Institute for International Law and Justice co-hosts Beijing conference

“Law Issues in the Process of Globalization: Globalization & Legal Governance," co-sponsored by the Institute for International Law and Justice (IILJ), the Tsinghua University Law School, and the International Development Research Centre of Canada, was held on the Beijing campus of Tsinghua University last month. Six faculty members from New York University School of Law joined colleagues from eight other nations for a wide-ranging discussion of complex issues such as worldwide commerce and environmental regulation, as well as the economic effects of global warming.

As host country, China was a special focus of the conference, according to Rochelle Dreyfuss, Pauline Newman Professor of Law, who presented a paper on intellectual property. “China is an emerging innovator," she said, "so we're all interested in how the country will develop as such—and how it will treat innovations from other countries.”

Other scholars from NYU Law participating included Global Professor of Law Simon Chesterman, director of NYU Law’s Singapore Program; renowned China expert Professor Jerome Cohen; Kevin Davis, Beller Family Professor of Business Law; Benedict Kingsbury, Murry and Ida Becker Professor of Law and director of the IILJ; and Richard Stewart, John Edward Sexton Professor of Law, chair and faculty director of the Hauser Global Law School Program, and director of the Frank J. Guarini Center for Environmental and Land Use Law. They presented papers on climate change, capital development, sovereign wealth funds, and international trade. Their Chinese counterparts also examined matters such as regulatory and institutional reform and trade protectionism in the context of the global administrative law framework. Further perspectives were provided by law professors from Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Italy, India and South Africa, who were present in Beijing also for the concurrent launch of the first stage of the Law School's Global Partners Initiative. Supported generously by the Candian-based International Development Research Center, these scholars have now embarked upon significant research collaboration that will focus on topics in global governance of great significance for the developing world. The conference was organized by Fan Yunpeng (LL.M. '08).

Posted on June 8, 2009