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.

Taxing Tech: The Future of Digital Taxation

Abstract: In recent months, France and the United Kingdom have announced new taxes that are designed to target large multinational tech companies. In response, the United States has threatened trade sanctions. This article introduces the larger context of this controversy. The French and UK taxes are merely two examples of a much larger trend that has been taking place over the last several years, with countries around the world designing tax measures to target the so-called “digital economy” without ever determining what the digital economy is or how it differs from the rest of the economy. This article argues that, despite the many differences between the dozens of digital tax measures proposed or implemented over the past decade, two fundamental similarities link them together. First, all of these measures illustrate that countries believe that the current international tax system, which was designed in the 1920s under the auspices of the League of Nations, is outdated and needs to be reformed. Second, these digital tax measures focus on three elements of the existing system that countries believe need to be reformed: the physical presence requirement, the low tax rates available in some countries, and the ability of multinationals in particular to earn income without having a physical presence or to shift income to low-tax jurisdictions. Given these areas of agreement, this article considers the likelihood of countries reaching an international solution. This article acknowledges that an effective international solution—where countries agree to the necessary technical details and not just to high-level principles—faces serious challenges given that many countries now benefit from the current system. This article concludes that, if countries cannot agree to real international reform, then the international tax system will face many more years of countries imposing a cascade of inconsistent and overlapping digital tax measures on tech companies.

The Challenges of Prediction: Lessons from Criminal Justice

Abstract: Government authorities at all levels increasingly rely on automated predictions, grounded in statistical patterns, to shape people’s lives. Software that wields government power deserves special attention, particularly when it uses historical data to decide automatically what ought to happen next. In this article, I draw examples primarily from the domain of criminal justice — and in particular, the intersection of civil rights and criminal justice — to illustrate three structural challenges that can arise whenever law or public policy contemplates adopting predictive analytics as a tool: 1) What matters versus what the data measure; 2) Current goals versus historical patterns; and 3) Public authority versus private expertise. After explaining each of these challenges and illustrating each with concrete examples, I describe feasible ways to avoid these problems and to do prediction more successfully.

The New Refugees and the Old Treaty: Persecutors and Persecuted in the Twenty-First Century

Abstract: When the fledgling U.N. negotiated a treaty to protect refugees after the Second World War, member states focused on Europe as well as on events causing forced migration that occurred prior to 1951. No one imagined that cross-border escape from persecution would become a global phenomenon and remain one more than sixty years later, or that this human rights treaty would be needed in the twenty-first century. In fact, as increased numbers of asylum seekers from developing countries reached the most developed regions of the world during the last thirty years, critics have questioned the merits of this treaty and argued that the Refugee Convention has become outmoded and obsolete. This Article considers how well-suited this treaty is for the protection of refugees fleeing persecution in today’s world. The author first looks at how the nature of the state itself has evolved and finds that too many governments today fail at providing significant portions of their citizenry with the most basic level of human security. A new cast of persecutors apart from the state now exerts authority and power in such societies, targeting particular societal groups using new forms of persecution. Examining how states have adapted this multilateral agreement to these changing circumstances, the author finds that this treaty continues to be vital in protecting the human rights of refugees thanks to two important treaty elements: a clear and fundamental purpose to protect individuals whose governments have been unwilling or unable to do so, and flexible terms that have enabled jurists and government officials to adapt the refugee definition to the changing nature of forced migration. Accordingly, the author’s analysis confirms the conclusion of the International Law Commission Special Rapporteur on Treaties over Time that “subsequent practice by the parties may guide an evolutive interpretation of a treaty.”

Competition policy for global markers

Abstract: Proposals for international action on competition policy respond to four problems: increasing transnational anti-competitive activity outside control of any single nation, enforcement conflicts, market access problems, and unnecessary costs of compliance with multiple national regimes. All four are real, but limited, problems, though transnational anti-competitive activity could be very significant in the future. A competition code in the WTO would process competition problems principally as market access problems. The resulting arrangement would address market access issues imperfectly, and the other three problems not at all. International initiatives in this area must facilitate cooperation among competition authorities. The best approach is to pursue a mix of bilateral, OECD, and WTO initiatives which places protection of consumers from anti-competitive activities at the center of international efforts. Copyright 1999 by Oxford University Press.

A policy analysis of funding for ambitious interventional gerontology: the possibility of rejuvenation research at the National Institute on Aging.

Abstract: Issues related to the development of ambitious interventional gerontology-rejuvenation research-at the National Institute on Aging (NIA) within the National Institutes of Health (NIH) are discussed. Creating a separate branch for rejuvenation research within the NIA is probably neither feasible nor desirable at this time. However, it may be both feasible and desirable to begin rejuvenation research by establishing a bioengineering laboratory offering technologies that complement the disease-orientated focus of other NIA intramural laboratories. Such a bioengineering lab could use modern engineering tools for cell and gene therapies to uncover mechanisms of aging and to attempt to repair age-associated pathogenic damage. It is argued that, even in the absence of a full understanding of the complex causes and manifestations of human aging, interventional bioengineering could create methods for reversing aging processes. Exploring technical interventions may both reverse aging processes and significantly advance current disease-specific research.