Volume 4, Number 8
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Feminization of Poverty and Women's Leadership

Poverty is often the face of a woman. Rangita de Silva de Alwis, a member of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, hopes that this year’s meeting of the UN Commission on the Status of Women will help make women the face of anti-poverty solutions.

Volume 3, Number 24
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The Holding Foreign Companies Accountable Act: ...

Tamar Groswald Ozery argues that risks to investors may actually be worsened by US enforcement of the Holding Foreign Companies Accountable Act, which was enacted in the name of investor protection. Ozery describes the HFCA as part of a geopolitical agenda of decoupling, but says it is backfiring by enhancing the Chinese government’s control over Chinese issuers.

Volume 3, Number 20
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The High Price of Lying in US-China Relations

Following the recent Chinese balloon incident, both Washington and Beijing would do well to recall lessons from a failed CIA espionage mission in China 70 years ago, says Jerome A. Cohen. US refusal to acknowledge the CIA’s role resulted in its own agent, John T. Downey, spending almost 21 years in a Chinese prison. The most obvious lesson: how counterproductive it is for governments to engage in lying.

Volume 3, Number 19
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The Future of CEDAW

Rangita de Silva de Alwis, who joined the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women in January 2023, shares her vision for future development of the jurisprudence of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women.

Volume 3, Number 17
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In Search of a Rule of Law Model? Try Japan

A politicized judiciary is foundational to the US legal system, not aberrational. It is the reason I argue that -- constant preaching about the “rule of law” notwithstanding -- the US is a poor exemplar of it. Japan is a much better model.

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Reassessing Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge Tribunal

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On December 23, Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge Tribunal issued its final, written judgment in the case against Khieu Samphan, affirming his convictions for genocide, crimes against humanity, and other international crimes, as well as his life sentence. The judgment brought to a close the tribunal’s judicial proceedings and marked the improbable achievement of a measure of justice for the millions of victims of the Khmer Rouge regime. Unfortunately, a narrative has emerged among international human rights organizations and commentators that dismisses its achievements and focuses on its flaws.

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Adaptive Protection: Strengthening ASEAN’s Human Rights Regime through Scrutiny

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Human rights advocates frequently criticize the Association of Southeast Asian Nations for addressing human rights through soft rather than hard law mechanisms. Yet as ASEAN’s human rights system evolves, there are grounds for optimism that it is gradually developing scrutiny mechanisms that increase human rights protection.

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The Long Road to Ending Gendered Violence in China

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In June 2022, a group of men violently attacked four women at a barbecue restaurant in Tangshan, China, after one of the women rejected a pickup attempt. Video of the attack went viral. What happened next revealed the problem at the heart of gendered violence in China: instead of acknowledging the role gender played in the attack, authorities treated it as a case of gang criminality.

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Lessons from Toshiba: Corporate Governance in the Era of Activist Shareholders

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The most significant, long-running corporate governance scandal in the history of Japan may finally be coming to a head. Following a series of misdeeds and clashes with activist investors over the past seven years, Toshiba Corporation, an icon of the Japanese business establishment, is in negotiations to sell itself to a Japanese private equity fund.

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Decoding the Supreme People’s Court’s Services and Safeguards Opinions

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Over the past seven years, the Supreme People’s Court has issued almost 30 documents that contain the phrase “judicial services and safeguards.” These documents have received little attention but they represent what is becoming the SPC’s most important function in the Xi Jinping era: translating Chinese Communist Party policies into guidance for lower-level courts.

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Taiwan’s Citizen Judges Act: Part II

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Lay adjudication can give citizens a meaningful role in the administration of justice and may boost their confidence in the courts. However, the use of lay adjudication also may raise questions about the extent to which systems can deliver a fair trial and the safeguards needed to assure accused persons that the system of adjudication is independent and impartial.

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Taiwan’s Citizen Judges Act: Part I

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In 2020, after years of advocacy by judicial reformers, Taiwan’s legislature passed the Citizen Judges Act, providing for professional judges to share their benches - and their power - with lay judges in a relatively small subset of criminal cases. The law takes effect January 2023. USALI Perspectives invited six experts in Taiwan’s judicial system to unpack the practical challenges and potential larger significance of this seemingly small step.

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February 24: A Clarifying Moment for China’s Foreign Policy

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Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24 has abruptly propelled China much further down the path of policy confrontation with the US outside of Asia. Weakening Washington’s global leadership – specifically its sanctioning power and use of alliances to project power around the world – has become a new Chinese core interest.

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Hong Kong’s Rights Reckoning: What We Can Expect from the UN Human Rights Committee

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In July 2022, the UN Human Rights Committee will complete its first formal review of Hong Kong since the National Security Law (NSL) came into force in 2020. The review will be an important test of whether the local government still views the ICCPR as a meaningful constraint on its actions. It also will be a test of the efficacy of the UN human rights treaty-monitoring system.

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A Reputation Tarnished: Reflections on the Resignation of Overseas Judges from Hong Kong’s Court of Final Appeal

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Hong Kong has been privileged to have a panel of eminent overseas judges to serve as non-permanent judges of its Court of Final Appeal (CFA). The willingness of overseas judges to serve on the CFA was seen as a vote of confidence in the constitutional model of “One Country, Two Systems,” in which a common law legal system and its values were to be preserved within a socialist sovereign. Now two UK judges have resigned, expressly citing the National Security Law as the reason.

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Exonerating Those They Prosecuted: Prosecutorial Reforms in China, the US, and Taiwan

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Traditionally, prosecutors have focused on putting criminals in jail. That narrow focus is now broadening to some extent on both sides of the Pacific as prosecutors in China, Taiwan, and the United States give significant attention to redressing wrongful convictions. The following is a brief comparison of reform efforts in those three jurisdictions.

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Exploring the Social Role of Corporations in Asia-Pacific

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The genesis of this symposium was a straightforward question from a colleague at the U.S.-Asia Law Institute: What is the hottest topic today in corporate governance throughout Asia? To find out, I queried a group of colleagues from six Asia-Pacific countries who previously collaborated with me on a book on corporate governance in the region. The essentially unanimous answer was the social role of corporations, as exemplified by ESG—the environmental, social and governance factors related to a company’s business activities.

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When Judging Meets Development: Foreign Judges on Pacific Courts

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Pacific island states are unusual, but not alone, in relying on foreign judges to sit on their highest courts. This essay focuses on the intersection of foreign judging and overseas development assistance. Does the appointment of foreign judges undermine the very qualities of good governance and the rule of law that development agencies seek to promote?