This special issue contains several papers presented at a workshop held at Columbia Law School in May 2017, which brought together investment law scholars to consider the legal construction and protection of expectations as objects of property in varied contexts and areas of law, from federal land policy to international investment law.
A Fundamental Shift in Power: Permitting International Investors to Convert their Economic Expectations Into Rights
The article evaluates the doctrine of protecting investors’ specific-commitment backed-expectations. The author argues that the doctrine has shaky legal foundations and raises fundamental policy concerns. It affects the rules and processes governing allocation of property rights, can exacerbate inequality, and can send wrong signals to investors regarding responsible business conduct.
Episode 3.7: Threats to the Constitutional Order
In this episode, we sit down with Professors Aziz Huq, Tom Ginsburg and Lawrence Sager to discuss threats to constitutional democracy and how well America’s constitutional democracy might fare in the face of those threats.
Episode 3.6: Excessive Fines and Fees and the Right to Counsel with Professor Beth Colgan
In this episode, we sit down with Professor Colgan to discuss how the Eighth Amendment's prohibition against excessive fines and fees and the Sixth Amendment's Right to Counsel fail to protect vulnerable segments of the population.
Episode 3.4: Hackers & Cybersecurity Law: How Hackers, Governments and Corporations Make Surprising Bedfellows with Professor Kristen Eichensehr
In this episode, we sit down with Professor Eichensehr to discuss the ways in which governments, corporations and hackers navigate cybersecurity law and the surprising ways in which they collaborate to their mutual benefit.
Squeeze Blood From Turnip®: Abusing Trademark Law’s Morality Provision in the TTAB
The “Morality Provision” of trademark law prohibits the registration of trademarks that are immoral or scandalous. This essay exposes how the Morality Provision is abused by individuals who do not have any real interest in the proposed trademark, but who morally disapprove of the trademark owner or its commercial activities.
Episode 3.3: Law and Disorder, Part II: Exploring DACA and Its Rescission with Professor Hiroshi Motomura
In this episode, we sit down with UCLA immigration law Professor Hiroshi Motomura to talk about DACA's legal underpinnings as well as the Trump Administration's decision to do away with the Obama-era policy.
Auctions, Taxes, and Air
In recent California litigation, a California Court of Appeals held that California’s greenhouse gas emissions auction was not a form of taxation. This article argues that the court reached the right result. Like the government's sale of any other public resource, emissions auction should not be considered a form of taxation.