MANDELA INSTITUTE WORKSHOPS

Using the World Trade Organisation Dispute Settlement System 13 and 14 September 2011
Burgers Park Hotel, Pretoria
The Mandela Institute at Wits School of Law, in conjunction with the Department of Trade and Industry and the World Trade Institute, will be holding a one and a half day workshop on the World Trade Organisation Dispute Settlement Understanding (WTO DSU).
Workshop topics will include:
Introduction to the DSU
The structure of states’ rights and obligations under WTO Agreements
WTO dispute settlement procedures (consultation, panels and appeals)
Use of the dispute settlement mechanism (as claimant, third party, respondent, amicus curiae)
Efficient and inefficient use of existing opportunities
Reforming the system to improve access
Enforceability of DSU outcomes
South African industry and the DSU
Positioning the South African government in relation to WTO claims
Case studies
Expert Speakers
David Unterhalter SC, WTO Appellate Body Member
Mustaqeem De Gama, Director ITED Legal International Trade and Investment, Department of Trade and Industry
Michael Hahn, Professor and Director of LLM Program in International and European Economic and Commercial Law, University of Lausanne, Switzerland
Lambert Botha, Director, Trade Law Chambers
Other speakers to be confirmed Dates and times: 13 September, 07h15 – 16h00 and 14 September, 09h00 – 13h30 Venue: Burgers Park Hotel, 424 Van der Walt Street (Cnr Minnaar Street), Pretoria Central Cost:

 Foreign Direct Investment – Southern African Needs and Systems 11 and 12 October 2011
Chalsty Teaching and Conference Centre, Wits School of Law, Johannesburg
A second workshop on Foreign Direct Investment – Southern African Needs and Systems will follow the WTO DSU workshop.
Workshop topics will include:
Trends in foreign direct investment (global, South African, case studies)
International investment policy and development
Trends in the evolution of investment rule-making: Bi-lateral investment agreements and investment chapters in regional trade agreements
Regulatory policy in South Africa in foreign direct investment
Dispute resolution options – policy and practice
Case studies in cross-border investment
Southern African developments
Drafting an investment act
Drafting a model investment treaty
Resolving investment disputes
Expert Speakers
Roberto Echandi, Director, Program on International Investment, World Trade Institute, University of Bern, Switzerland
Mustaqeem De Gama, Director ITED Legal International Trade and Investment, Department of Trade and Industry
Laurence Boulle, Issy Wolfson Professor of Law and Director, Mandela Institute, Wits School of Law
Stephen Gelb, Professor, University of Johannesburg and Executive Director, The EDGE Institute Dates and times: 11 October, 09h30 – 18h00 and 12 October, 08h30 – 13h00 Venue: Chalsty Teaching and Conference Centre, Wits School of Law, Johannesburg Cost: A small charge to be advised. Limited scholarships covering registration fee, airfare and accommodation, are available for SADC delegates. Motivation must be provided if applying for a scholarship. Registration: For further information and to book your place, please contact Julie Dunsford at the Mandela Institute, Wits School of Law on Julie.Dunsford@wits.ac.za or phone +27 11 7178468. WTO DSU workshop registration closing date is 8 September 2011 FDI- Southern African Needs and Systems workshop registration closing date is 6 October. There is no charge to attend the workshop. Limited scholarships, covering airfare, transport to and from Pretoria and accommodation, are available for SADC delegates. Motivation must be provided if applying for a scholarship.

Africa and International Law: Taking Stock and Moving Forward – April 13-14, 2012

Africa and International Law: Taking Stock and Moving Forward – April 13-14, 2012

Albany Law School: Call for Papers

Co-Sponsored by the African Interest Group of the American Society of International Law

Keynotes:
His Excellency Judge Abdul Koroma of the International Court of Justice
Dr. Willy Mutunga, Chief Justice and President of the Supreme Court of Kenya

Over the last several years, a dense network of treaties, conventions, protocols have been generated by a growing number of African international organizations. The growing number of international organizations include regional judiciaries, regional and continental wide organizations such as the African Union and the variety of regional economic communities. They cover a broad range of concerns including trade, security, common resources such as rivers and lakes, the environment and human rights.  The jurisprudence of the African Commission on Human and Peoples Rights has influenced civil society challenges of human rights and rule of law violations at the national level resulting in what some have referred to as ‘modest harvests.’ An entirely new generation of practitioners and scholars of international law has also emerged and international law has provided these experts, practitioners and scholars important normative guidance that has formed the basis of their interactions with African states at the national, regional and continental levels. In this sense, international law has gained increasing salience as a way of framing and responding to the challenges facing the African peoples and governments.

Even though international legal, institutional and professional growth has increased, many African governments have remained committed to their sovereignty and African leaders have largely escaped accountability under national and regional legal regimes. Accountability functions by international mechanisms such as the International Criminal Court (ICC) have not fared better. Africa’s relationship with these international legal regimes is complex – instead of confronting the culture of impunity through good faith investigations and prosecutions of those bearing the greatest responsibility for international crimes in Africa’s numerous post-Cold War conflicts, the African Union has more or less branded the ICC as nothing more than a new form of imperialism masquerading as international rule of law.

Further, there are already conflicts of obligations arising from the multiplicity of regional and international treaties. Thus, although only 31 of the 50 members of the African Union are concurrent Rome Statute and African Union members, the entire membership of the African Union has decided not to cooperate with the ICC. In the area of regional trade agreements, the problems arising from conflicting and overlapping memberships and treaty obligations are a well known problem.

A major objective of the conference will be to engage in a broad ranging conversation among scholars, practitioners and policy-makers to examine and evaluate how these international and regional regimes and institutions in Africa are producing new narratives of justice and how best they can make a real difference in responding to the challenges facing African peoples and governments.  

Abstracts and papers are invited on a broad range of themes including the French intervention in Cote D’Ivoire, the NATO/US allied action in Libya, the fledgling jurisprudence of regional integration tribunals as well as piracy trials being conducted under universal jurisdiction, the race for African resources by China and other countries. Thus, a broad range of themes from public to private international law, as well as international and regional economic and trade legal systems and policies will be explored at the conference and abstracts and papers are invited.

In addition, papers and abstracts are invited to examine one of the reigning paradigms of African international legal scholarship that has argued that Africa has been and continues to be an innovator and generator of institutions and rules of international law, rather than its passive recipient. Papers and abstracts examining the tenability of claims that Africa is wholly disadvantaged and ineffectual in regimes such as international arbitration and trade as well as the extent to which such regimes have reinforced Africa’s peripheral location in the international political economy are invited.

Selected papers presented at the conference will be published in the inaugural issue of a new international law journal which will serve as an authoritative mouthpiece of the African international law experience.  Please visit the conference website at www.albanylaw.edu/afintlaw.

Confirmed Participants Include:

Adama Dieng, Registrar of the ICC for Rwanda and United Nations Deputy Secretary General

Abstract Submission

Abstracts are due by September 30, 2011. Final Papers will be due on or before March 15, 2011.

All abstracts and final papers should be sent to: jgath@albanylaw.edu

Or by mail to:
Prof. James Gathii
Associate Dean for Research and Scholarship
Governor George E. Pataki Professor of International Commercial Law
Albany Law School
80 New Scotland Avenue
Albany, N.Y. 12208

Hotel Accommodations

Rooms have been reserved at the Hilton Garden Inn Albany Medical Center across from the law school on April 12-14 with check out Sunday April 15. These rooms are $99 per night. 
To receive the special rate, call 518-694-3806 or click here.

Address:
62 New Scotland Avenue,
Albany, New York, USA 12208
Tel:  1-518-396-3500
Fax:  1-518-396-3535  

Call for papers: FLACSO-WTO Chairs Award for young professors and researchers - Two prizes - US$1,000 and US$500 - Deadline October 3, 2011

An invitation from the Virtual Institute. Forwarded to you by one of its members.

I am pleased to forward this excellent opportunity for young professors and researchers on behalf of our Argentinian member university, the Latin American School of Social Sciences (FLACSO).
The general topic is developing countries and the WTO. Theoretical works as much as empirical or case studies are welcome. Papers and essays may deal with institutional and political aspects, as well as economic and social impacts of the multilateral trading system. Papers may be submitted in English, Spanish or Portuguese.
Prizes of US$1000 and US$500 will go to the two top papers.
More details may be found at the following links: English, Español, Português
Deadline for submissions is October 3. For further information, you may contact: catedraomc@flacso.org.ar
I hope you find this information useful, and that many of te Virtual Institute network's young lecturers and researchers will participate.
Best regards,
Susana Olivares
Virtual Institute
UNCTAD - United Nations Conference on Trade and Development
Division on Technology and Logistics
Knowledge Sharing, Training and Capacity Development Branch
Palais des Nations
1211 Geneva 10 - Switzerland
Phone: +41 22 917 5823 Fax: +41-22 917 0050
Web: http://vi.unctad.org

Raising the voice of Africa

We are a group of academics, practitioners and business people from all over the continent who are involved in the task of understanding the issues of International Economic Law from the African perspective.
Our goal is to play a role in the development of the Law and Policy making with significant outcomes in research and outputs in law and policy making.