Georgetown University Law Center

About: Georgetown University Law Center is a based out in . It is known for research contribution in the topics: Supreme court & Global health. The organization has 585 authors who have published 2488 publications receiving 36650 citations. The organization is also known as: Georgetown Law & GULC.

Resolving Malpractice Claims after Tort Reform: Experience in a Self-Insured Texas Public Academic Health System.

Abstract: Objective To describe the litigation experience in a state with strict tort reform of a large public university health system that has committed to transparency with patients and families in resolving medical errors. Data Sources/Study Setting Secondary data collected from The University of Texas System, which self-insures approximately 6,000 physicians at six health campuses across the state. We obtained internal case management data for all medical malpractice claims closed during 1 year before and 6 recent years following the enactment of state tort reform legislation. Study Design We retrospectively reviewed information about malpractice claimants, malpractice claims, and the process and outcome of dispute resolution. Data Collection/Extraction Methods We accessed an internal case management database, supplemented by both electronic and paper records compiled by the university's Office of General Counsel. Principal Findings Closed claims dropped from 244 in 2001–2002 to an annual mean of 96 in 2009–2015, closures following lawsuits from 136 in 2001–2002 to an annual mean of 28 in 2009–2015, and paid claims from 60 in 2001 to an annual mean of 20 in 2009–2015. Patterns of resolution suggest efforts by the university to provide some compensation to injured patients in cases that were no longer economically viable for plaintiffs’ lawyers to litigate. The percentage of payments relating to cases in which lawsuits had been filed decreased from 82 percent in 2001–2002 to 47 percent in 2009–2012 and again to 29 percent in 2012–2015, although most paid claimants were represented by attorneys. Unrepresented patients received payment in 13 cases closed in 2009–2012 (22 percent of payments; mean amount $60,566) and in 24 cases closed in 2012–2015 (41 percent of payments; mean amount $109,410). Even after tort reform, however, claims that resulted in payment remained slow to resolve, which was worsened for claimants subject to Medicare secondary payer rules. Strict confidentiality became a more common condition of settlement, although restrictions were subsequently relaxed in order to further transparency and improve patient safety. Conclusions Malpractice litigation risk diminished substantially for a public university health system in Texas following legal changes that reduced rights to sue and available damages. Health systems operating in a low-tort environment should work with policy makers, plaintiffs’ attorneys, and patient groups to assist unrepresented patients, facilitate early mediation, limit nondisclosure obligations following settlement, and expedite the resolution of Medicare liens.

The African Continental Free Trade Area: Toward a New Legal Model for Trade and Development

Abstract: International trade law is at a turning point, and the rules as we know them are being broken, rewritten, and reshaped at all levels. At the same time that institutions like the World Trade Organization (WTO) face significant change and a global pandemic challenges the rules of the market, Africa’s new mega-regional trade agreement, the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), is emerging as a promising framework for redesigning international economic law. As this Article will argue, the AfCFTA presents a new normative approach to trade and development that is positioned to rewrite the rules in a more inclusive and equitable way and, over time, possibly affect global trade well beyond the African continent. Historically, trade and development have been linked through the framework of Special and Differential Treatment (S&D), which has been a central feature of the WTO and is increasingly shaping regional trade agreements (RTAs) as well. Although the connection between trade and development is more important than ever before, traditional S&D is not positioned to deliver on broader priorities of social and economic development in the current international climate. Fortunately, as this Article will argue, Africa’s approach under the new AfCFTA sets the stage for a needed refresh of S&D. While the AfCFTA incorporates traditional aspects of S&D, it also includes elements of a forward-looking, rules-based approach to further economic and social development, advancing the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This new dimension of S&D holds great potential for promoting integration through trade, representing the needs of a diverse group of countries in the rulemaking process, and reshaping international economic law more broadly to generate positive development outcomes. This Article begins with an assessment of the AfCFTA as an alternative model for trade and development law, evaluating the agreement in the historical and evolving context of S&D and examining its role in shaping a new normative approach to S&D. The AfCFTA, we argue, represents a shift from using S&D as a largely defensive trade approach to one that positions S&D as an affirmative tool for achieving sustainable development through the design and implementation of the rules of trade themselves, while still maintaining flexibility for countries that need it. This new approach may finally replace the old trade paradigm of the ”haves and have nots” with a system in which trade rules can be designed to benefit all. Although the AfCFTA is still at an early stage and will have to overcome formidable challenges, this Article provides an initial assessment of the AfCFTA’s proactive new model in the context of the substantive areas of law identified as next-stage (Phase II) negotiating priorities: intellectual property rights (IPR), investment, and competition law. The Article’s comparative assessment draws upon the laws of African nations, African and international RTAs, and other proposals for international legal reform. Finally, the Article looks to the future, positing that the AfCFTA could be the best legal instrument available to break the stalemate in international rulemaking, design new trade law approaches to pressing issues like global health and food security, and close the loop between trade rules and development goals, including the seventeen SDGs. As the AfCFTA is rolled out and implemented, it could have a profound impact on trade and development law, reshaping the rules for Africa and perhaps the world as well.

Taming the Animal Spirits of the Stock Markets: A Behavioral Approach to Securities Regulation

Abstract: Recent advances in behavioral finance and economics have offered fascinating, albeit tentative, suggestions that may be useful to securities law policy-makers, especially in the aftermath of Enron and similar scandals. Because of the tentative nature of the findings, however, strong incorporation seems premature. After reviewing some of the literature, I look at three different problem areas - internet fraud, selective disclosure and the measurement of damages in class actions - where this literature might at least provoke creative ideas on how to respond, even if it doesn't generate a clear-cut solution.

The economist and the enlightenment: how Cesare Beccaria changed Western civilization

Abstract: This Article traces the influence of Cesare Beccaria’s writings on Western civilization. It explores the global impact of Beccaria’s 1764 book, Dei delitti e delle pene, later translated into English as An Essay on Crimes and Punishments. In particular, the Article highlights Beccaria’s advocacy for proportion between crimes and punishments and against the death penalty. The Article gives a short sketch of Beccaria’s life and describes the impact of Beccaria’s book and his legacy in shaping the world’s laws. The Article further describes how Beccaria’s role as an influential eighteenth-century economist has been neglected by some economic historians.

The Idea of Humanity: Human Rights and Immigrants' Rights

Abstract: This essay asks whether international human rights arguments are likely to be effective in advancing immigrants' rights in the United States. There are certainly reasons to be pessimistic. Despite its history as a nation of immigrants and the ever-increasing diversity of its populace, the United States remains a deeply parochial and nationalist culture. International human rights arguments are often seen as the advocates' last refuge. In the absence of an international forum that can hold the United States accountable, and in the face of Congressional directives that the international human rights treaties it has ratified are not self-executing, international human rights often seem only aspirational. International human rights arguments are rarely advanced in domestic U.S. courts, where they are broached, they are as often as not ignored or dismissed. Yet there are also reasons to be hopeful about the potential for advancing immigrants' rights through international human rights. Human rights are just that - human rights - and therefore generally do not acknowledge distinctions in fundamental rights between citizens and noncitizens. Human rights offers a common language and standard for global pressure. And international law has always been an integral part of immigration law. Accordingly, human rights discourse offers tremendous normative power and potential for advancing social justice on behalf of foreign nationals in the United States. Analogizing to the New Deal revolution in the role of the federal government vis-a-vis the economy and rights protection, this essay argues that we may be living in a similar global revolution marked by the simultaneous rise of a global economy and an international human rights regime. I propose a three-pronged strategy: advancing modest claims of statutory construction and constitutional interpretation in the courts; advocating more expansive conceptions of international human rights in the political and popular realms; and pushing for the creation of institutions and processes to bring international human rights considerations into domestic policymaking at the outset, before disputes arise.