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The Uneven Legal Geographies of Nutrition Entitlement Programs in the United States. Realizing or Hindering the Right to Food?
Full text linkUnlike many countries across the world, the United States government does not formally recognize the Right to Food in law. However, it funds and administers nutrition entitlement programs that play a significant role in mitigating hunger and food insecurity across the country. Reflecting on the socio-political dynamics that shape the legal spaces of nutrition entitlement in different places, this Article explores the uneven geographies of the Right to Food in two other countries (South Africa and Ecuador) and then turns its focus to the United States. This Article offers an overview of the two most extensive nutrition entitlement programs (SNAP and school nutrition programs) and their implementation at the state level in West Virginia. The case study of West Virginia points to the key role that local jurisdictions also play in fulfilling or hindering the Right to Food in specific places, and suggests that legal spaces there are also important sites of Right to Food organizing and advocacy
Indigenous Knowledge as Evidence in Federal Rule-Making
Full text linkRecent and historic federal guidance instructs agencies to consider Indigenous Knowledge in decision-making where it is available. However, tribal advocates are faced with many hurdles, in the form of “information quality” criteria, which requires the collection and dissemination of Indigenous Knowledge to conform to a complex set of procedural rules before agencies may be willing to consider it as evidence for rule-making. This Article seeks to define Indigenous Knowledge, highlight the hurdles to its implementation by federal agencies, and equip tribal advocates and officials with strategies and a demonstrative example of best practices for the packaging and presentation of Indigenous Knowledge in a manner which will give that knowledge the greatest chance of inclusion as evidence in agency decision-making
Contracting for Social Change
Full text linkThroughout history, social change has often been shaped by high profile legislation and through high-stakes litigation. But social change can also be spurred on through private contract, including through the agreements businesses and individuals make with each other every day. Transactional attorneys can promote social change through drafting techniques and choices, including narrative and storytelling techniques, and can use such drafting techniques in order to 1) write better and more complete agreements that are more consistent with business-led social activism already taking place, and 2) influence society by forcing counterparties to evolve on social issues, change industry practice, or foster a narrative for social change in society in general.
This article begins with establishing a background overview on business-led social activism, describing recent efforts by large businesses to influence social policy, and provides a scholarship overview regarding how transactional drafters can use narrative theory and storytelling techniques in transactional documents. Combining these two elements, this article analyzes how transactional attorneys can employ narrative and storytelling techniques to promote social change in transactional documents. The article argues that by integrating narrative and storytelling techniques into transactional documents, transactional attorneys can increase the persuasiveness of transactional documents, align corporate statements with existing business-led social activism, and positively influence social change
Fashion Upcycling as Protected Free Speech in Trademark Law
Full text linkFashion upcycling offers unprecedented opportunities for the sustainable reuse of clothing. Using second-hand garments as raw material for new creations, upcyclers transform used pieces of clothing into new fashion products that may become even more sought-after than the original source material. The more fashion elements enjoy trademark protection; however, the more legal obstacles arise. Fashion upcycling may trigger allegations of consumer confusion, brand dilution, and unfair freeriding. As the Introduction will explain, the exhaustion of trademark rights after the first sale does not necessarily dispel concerns about trademark infringement. The rearrangement of branded garment components in the upcycling process may render the first sale doctrine inapplicable and give the trademark proprietor ammunition to oppose the resale. Against this background, the analysis explores other strategies to assure fashion upcyclers that, as long as they do not specifically aim at misleading consumers or damaging and exploiting protected brand insignia, they can rework trademarked fashion items without risking the verdict of infringement. To lay groundwork for this approach, Section I focuses on trademark theory that stresses the need to develop a specific set of rules capable of shielding the expressive use of trademarks against allegations of trademark infringement. In the light of cultural sciences, Section II demonstrates that fashion upcycling constitutes a specific form of artistic speech – and a specific form of expressive trademark use – that has particular societal value in the current environmental crisis. It offers a vision of alternative, more sustainable production and consumption patterns. Therefore, fashion upcycling should benefit from breathing space for free speech in trademark law. Taking this insight as a starting point, Section III discusses two avenues for supporting fashion upcycling in trademark contexts: first, the option of adopting a strict test of use as a trademark that could immunize sustainable fashion reuse from allegations of trademark infringement on the ground that consumers will understand the specific reuse context and perceive third-party trademarks on circular economy products as mere decorative elements. Second, the option of strengthening defenses, in particular the referential use defense, by developing labelling guidelines that allow upcyclers to ensure compliance with the requirement of honest practices in industrial or commercial matters. The Conclusion offers concluding remarks. The EU trademark system – the Trade Mark Regulation (“EUTMR”) and the Trade Mark Directive (“TMD”) – will serve as a reference point for the discussion
A Critical Race Theory Analysis of Critical Race Theory Bans
Full text linkA majority of state legislatures have introduced bills prohibiting public schools from teaching certain divisive concepts attributed to critical race theory (CRT), with at least fifteen states successfully enacting them. This Article applies a critical race theory analysis to these critical race theory bans, finding that the bans embody white privilege and especially its companion, white fragility.
After providing a primer on critical race theory, Part I explains how the state bans profoundly misunderstand critical race theory, which focuses on how systems and institutions reproduce racial inequality. These bans, however, assume that racism is individual, intentional, and rare, and that radial harm is caused by discussions of race rather than systemic racism. At the same time, to the extent the laws forbid suggesting that systemic racism is widespread or that the United States is not a meritocracy, these bans may prevent students from learning core CRT concepts.
Part II then examines these bans through a critical race theory lens. It first demonstrates how the laws\u27 ignorance of critical race theory and of the role race plays in the United States reflects white privilege. It next explains how the bans embody white fragility-those defensive behaviors white people may exhibit when their radial advantages are pointed out-in the way they overreact to imagined threats, focus on white people\u27s wellbeing, frame white people as the true victims of race relations in the United States, and finally assert false equivalencies.
Ultimately, critical race theory bans reinscribe racial inequalities. By chilling classroom discussions about the creation and maintenance of racial hierarchies, these bans leave unaddressed all the structural issues that critical race theory aims to uncover. It is a perfect vicious circle
Trade Law Policing on the Factory Floor: Next Generation Agreements and Their Corporate Accountability Tools
Full text linkTrade policymakers\u27 increased attention to sustainability has prompted the development of trade tools focused on corporate accountability within international trade agreements. As evidenced by the creation and use of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement\u27s Rapid Response Labor Mechanism, this institutional shift has potent implications for labour rights and environmental protections. This article, which transcribes a lecture delivered at the Lauterpacht Centre in October 2023, scrutinises the turn toward supply-chain policing within international trade law and its institutional, legal, sociological, rhetorical and disciplinary effects
Understanding Cyber Risk: Unpacking and Responding to Cyber Threats Facing the Public and Private Sectors
Full text linkCyberattacks, data breaches, and ransomware continue to pose major threats to businesses, governments, and health and educational institutions worldwide. Ongoing successful instances of cybercrime involve sophisticated attacks from diverse sources such as organized crime syndicates, actors engaged in industrial espionage, nation-states, and even lone wolf actors having relatively few resources. Technological innovation continues to outpace the ability of U.S. law to keep pace, though other jurisdictions including the European Union have been more proactive. Nation-state and international criminal group ransomware attacks continue; Sony’s systems were hacked by a ransomware group; MGM Resorts disclosed that recovery from their September 2023 hack may ultimately cost more than $100 million; serious server software Log4j exploit became evident; U.S. embassy phones are hacked; cyberwarfare is deployed by Russia in their invasion of Ukraine; and theft of valuable intellectual property due to cybersecurity breaches are reported.
This Article proceeds in seven parts. First, it provides an overview of the cyber threat environment. Second, it discusses the current cybersecurity legal landscape. Third, it introduces cybersecurity and corporate governance. Fourth, it discusses how corporate directors govern cybersecurity. Fifth, it explores the emerging cyber threat from nation-states and the impact of geopolitics on business. Sixth, it focuses on issues involved in identifying and responding to digital attacks. And last, it concludes. This Article adds to the important body of cybersecurity literature that explores the roles of government and business, particularly corporate directors, in the governance of data security
No Flash Photography Please: An Analysis of Corporate Use of Street Art Under Section 120(a) of the AWCPA
Full text linkStreet art and graffiti are pervasive artforms found throughout the world and throughout history. While the artforms have been associated with crime and vandalism in the past, they have increasingly been featured in different capacities from art galleries to corporate marketing campaigns. With street art’s growing recognition and popularity, corporations have begun to use the medium to target new customer bases. In some situations, the use of artwork in marketing campaigns is unsanctioned by the artist. Therefore, courts have now begun to examine the balance between copyright protection for street artists and the corporate use of street art. Section 120(a) of the Architectural Works Copyright Act of 1990 (AWCPA) provides a limited panorama right to take pictorial representations of architectural works that are visible to the public without fear of copyright infringement. Specifically, the Central District of California and the Eastern District of Michigan have grappled with the copyright protections for street art appearing on buildings in the background of ad campaigns and Section 120(a).
This Note argues that the exemption found under Section 120(a) should be limited to noncommercial uses of street art in order to balance street artists’ copyright interests with the relative resources of companies that wish to use the artwork. Limiting Section 120(a) to noncommercial uses would also align with the congressional intent behind the exemption and would be analogous with other Berne Convention signatory countries who also provide a limited panorama right for noncommercial uses. Courts and the general public have recognized the valuableness of street art and graffiti. Therefore, street art should receive increased copyright protection similar to other artforms
