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The Financial Sector and Global Dollar System
No full textThe second Trump administration’s approach to financial markets and institutions mixes familiar deregulatory policies with a range of other policies (financial and non-financial) that are largely without precedent and may lead to significant structural change in the long term. Combined, these policies have the potential to affect the financial sector in at least four ways. First, they could threaten the foundations of the global dollar system – mutual cooperation, trust, and interdependency, both between the producers and consumers of financial instruments and among the nations that constitute the dollar bloc. Second, they may undermine financial stability by loosening prudential standards, especially with respect to limits on leverage. Third, they can jeopardise consumer and investor confidence by relaxing regulatory standards and lessening financial law enforcement. Fourth, they could frustrate the financial crimes and sanctions regime, notably by promoting stablecoins, which can be used beyond the reach of governments to enable various forms of illicit activity.
These effects, in turn, could have a negative impact on the economy in the medium to long term. They raise the risk of financial instability and a messy deleveraging. They also may put upward pressure on interest rates for public and private dollar-denominated debt. Although the global dollar system has proven robust to past disruptions, and remains well entrenched, the administration’s new stance, if pursued to its logical end, could increase financial fragility and impair capital formation. If that comes to pass, a future exogenous shock to the economic or financial system would pose significant risk to economic growth if policymakers are unable, in the face of such a shock, to come together swiftly to avert a disorderly monetary contraction
Fixing MFW: Fairness and Vision in Controller Self-Dealing
No full textThe legal regime governing controlling shareholders relies on the ability of Delaware courts to police conflicted transactions under the stringent entire fairness standard of review. This review involves both implicit valuation – evaluating the transaction process, and explicit valuation – assessing the fairness of the transaction\u27s financial terms. This Article reveals a critical flaw in this regime: courts cannot reliably engage in valuation when the transaction involves an entrepreneur\u27s idiosyncratic vision for the company. As a result, there is a gaping hole in Delaware\u27s framework for policing the fairness of controller transactions.
Delaware courts have developed guardrails to avoid judicial valuation by rewarding controllers that implement procedural protections for minority shareholders with more favorable review. Nonetheless, we describe how these guardrails have increasingly failed, forcing judicial valuation to the forefront of trials and negating the informed input of shareholders. To address this shortcoming, we propose reforms to the cleansing framework that would enable courts to avoid valuation when the interested parties have endorsed the transaction and its price. We also offer guidance for judicial review of controller self-dealing transactions where necessary that respects the competency of courts. Our modified framework represents an important advancement in the legal treatment of controlling shareholder transactions. It would safeguard minority shareholders from expropriation by controllers while simultaneously encouraging visionary entrepreneurs to engage in value-creating activities, thereby promoting both fairness and innovation in Delaware corporate law
The Trump Administration Reverses U.S. Position on UNRWA Immunities
No full textOn April 24, 2025, the U.S. Department of Justice submitted a letter in a civil lawsuit that maintains for the first time that the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) is not immune from U.S. civil litigation. The letter reverses the position taken by the previous administration in the same lawsuitFootnote 2 and alters nearly eight decades of U.S. practice concerning the immunities of UN entities that are considered subsidiary organs of UN principal organs and thus part of the United Nations itself. Heretofore, the government stated that such organs are entitled to absolute immunity under U.S. treaty obligations. The new position regards UNRWA as an agency with separate legal personality and hence ineligible for the absolute immunity applicable to the United Nations, and it downgrades the immunities of high-ranking UN officials responsible for UNRWA’s activities. The executive branch’s change of position is significant not only for this lawsuit and for UNRWA, but also for UN-affiliated bodies more generally, and for UN officials, including officers at or above the rank of UN assistant secretary-general who enjoy the equivalent of diplomatic immunities under applicable international law. The reversal implicates questions of the international law of immunities, as well as the constitutional and statutory law of the United States. Specifically, the new position will require U.S. courts to address such issues as: whether the U.S. president has constitutional authority to determine the immunities of an entity created by the UN General Assembly; whether courts should autonomously interpret the applicable treaties and statutes dealing with the immunities of such an entity; what degree of deference (if any) should be accorded to a new executive treaty interpretation, announced for the first time in litigation where the prior administration had twice affirmed longstanding positions on the same questions; and how the relevant statute on international organizations immunity should be interpreted in relation to a subsequent and self-executing treaty on UN immunities
The Legal Framework for Enhanced Rock Weathering in Minnesota
No full textThis paper focuses on one form of carbon dioxide removal, terrestrial enhanced rock weathering, which involves spreading finely ground alkaline rocks over land. Scientists posit that the alkaline materials will bond with carbon dioxide in the air, sequestering it in mineral form, potentially for tens of thousands of years. Within the U.S., Minnesota is thought to be an ideal location for enhanced rock weathering, as it has pre-existing silicate rock reserves and quarrying infrastructure, and appropriate land. However, before enhanced rock weathering can be deployed at scale, further research is required to verify its effectiveness, co-benefits, and risks.
Currently in the U.S., there are no laws that specifically address enhanced rock weathering, but the practice may be regulated under a number of general laws. This paper builds on prior research on the laws that may apply to enhanced rock weathering by analyzing the application of both federal laws and state laws to projects in Minnesota, as part of a larger Sabin Center project aimed at clarifying state level regulation of carbon dioxide removal activities
The Disaster Management Complex: Law’s Adaptations in Times of Climate Disaster
No full textThe Anthropocene is marked by constant climate-related disasters and defined by the urgent need to foster and implement adaptations to future climate impacts that reduce disaster risk. The intensity, frequency, and severity of extreme weather events continue to rise even as nations and corporations alike miss their emissions targets, all promising a hotter, wetter, and more extreme future. A number of federal agencies, including the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), have, at times, sought to adapt their own famously fragmented responses to these changing circumstances. However, federal disaster response is conducted against a backdrop of authorizing legislation that is designed primarily to support disaster consequence management, with often murky definitions of disaster types eligible for assistance. Consequently, the relationship between agencies and disaster response and management is subject to pendulum policy swings between presidential administrations. As the politicization and polarization of issues at the intersection of climate and disaster grow, and in the light of recent actions of the Trump Administration, there is a growing call for reform. This Article analyzes how FEMA might integrate climate change into its disaster resilience efforts under existing authority, while exploring a more effective formal legislative mandate to enable FEMA to be a viable source of climate resilience leadership. We propose that FEMA’s mission would be best served by legislation explicitly requiring the agency to integrate climate change responsibilities in all phases of disaster management. In particular, we recommend legislation that (a) clarifies the role of FEMA in relation to slow-onset disasters, such as sea level rise; (b) clarifies the role of FEMA in relation to compounding disasters, disasters that occur while recovery from a previous disaster is still underway; and (c) requires relevant federal, state, and local agencies to integrate climate projections and modelling into hazard and risk assessments
Custom and Adjudication in International Law through the Civil Law Tradition in Colombia
Full text linkInternational Law has often been described as a decentralized domain, in the sense that the authority to create the law doesn’t derive from a sole center of power. This is especially true in the context of normative production through Customary International Law. Multiple and disaggregated expressions of state practice and opinio iuris come together in the formation of custom, and a variety of actors, which authority is often contested, including international organizations and tribunals, play a major role in identifying the rules of customary law.
One could also speak of decentralization, or at least of non-systematization, in the domain of international adjudication. Most international judicial bodies and arbitral tribunals decide the disputes brought before them under the formal rule that their decisions only produce effects between the parties to the case. However, in practice, it is not rare to see forms of cross-referencing among international decisions that have rightfully made many legal scholars argue about the existence of a system of jurisprudence both in the case of the International Court of Justice as a prominent example of a permanent international court and arbitral awards.
In this essay, I address these issues, namely, the structures that govern normative production through Customary International Law and the criteria to determine the authority of international judicial decisions and arbitral awards by reference and comparison to the structures and criteria employed for the same purpose in the national level in Civil Law jurisdictions, where, as we will see, legal production is regulated and mostly tied to the centralized authority of the state and one can more properly speak of systems of jurisprudence, with exceptions in the domain of domestic arbitration.
Drawing from my background and experience, I engage in this comparative analysis based on an account of the General Theory of Law in the Civil Law tradition with examples of legal developments and attributes from the Colombian legal system. I conclude by offering some comments on the most salient points of comparison between the domestic and international levels. The Essay is also thought to serve as a legal thought comparative companion for students formed in the Civil Law to engage in the study of two of the most important sources of International law: custom and adjudication
Seaweed Cultivation and Sinking for Carbon Dioxide Removal in Alaska
Full text linkMeeting global climate change goals requires a rapid and dramatic reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. That will not be sufficient by itself, however. It will also be necessary to remove carbon dioxide, and potentially other greenhouse gases, from the atmosphere. One proposed approach involves the cultivation and sinking of seaweed.
Alaska’s coastal waters, rich in nutrients, provide ideal conditions for seaweed cultivation projects. Moreover, Alaska’s coastal waters are more vulnerable to acidification than those in lower latitudes, making aquaculture particularly beneficial in this region. Alaska has made active efforts to streamline the permitting of seaweed cultivation, encouraging research projects in the area. This report analyzes the potentially applicable laws and explains the permitting and other requirements they impose on seaweed projects in Alaska. The report also provides recommendations for improving the permitting process to facilitate CDR projects, while still ensuring they occur in a safe, responsible, and just way
The End of the U.S.-Backed International Order and the Future of International Law
Full text linkThe international order that the United States has for decades led and maintained is undergoing dramatic change. In this Essay, we explain that international law during this period was constituted with, and dependent on, U.S. power; that the two became (in odd-couple fashion) entwined together; and that, as the international order changes, the international legal system, its content and its architecture, will also inevitably change
Mainstreaming Parafamily
Full text linkIn Parafamily, Chen and Mulligan have managed to cover vast terrain, to catalogue important developments in law, to canvass insights from generations of thinkers, and to propose an ambitious yet pragmatic approach to the laws that govern human relationships, directly and indirectly. They do all this in a relatively short article composed of unusually readable prose. Quite a feat.
The focus of the piece is Chen and Mulligan’s contribution to the field of legal scholarship dedicated to relationships that go beyond the traditional nuclear family. As their title reveals, the authors contribute a new term and concept to this literature: parafamily. How is parafamily defined? “We call close and committed connections a person’s parafamily,” the authors tell us
How Domestic Institutions Shape the Global Tech War
Full text linkThe United States (U.S.), China, and the European Union (EU) are engaged in a national security-driven economic competition over advanced technology. Many scholars and commentators focus on the external dimension of this geopolitical contest; that is, they describe the strategic choices by each actor in terms of geopolitical realities, threat perceptions, and relative power. However, this Article brings to the fore the internal dimension of the global tech war. We argue that each player’s strategy in the tech war is a function of its internal features, including basic constitutional powers, domestic legal institutions, and the relationships between the government and private industry. We show how these internal features enable the United States, China, and the EU to deploy certain strategies while constraining them with respect to other strategies. Comparing key U.S., Chinese, and EU domestic features reveals important insights about their respective strengths and weaknesses in waging the global tech war, and it offers predictive insights about the tech war’s likely future