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The Unintended Consequences of Torture\u27s Ineffectiveness
Get PDFWhether torture to extract true information—for example, military secrets or the location of a terrorist-planted bomb—is morally permissible and empirically effective is widely disputed. But many agree that such torture’s effectiveness is a necessary condition for its permissibility; if ineffective, then it is impermissible. Thus, the empirical issue has become crucial in deciding the moral issue. This Article addresses the empirical issue with a novel, non-empirical argument. Torture’s ineffectiveness not only ensures torture’s impermissibility but also exposes torture victims to criminal liability for any offenses they are tortured into committing. With torture as the most extreme and horrific form of coercion, seemingly if anyone deserves eligibility for a duress defense against criminal liability, it is torture victims. But ineffective torture is ineffective coercion, and ineffective coercion fails to sufficiently coerce to support a duress defense. Therefore, an unintended consequence of torture’s ineffectiveness is its inconsistency with and preclusion of torture victims’ eligibility for a duress defense. The inconsistency between the two establishes that at least one of them is false. Seeking to resolve the inconsistency, this Article considers several modifications of the empirical claim—including torture being merely generally ineffective or ineffective only under certain conditions—and alternative formulations of the duress defense. With none of these satisfactory, a dilemma arises: either close the door on torture victims’ eligibility for a duress defense (by maintaining torture’s ineffectiveness) or open the door on the permissibility of torture (by conceding torture’s effectiveness). Neither alternative may be palatable, but (to resolve the inconsistency) one must be chosen
The Sources and Consequences of Disputes over Contractual Meaning
Get PDFWith some frequency, parties agree to the particular words used in a contract they sign, only to later disagree as to the meaning of those words and their legal effect. That is, they each assent to something, but that “something” is something different for each of them. In this Article, I first categorize and trace the sources of recurring points of disagreement as a matter of language and linguistics. Then, I look at the consequences of a dispute that leads a fact finder to conclude that the parties genuinely did not agree to the same thing, which is to say that the meaning of the words they chose is indeterminant in the milieu of their “contract.” Finally, I situate the discussion in the context of dispute resolution and the procedural consequences of a finding that, in words or effect, “there was no agreement.
Getting to Green: International Financing for Green Energy Infrastructure in Developing Countries
Get PDFOne of the symposium panels discussed financing clean energy projects. One panelist in particular expressed concern about how to build developing countries’ institutional capacity to utilize international financing for green energy. Global institutions like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) provide loans to developing countries conditioned on the countries privatizing and deregulating their energy sectors—otherwise known as austerity. While austerity measures may make sense in developed countries, this Comment argues that developing countries often lack the infrastructure needed to effectively utilize international financing precisely because the loans are conditioned on austerity. The World Bank and the IMF should therefore change the conditions of their loans from privatization to public-sector investment in infrastructure. Amending the conditions for green energy loans would make privatization more feasible in the future and promote the transition to green energy in developing countries
Negotiating Police Reform
Get PDFIn the summer of 2020, after the murder of George Floyd, the national conversation around police reform intensified and was part of a conversation with students at Texas A&M University School of Law. Students wanted more discussion and teaching about police, police misconduct, police reform, and defunding the police. Following those discussions, I created a simulation on local level police reform that, as of this writing, I have used twice in my negotiation class. Simulations are helpful teaching tools in a variety of settings, including law schools. Simulations can be particularly useful to help students discuss difficult topics in different ways by putting students in roles that demand that they go beyond their own views and that they put themselves in the shoes of others. I wanted an exercise that would help students to discuss police reform, police funding, and the issues of race that are wrapped up in these topics in a different way. In this short essay, I will explain the simulation, how I have used it in class, how it can be used to stimulate discussion around police reform, and some of the lessons I have learned in terms of how to conduct and organize this simulation
Prudence, Role Morality, and Restraint: Judge Wilkinson on the Separation of Powers
Get PDFCaution in reviewing the actions of the legislative and executive branches has been a hallmark of the jurisprudence of Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III. The Constitution “at most gives judges specific authority to redress violations of specific provisions,” Judge Wilkinson writes in his book Cosmic Constitutional Theory. But even when doing so, “courts must exercise great caution before injecting themselves into the vortex of varied political questions,” for “[i]t is often far preferable to allow the political institutions under our Constitution to struggle among themselves, with each bringing to bear the respective arsenal of powers the Framers accorded them.” Three related features of the Judge’s jurisprudence stand out in his work on the separation of powers: prudence, role morality, and restraint
Walk Like the Bird Flies
No full textThese poems transport us from Texas desert landscapes to New England mountains to Adriatic tavernas, festivals, and landmarks, and at the same time they offer vivid confrontations with the elements of the natural world—mud, fire, water, forests, the wind that possibly “[carries] messages from beyond”—treating both foreign cities and nature’s manifestations as phenomena to observe and honor through the eyes of an estranged but receptive traveler. Susan Ayres fuses images from inner and outer landscapes, raising questions that can’t be answered and perspectives that can’t be contained but nevertheless offer sparks of revelation in poem after poem.
–Leslie Ullman, (The You That All Along Has Housed You and Library of Small Happiness)
“Listen to me as one listens to the rain,” Susan Ayres begins this incredible journey, because only when she listens to the rain can her imagination wander and guide us through a history and geography that is at once personal and cosmic in its reach. Indeed, she ends with a long poem that itself carries us from “from silkworms to / Skies.” But what is even more exciting, and so skillfully done, is the kind counterpointing that moves us from a medieval bridge in Slovenia to the American west to a contemporary beach to Led Zeppelin, a combination that requires great skill and vision. And skill and vision are what we have here, giving us a new sense and appreciation of our world, for Ayres has given us poetry’s version of Galileo’s Starry Messenger.
–Richard Jackson, Author of The World as Framed: New and Select Poem
Overlapping Intellectual Property Rights
No full textOverlapping Intellectual Property Rights provides a comprehensive analysis of the overlapping intellectual property (IP) rights across UK, US, and European law. Even though IP rights are mostly studied in isolation, multiple IP rights often overlap with respect to the same underlying subject matter. In practice, the legal categories created to protect IP rights only provide partial legal courage in the broader context of the aforementioned rights’ creation, usage, and implementation. Moreover, comparison tables of other countries’ IP rights showcase how the overlap of rights applies and differs in various legal jurisdictions. It considers discrete pairs of IP rights in correlation to a hypothetical scenario to analyse particular conceptual and practical issues
Keep Austin…White? How Equitable Development Can Save Austin, Texas from its Racist Past and Homogenized Future
Get PDFMore than a century of racist federal, state, and local government policies created inequitable and racially segregated neighborhoods through a practice known as redlining. I-35 in Austin, Texas, represents one of the most iconic and stark segregationist splits in the country, with the Eastside being impoverished and mostly Black while the Westside’s mostly White population thrives. As a result, Austin is the only fastest-growing city in the nation losing people of color. While there have been some private and local efforts in Austin and across the country to increase investment in marginalized and divested communities, most of these approaches are limited because they cannot combat the systemic practices that lead to this issue in the first place. Without acknowledging the intentional and racist policies that created this issue and using the same intentionalism to reverse this, policies will fail to reach the communities in most need of affordable housing and eventually drive all people of color out of metropolitan cities. Thus, to properly redevelop cities such as Austin equitably, federal, state, and local governments should create affordable homes and rental units with an intentional focus on targeting marginalized communities and those displaced from the city. This Article seeks to explore tools that will allow cities to accomplish this, with a particular focus on a solution tailored to Austin, Texas, in light of redlining’s history on the federal and local levels and the more recent history of failed reforms attempting to address this issue