Stand-Alone Posts

This symposium organized by the AfronomicsLaw with the assistance of Monica Victor focuses on the synergies between taxation and the digital economy in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Although the use of the plural on ‘provisions’, in the Transparency Mechanism could also be interpreted as meaning notification under GATT Article XXIV (for RTAs in goods) and GATS Article V (for RTAs in services) only, it remains an open question. Consequently, notification of the Protocol on Trade in Goods of the AfCFTA under both routes (GATT Article XXIV and Enabling Clause) would come as no surprise despite the dubious legality of such a practice.

This webinar is a follow-up to the recently concluded Taxation and the Social Contract in a Post-Pandemic Era: Domestic and International Dimensions Symposium which had 20 blog submissions. The Webinar panelists will deliberate on the following questions: has the social contract between the state and the governed in many states been broken? Can the broken social contract be repaired and what role can the law play in repairing the broken social contract? How should countries reform their tax law and policies to be self-sufficient, while ensuring representation and accountability? What is the role of international tax rules in national sufficiency and how should international tax rules be designed in light of fiscal sovereignty and equity?”

World Trade Organization (WTO) member states are moving towards increased reliance on renewable energy and are enacting domestic policies to encourage investment in renewable energy technology. These domestic policies have not escaped the scrutiny of other WTO members, who in some cases have commenced dispute resolution processes to resolve claims of non-compliance with WTO Agreements. This commentary discusses relevant decisions of the WTO dispute resolution bodies and the possible effect of these decisions on renewable energy in Africa.

From a human rights perspective, ‘a new normal’ like COVID-19 should generate tremendous change.  It is important that, in the midst of this crisis, we keep an eye on the future and begin to forge a better Nigeria that works for our vulnerable and marginalised citizens. Although we are uncertain of how the post- COVID-19 world will look like, our aim is to come out of it stronger and united.

Our ethical conundrum as we think about issues of global distributive justice in the post-pandemic era is that social contract theory fails to provide an adequate framework for conceptualizing duties and obligations of international organizations to individuals, as opposed simply to their member states. The tension comes from the fact that people intuitively have a sense of justice which is offended by the manner in which power is wielded by those at the helm of the global financial order to place the interests of international organizations, banks, and multinational corporations over and above those of individual human beings, particularly those at the margins of the world economy.

This blog aims to present some of the challenges being faced within Africa’s trade landscape and some of the workable policy instruments for overcoming these barriers in the digital post-COVID-19 age. In other words, the broad objective is to propose innovative solutions for enhancing post-COVID-19 economic resilience across businesses and households in a sustainable fashion.

The ongoing negotiation of a business and human rights treaty represents without a doubt a complex political and legal challenge, where diverse aspects – economic, diplomatic and juridical– must be agreed upon between negotiating States with very different geopolitical positions. Despite the realpolitik involved, this process presents an opportunity to refineand reinforce State obligations vis-à-vis the domestic regulation of business activities, as well as to improve access to justice for victims of transnational corporate human rights abuses.

This contribution highlights two points made in the latest report of the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights on Business and Human Rights (2019), which, in the future, might well transcend the debate in the Americas: the clear definition of a State obligation to regulate enterprise due diligence in national law, creating an indirectly binding natureof the until now voluntary Pillar II of the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, and the insufficiency of adopting public policies (without regulation) on the matter to comply with that obligation, risking to be found acquiescent in business behavior that violates human rights.

The purpose of this post is to examine the concept of due diligence.  By building on a notion common to the fields of corporate law and human rights law, due diligence became a bridge for the business and human rights (BHR). In order to meet with the expectations from victims of corporate abuses, a BHR due diligence must develop its proper concept, particularly in the field of reparations and access to remedies.