University of California Hastings College of the Law
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From Prompt to Clone: Copyright Challenges in AI Model Distillation
No full textThis paper examines the legality of model distillation in the context of large language models (LLMs), where smaller “student” models are trained by mimicking the outputs of larger, proprietary “teacher” models. As artificial intelligence continues to advance rapidly, the legal framework surrounding patent, and contract law is being tested. Specifically, the paper explores whether current U.S. copyright law offers sufficient protection for frontier LLM developers and whether practices like unauthorized distillation amount to infringement. By analyzing model architecture, training data, behavioral mimicry, and reverse engineering under prevailing legal doctrines—including fair use, terms of use enforcement, and recent litigation—the paper finds that model distillation is unlikely to constitute copyright infringement under existing law. Nevertheless, the broader implications for innovation, proprietary model protection, and ethics of open sourcing suggest that a reevaluation of intellectual property norms in AI development is both necessary and imminent
Recognizing Arab Climate Refugees Under Both International and Regional Law
No full textClimate change is increasingly displacing populations worldwide, yet existing international and regional legal frameworks, including the 1951 Refugee Convention and the Arab Charter on Human Rights, fail to recognize climate refugees as a protected category. These legal instruments define refugees narrowly, limiting protection to individuals fleeing persecution on specific grounds such as race, religion, or political opinion. As climate change accelerates environmental degradation, resulting in extreme weather events, desertification, and resource scarcity, millions of people are being forced to migrate, often across international borders, without legal recourse or asylum rights. This Article argues that climate refugees should be afforded the same protections as political refugees under both international and regional refugee law.
Using the Arab Charter and the 1951 Refugee Convention as a foundation, the Article examines the gaps in the current asylum framework and proposes legal solutions to extend protection to climate-displaced individuals. It argues that existing legal definitions should either be interpreted broadly to encompass climate refugees or amended to explicitly include them as a protected category. Additionally, it explores alternative avenues under international and regional human rights law, emphasizing rights to life, health, a safe environment, and non-discrimination as crucial for protecting displaced populations.
Given the Arab world’s heightened vulnerability to climate change, exemplified by rising temperatures, droughts, and natural disasters, there is an urgent need for reform. Without action, climate-induced displacement will continue to pose humanitarian challenges, exacerbating resource conflicts and straining asylum systems. This Article advocates for an immediate legal response to prevent the exclusion of climate refugees before displacement reaches an unprecedented scale
The Mono Basin Project: Remedying Environmental Injustice Through Tribal Beneficial Use Designations
No full textDue to a history of violence, dispossession, and racism, Native American tribes in California face structural disadvantages and inequities with respect to water rights. At the same time, tribes lack meaningful legal remedies to gain access to the water resources necessary to maintain their ways of life. One key issue is that California water agencies traditionally did not consider tribal water uses when implementing water quality control laws, leaving such uses unprotected. For years, tribes have urged the State to fill in these gaps in the law by adopting tribal beneficial uses (“TBUs”), which would protect tribal water uses, such as subsistence and cultural uses, through heightened water quality objectives. In recent years, state agencies have taken initial steps toward implementing TBUs in response to this advocacy.
This Article examines the Lahontan Regional Water Quality Control Board’s Mono Basin Project, one of the state’s first TBU implementation projects. Mono Lake, home of Native tribes like the Kootzaduka’a since time immemorial, has long been at the center of an intense debate about balancing the protection of tribal water uses against the need to divert water to the state’s more densely populated and water-scarce regions. Since the mid-1900s, diversions from the Mono Basin to Los Angeles have substantially lowered Mono Lake’s water level, leading to adverse ecological impacts and threatening the ability of the Kootzaduka’a people to maintain their traditional subsistence and cultural practices.
As one of the earliest TBU projects in California, the Mono Basin Project can provide crucial insight into both the benefits and potential shortfalls of TBUs as a mechanism for protecting tribal water uses. This Article argues that despite the Mono Basin Project’s apparent procedural justice, the project reveals key limitations to using water quality law as the primary mechanism for addressing inequities faced by tribes with respect to water. First, the project raises the issue of constraints imposed by water rights, which commonly conflict with water quality control implementation and, in the Mono Basin context, may significantly limit the effectiveness of TBUs at increasing Mono Lake’s elevation. Second, at a broader, statewide level, the slowness of the TBU process thus far raises concerns about the effectiveness of the state’s current TBU regime. The Article argues that to secure needed protections for tribes within a meaningful timeframe, the current discretionary system should be replaced by a statutory directive for TBU implementation
The ESG Disclosure Paradox: Gaps in Environmental Justice Criteria
No full textEnvironmental Justice (“EJ”) and Environmental Social Governance (“ESG”) are terms used to address the impacts of corporate actions as well as environmental and social regulation on the people and the planet. ESG disclosure is a corporate-driven invention that aims to measure progress towards sustainability and disclose environmental and social criteria while fostering value for businesses. EJ, by contrast, emerged as a social movement that evolved into regulatory frameworks. Governmental agencies and EJ advocates are utilizing EJ mapping tools and metrics to assess inequalities in environmental impacts caused by private and public policy and decision-making. Though these concepts may initially create an impression of contradiction, the paradoxical relationship between using EJ tools within ESG disclosure frameworks creates innovative avenues to achieve long-term corporate viability while pursuing EJ objectives.
ESG disclosure requirements can be imposed through mandatory rules by public regulators or adopted voluntarily by businesses. In the U.S., environmental protections in general, and disclosure regulations in particular, remain uncertain, with ongoing political turmoil and a push-pull dynamic surrounding the establishment of mandatory ESG requirements and EJ programs. Given this uncertainty, voluntary frameworks warrant closer examination, as they offer immediate insights into corporate environmental and social disclosures. Additionally, voluntary reporting frameworks serve as models that influence the development of mandatory ESG regulations.
This Article evaluates and critically examines the inclusion of EJ in voluntary ESG disclosure frameworks and identifies the gaps in existing frameworks for the effective inclusion of environmental justice criteria. Thus, this work intends to provide ideas and tools to guide businesses incorporating EJ into ESG, inform public regulators (increasingly relying on private frameworks to create mandatory ESG disclosure), and support EJ advocates in navigating the complexities of ESG disclosure
Abandoned Priorities and Cases in Limbo: An Analysis of Title IX Enforcement in the First Year of Trump’s Second Term
No full textDuring President Trump’s second term, the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights has resolved far fewer cases than his first term or the ten year average, and has not resolved a single case of discrimination based on sexual assault, sexual harassment, or pregnancy/parental status.https://repository.uclawsf.edu/wll/1003/thumbnail.jp
Private Money: Stablecoins, Bitcoin, and the GENIUS Act
No full textCryptocurrency has been legalized in the United States. The 2025 GENIUS Act provides a sensible regulatory framework for cryptocurrency as a medium of exchange while avoiding predicted monetary chaos. The Act correctly distinguishes between volatile fiat cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, which are unsuitable as payment mechanisms, and stablecoins backed by traditional currencies and reserves.
Historical analysis spanning American monetary systems from the “free banking era” before 1860 through modern digital payments demonstrates that private money has long coexisted with government currency but requires appropriate regulation to prevent bank runs, fraud, and monetary instability. The GENIUS Act addresses key cryptocurrency risks—technological failures, volatility, issuer fraud, and loss of monetary control—through one-to-one reserve requirements, business activity restrictions, supervisory oversight, and priority for stablecoin holders in bankruptcy proceedings.
Critics argue the Act enables monetary chaos, lacks consumer protections, and permits “Big Tech” to control money supply. These criticisms are largely unfounded. The Act’s reserve requirements prevent fractional banking and money supply disruption, while existing corporate governance and consumer protection mechanisms provide adequate safeguards.
The GENIUS Act represents neither a return to nineteenth-century monetary chaos nor abandonment of oversight, but rather a measured approach distinguishing payment uses from investment uses of cryptocurrency. Success ultimately depends on whether stablecoins can satisfy the “no-questions-asked” principle and offer competitive transaction costs compared to existing payment systems like credit cards and digital wallets
The Case for a Moratorium on Deep-Sea Mining: The International Seabed Authority, Indigenous Rights, and Marine Ecosystems in the Eastern Pacific
No full textThe rising interest in deep-sea commercial exploitation has sparked a powerful debate over the environmental and social justice implications of mining the ocean’s depths for valuable minerals. Deep-sea mining targets polymetallic nodules found on the seabed, containing metals critical for green technologies like electric vehicles and solar cells. The Clarion-Clipperton Zone (“CCZ”) in the eastern Pacific is estimated to hold more nickel, manganese, and cobalt than all terrestrial resources combined. As one of the last largely untouched ecosystems, deep-sea mining in the CCZ raises significant concerns about the irreversible harm to its biodiversity and the disruption to Indigenous communities reliant on intact marine environments.
Part I examines the environmental and social dimensions of deep-sea mining, emphasizing its dual role in supporting the clean energy transition and threatening deep-sea ecosystems and Indigenous livelihoods. It discusses the ecological risks, including biodiversity loss ecosystem disruptions, and the downstream impacts on coastal communities.
Part II reviews the governing legal frameworks for deep-sea mining, including the 1982 United Nations Conventions on the Law of the Sea and the International Seabed Authority. While these frameworks provide some safeguards, they also reveal critical gaps in transparency, enforcement, and Indigenous representation. Additionally, the article examines the Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction Agreement and its potential to strengthen international collaboration and environmental protections in areas beyond national jurisdiction. The article also evaluates other international frameworks, such as the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and the Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention, highlighting their contributions to safeguarding Indigenous rights in the context of deep-sea mining
Part III advocates for a phased moratorium on deep-sea mining, grounded in the precautionary principle, to address scientific uncertainties, potential ecological harm, and social inequities. It highlights alternatives to deep-sea mining, such as advances in battery technology, land-based mining, and recycling, which challenge the necessity of seabed exploitation for the clean energy transition. The article also addresses critiques of a ban, advocating for a robust governance reform if a moratorium is not implemented.
This article argues that a phased moratorium offers a responsible path forward, allowing time to strengthen legal frameworks, advance alternative solutions, and ensure inclusive and equitable governance. Protecting the Earth’s last frontier while advancing the clean energy transition requires prioritizing marine biodiversity, as well as environmental and Indigenous rights protections
When Ownership Meets Licensing–New Normative Expectations and the Need for NFT Categorization: All Your Projects “Are” Belong to Us
No full textThe current treatment of all NFTs in legal scholarship as identical digital assets fundamentally misunderstands their varied applications and the new normative expectations they create. The Moonbirds controversy of 2022, where a creator’s unilateral license change affected nearly 20,000 token holders, exemplifies the crisis: token holders believed they owned digital assets that could be controlled and commercialized, but existing copyright frameworks treat NFTs merely as licenses subject to creator discretion. Picture for Profile (PFP) Projects—community-based NFT collections involving thousands of tokens often with governance and commercial rights—combine concepts of possession, community governance, and commercialization in ways that challenge traditional intellectual property licensing. Despite industry efforts to create NFTspecific licenses, empirical analysis reveals declining adoption and increasing fragmentation. Current legal scholarship debates whether NFTs should fall under copyright or property law, but such broad categorizations are premature. A better approach is a fact-based analytical framework to distinguish PFP Projects from other NFT types. Such a framework would enable courts to apply appropriate legal doctrines based on the specific NFT type rather than one-size-fits-all solutions that risk stifling innovation or inadequately protecting consumers. This article advocates for American Law Institute (ALI) guidance to create default rules for the $10B, and exponentially growing, NFT market. Guidance from the ALI provides courts with practical tools to navigate potential disputes involving ownership rights, commercial licensing, and decentralized governance while balancing innovation with consumer protection in an evolving digital economy
