excellent analysis Chinese strategies for investment in mining: Afghan Adventure, China Economic Quarterly 7-9 (Dec...

Birgit Spiesshofer on "Global Financial Crisis, Corporate Responsibility and Poverty GFC Taskforce Phase II"

Posted on March 09, 2013
Dr. Birgit Spiesshofer M.C.J. (New York), Attorney at Law, has been an Of Counsel in the Berlin office of Salans since 1 April 2010 and works mainly in the area of public law. (Birgit Spiesshofer)Birgit established the ?Gaemo Group ? Corporate Responsibility International? in June 2009...

Monitoring Corporate Social and Environmental Compliance: Oxfam Behind the Brands Campaign

Posted on March 07, 2013
I have suggested that over the last decade a complex system of governance has been evolving at the transnational level.   Backer, Larry Catá, Multinational Corporations as Objects and Sources of Transnational Regulation. ILSA Journal of International & Comparative Law, Vol...

Review Essay: Hu Angang (???), China in 2020: A New Type of Superpower

Posted on March 06, 2013
Hu Angang (???) is a professor at the School of Public Policy and Management and Director of the Institute for Contemporary China Studies at Tsinghua University. He is the author of over sixty books.  He is one of the most well known intellectuals in China and his work is widely read both in the People's Republic of China and abroad...

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