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Chad Dobson Reflects on the Launch of the World Bank Reform Campaign
No full textChad Dobson is the founder of the Bank Information Center (BIC) and led BIC from 1987 to 1997 and 2007 to 2016. He is widely accredited with developing the global campaign strategies for environmental and social reforms of multilateral development banks (MDB). In this interview, he recounts the early days of BIC and the development of the global campaign
Humanitarian Interventions on the Crossroads of Legality and Legitimacy
Full text linkIn an era marked by persistent geopolitical conflicts and recurring human rights crises, the discourse surrounding humanitarian interventions (“HI”) and the role of the United Nations in this complex arena is of paramount importance. The pressing need to address mass atrocities, including ethnic conflicts and political unrest, highlights the legal and moral dilemmas associated with humanitarian interventions
The Death of Amateurism: How A Vertical Restructuring of the NCAA Could Preserve Its Role as the Governing Body of Collegiate Athletics
Full text linkThe National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is struggling to survive as an organizational entity because of near-constant litigation over university and student-athlete rights. As we enter an era of “amateur” sports where student-athletes can earn unrestrained financial compensation for their efforts, the NCAA is struggling to convince stakeholders that it has a worthwhile plan for the everchanging landscape of collegiate athletics. The NCAA retained a purpose as a governing entity when its rules relating to financial inducements and transfer eligibility were enforceable. Now, stakeholders look to separate themselves from the NCAA. To maintain a purpose and survive as the governing entity of collegiate athletics, the NCAA needs to recover its coveted antitrust exemption. This Comment advocates for the NCAA to create distinct governing bodies for its biggest sports: men’s and women’s college basketball. The NCAA should then vertically restructure itself as a franchise, where willing universities would join as franchisees. The purpose of this joint venture is to exploit the “single entity” defense, one of the chief avenues to obtaining antitrust exemption. This recommendation will use Major League Soccer’s corporate organization as the blueprint for the NCAA to follow in an effort to preserve its role as the governing body of American collegiate athletics
[interview] We Went to a Crypto Conference: We Left Terrified
No full textThe crypto industry could cause a 2008 style economic crash. After spending $130 million on the 2024 elections, the industry won every seat it invested in. Now, they\u27re getting the policies they want--and that could mean economic disaster for the rest of us. More Perfect Union’s mission is to build power for working people. Here’s what that means: We report on the real struggles and challenges of the working class from a working-class perspective, and we attempt to connect those problems to potential solutions. We report on the abuses and wrongdoing of corporate power, and we seek to hold accountable the ultra-rich who have too much power over America’s political and economic systems
Why the Right Still Embraces Ivermectin
No full text[quote] The ongoing interest in ivermectin comes as little surprise to Lewis A. Grossman, a law professor and historian at American University who has written extensively about the concept of “therapeutic choice.” Mr. Grossman said that over the course of American history, a number of treatments have become popular despite having little or no buy-in from medical experts.
For example, he said, laetrile, an unproven cancer remedy derived from apricot pits, surged in popularity in the 1970s; the actor Steve McQueen used it in his unsuccessful fight against cancer.
At the height of laetrile’s popularity, proponents praised its affordability and railed against a big medicine-government “conspiracy” against it, while many experts classified it as quackery. The F.D.A. never approved it for treating cancer or any other therapeutic use, said Mr. Grossman, who is writing a book about laetrile called “Seeds of Rebellion.”
“The ivermectin story fits within a very, very long tradition in America of people latching on to nonorthodox therapies based in part on their suspicion that, for profit-maximizing reasons, drug companies and physicians are suppressing truth about them,” Mr. Grossman said
Copyright in Characters: A Proposal for Reform
Full text linkThe doctrine of character copyright is an eccentricity in copyright law that should either be abandoned or substantially reformed. Originally limited to literary characters, this doctrine decomposes a narrative work in order to recognize characters as works of authorship independent of the narrative works from which they are derived. Claimants generally seek independent protection for characters for three, sometimes overlapping, reasons: (1) to repackage what would otherwise be a weak claim of substantial similarity if comparison were to be made with the work(s) from which the character has sprung; (2) to overcome obstacles posed by prior licensing decisions that have subdivided ownership in the source work(s), leaving the party claiming character protection without standing to assert rights in the source work(s); or (3) to retain some exclusivity in elements of the original source work that should be free for all to use when the original source work has fallen into the public domain, even if some derivative works retain protection.
This symposium contribution first provides a high-level synthesis of the legal literature on character copyright. It then discusses the appeal pending in the Ninth Circuit in Carroll Shelby Licensing, Inc. v. Halicki as a use case to demonstrate the pitfalls of character copyright. Recognizing that the courts are unlikely to fully abandon the character copyright doctrine, this Essay closes by arguing for reform. First, it provides an interpretation of the Ninth Circuit’s Towle test for character copyright that avoids the risks of using trademark analysis to decide a copyright question. Second, it argues in favor of procedural reform under which a party claiming character copyright must plead the claim with particularity for reasons analogous to those that have inspired courts to impose a particularity requirement in trade secret litigation. It shows how the claimed car character in Halicki would not have been able to meet a particularity requirement, and substantial litigation costs could have been avoided
Reforming Copyright or Toward Another Science? A More Human Rights-Oriented Approach Under the REBSPA in Constructing a Right to Research for Scholarly Publishing
Full text linkThis article identifies copyright impediments existing in the sphere of science, and then tentatively suggests how such impediments may be overcome. It focuses on scholarly publishing only, and here primarily on digital content, and specifically asks whether expensive commercial scholarly publishers continue to “add value” to research in the digital era. The deficits of copyright law and potential solutions thereto are assessed in the light of the right of everyone “to enjoy the benefits of scientific progress and its applications” (REBSPA) as laid down in Article 15(1)(b) of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) of 1966. A substantial part of the discussion examines whether and, if so, in what ways, the REBSPA gives rise to a “right to research”—also in a sense that legally obliges the international community of states toward states with fragile science systems, or in an extraterritorial sense that would require the right to be obeyed beyond borders—and it then enquires what the normative implications of such a right would be for copyright and science. It is submitted that current official interpretations of the REBSPA reveal flaws and gaps. Here, the REBSPA is accordingly reinterpreted in accordance with what is called a more human rights-oriented approach, its guiding concept being that of “adequacy for science.” This article finds that, while existing copyright law needs certain reforms in the interim to accommodate the needs of science, in the longer term, entire institutionalized science may have to be reconceived. Genuinely open science and the creation of a “true” scholarly knowledge commons require far-reaching changes in the way that copyright applies in the sphere of science. The continued role of commercial scholarly publishing needs to be questioned. Potentially, it will be necessary to “move beyond” the applicability of copyright in the field of science
Eye-For-An-Eye: High Compensation Awards Against States as Undue Punishment
Full text linkIn observing the past several years’ debates regarding reparations under international law, we are reminded of lessons we learned as children in Sunday School. The Jewish and Christian sacred texts address the principle of retributive justice reflected in the Biblical phrase “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.” During the early rabbinic period, the great sages grappled with the import of this rule. Jesus famously rejected the rule in favor of mercy: “turn the other cheek.” The rabbis were not as interested in rejecting this rule in its entirety as ensuring that it yielded justice