Bibliographie sélective OHADA

La intención de esta investigación, es realizar un breve análisis de las ventajas y desventajas que representa, la inclusión en los contratos comerciales, de una cláusula contractual que prevea la resolución de los posibles conflictos que pudiera suscitarse entre las partes, con la interpretación o el cumplimiento del contrato, a través de un ADR, que vincule en un solo proceso a la mediación y al arbitraje (Cláusula Med-Arb). Lo anterior, se pretende verificar a la luz de las disposiciones emitidas por los principales organismos en el comercio internacional, y su perspectiva de aplicación en el Derecho Español.

Los paraísos fiscales son territorios que se caracterizan por tener una baja o nula imposición a determinados vehículos para canalizar inversiones, tener una atractiva legislación comercial y financiera, así como otorgar una confidencialidad a los inversionistas. Sin embargo, legislaciones como la peruana y la española, regulan diversos aspectos de las inversiones realizadas a través de estos territorios o de las operaciones que la empresas locales realizan con residentes de dichos territorios; es decir, desarrollan normas defensivas “anti paraíso” para evitar perjudicar su recaudación tributaria ante el uso de dicho vehículos. Estas normas parten por la difícil tarea de definir qué países o territorios son considerados paraísos fiscales para esta legislación, lo que en sí mismo es una labor compleja por la multiplicidad de criterios utilizados para tal fin, como el uso de tasas referenciales o listados. Incluso en el caso de listados que enumeran las jurisdicciones que se considerarán paraísos fiscales, encontramos variaciones ya que las cifras varían en cada ordenamiento. Así, la legislación peruana sólo identifica 43 paraísos fiscale y la legislación española 33. Una vez que la legislación pasa por la tarea de identificarlos, la segunda etapa consiste en la regulación de normas que previenen los principales usos de los paraísos fiscales: a) Domicilios de conveniencia, b) Sociedades Instrumentales, c) Sociedades Base y las d) Sociedades de servicios. Los paraísos fiscales tienen sus antecedentes más próximos en la segunda mitad del siglo XX. Su notoriedad y crecimiento obedece al desarrollo industrial y económico que se producen después de la Segunda Guerra Mundial así como al proceso de independización de colonias que se encontraban como nuevos Estados en la búsqueda de la atracción de capital extranjero. Actualmente a ello se le suma, entre otros aspectos, la globalización que ubica a los paraísos fiscales en una sociedad de la tecnología e información. Así, en un contexto cada vez más globalizado, los territorios de baja o nula imposición se convierten en una alternativa para optimizar los flujos de la empresa, no sólo por los beneficios fiscales que otorga a la inversión extranjera, sino además, porque ofrecen facilidades financieros, económicas y practicidad en las operaciones. Asimismo, ante estas alternativas se produce también el endurecimiento de las normas frente a las operaciones con paraísos fiscales por lo que se hace imperioso tener claras las características, ventajas y desventajas de este instrumento de planificación tributaria. Bajo la premisa propuesta se hace necesario identificar, las contingencias que podrían derivarse de su utilización e implementación, considerando la creciente regulación anti-paraíso. A través de esta investigación, analizaremos la figura de los paraísos fiscales como una herramienta legal en el Planeamiento Tributario Internacional, cuya utilización dependerá de los inversionistas que estructuren un correcto planeamiento a través de la utilización de estos territorios, la cual es una actividad lícita si se cumplen con los requisitos y condiciones establecidas para su constitución y operatividad. El Planeamiento Tributario, al constituir una estrategia para aminorar la carga tributaria, puede contar con la utilización de estos territorios, asumiendo las consecuencias legales que imponga el país de residencia, ponderando estas restricciones con los beneficios que se obtendrán por invertir en países con una imposición muy baja. En ese contexto, con la elaboración de esta tesis se busca graficar las características de los paraísos fiscales, los principales mecanismos de utilización de estos; así como las medidas anti – paraíso fiscal; igualmente consideramos relevante indicar la proyección del uso de paraísos fiscales de Centroamérica y El Caribe; todo ello a fin de hacer más eficiente su utilización en el empresariado mediante proyectados de los beneficios y riesgos de su uso.

La notion de principe directeur est apparue en procédure civile il y a une quarantaine d’années et sert depuis de guide établissant les garanties fondamentales de bonne justice dans le procès civil. Elle s’est, ensuite, implantée en matière administrative et pénale. Un engouement pour cette notion l'a fait apparaître récemment en droit des contrats à un double niveau : au plan interne tout d'abord, depuis 2008, les différents projets de réforme du droit des contrats innovent par la création d’une nouvelle catégorie juridique, les principes directeurs. En fonction des projets, il est proposé d’intégrer dans cette catégorie la liberté contractuelle, la force obligatoire, la bonne foi, la cohérence. Au plan européen ensuite, les autorités bruxelloises s'interrogent, depuis un certain temps, sur l'opportunité de l'élaboration d'un droit européen des contrats commun à tous les États Membres. À cet effet, on retrouve des principes directeurs dans divers textes, codifications savantes et propositions à venir. Dès lors, ce concept a suscité un grand intérêt et les commentateurs ont majoritairement porté un regard très critique sur cette éventuelle introduction. Plus rarement, cette dernière a provoqué une certaine approbation. L’objet de la recherche consiste donc à approfondir le concept de principes directeurs du droit des contrats car après les premières questions liées à la curiosité scientifique doivent venir les recherches portant sur la science des principes directeurs du droit des contrats. Et si la notion est aujourd’hui fréquemment utilisée, son concept demeure énigmatique, aucun consensus ne s’étant opéré sur le sens même à lui donner et sur ses effets. La notion présente donc de nombreuses zones d’ombres qu’il faudra révéler, d’autant plus, qu’après de multiples résistances du Sénat, la loi du 16 février 2015 a habilité le gouvernement à réformer le droit des contrats par la voie de l’ordonnance. Or, les derniers projets reconnaissent des principes directeurs, il est donc temps d'apprécier la notion et ses effets potentiels.

Jurisprudence

Ce travail étudie, théoriquement et empiriquement, l'interaction entre le commerce international et l'investissement direct étranger (IDE), interaction qui a été un des principaux canaux de la mondialisation économique et de l'essor des chaînes de valeur mondiales dans la segmentation des activités de production. Les modèles théoriques montrent que le commerce international et les IDE peuvent se développer dans une relation de substituabilité ou de complémentarité. La nature de cette relation peut être la conséquence de facteurs exogènes, déterminants de la spécialisation des pays, ou le résultat de la stratégie endogène des firmes dans l'organisation de leurs activités à l'international. La validation empirique s'appuie sur une adaptation du modèle de gravité, en appliquant les techniques économétrique sur données de panel sur des données bilatérales pour la France au cours de la période de 1993 à 2012. Les estimations mettent en évidence une relation de complémentarité entre le commerce et l'IDE au niveau le plus agrégé. Cependant, une analyse comparative à un niveau plus désagrégé permet de trouver des indices de substituabilité et de complémentarité selon les groupes de pays partenaires.

La fausse qualification de «moyen de défense» attribuée par tradition à l'exception de procédure a conduit le législateur à la soumettre à un régime totalement incohérent et inadapté. L'illustration en est donné par l'échec constaté de l'exclusivité de compétence attribuée au juge de la mise état sur les exceptions de procédure, échec se matérialisant par les nombreuses dérogations que ne cesse d'apporter la jurisprudence à leur régime. Elle se traduit aussi par la quasi-impossibilité pour le demandeur à l'action principale de s'en prévaloir, ce en totale contradiction avec l'esprit des textes. Cette incohérence est illustrée enfin par les confusions opportunistes entre exception de procédure, fin de non-recevoir, incident et défense au fond. L'exception de procédure n'est pas un moyen de défense mais une demande incidente relative à la marche de la procédure qui en termes d'ordre logique doit être examinée par préalable au fond. Elle n'intéresse donc que les rapports procéduraux c'est-à-dire l'instance dont l'ouverture et la conduite aux termes des articles 1 et 2 du Code de procédure civile appartiennent aux parties. La classification et le régime des exceptions de procédure doivent en tenir compte. Il faut donc distinguer les exceptions de procédure opposées à l'ouverture de l'instance de celles qui sont opposées à sa continuation. Seules les premières doivent relever de la compétence exclusive du juge de la mise en état de qui on doit réussir à faire un véritable juge de l'introduction de l'instance. Les exceptions de procédure opposées à la continuation, par contre, doivent pouvoir être proposées au fur et à mesure de leur survenance ou de leur révélation sauf la possibilité pour le juge de les écarter ou de prononcer des condamnations pécuniaires à l'encontre de la partie qui se serait abstenue dans une intention dilatoire ou abusive de les soulever plus tôt.

Management accounting information should aid management in the design and implementation of strategy. Firms adopting a customer-focused strategy need customer accounting (CA) metrics. Yet accounting literature provides limited insights into what CA metrics are used, how they are used, or what factors influence CA measure choice or hinder more widespread adoption of CA practices. This thesis enhances knowledge of actual CA practices as they operate in firms with a customer-focused strategy and uses contingency theory to explain the choice of CA practices and their use in three exploratory case studies consisting of two national banks and a global courier company. The two strategic business units in Alphabank employ locally-developed, activity-based costing systems to produce CA information. Personal Banking incorporates a ‘customer needs met’ variable into a customer lifetime value measure used to segment customers based on potential profitability. Business Banking is smaller and currently uses historical customer profitability analysis at the individual customer level. Despite Alphabank’s overall customer-focused strategy, only product profitability is reported at executive level, and tensions between finance and operations potentially hinder more widespread CA usage. Betabank offers excellent customer service, but despite being very customer-focused they do not measure customer profitability. Executives use predominantly aggregate financial figures with a focus on net interest margin. Service excellence is paramount and Betabank do not consider financial CA useful as they do not segment customers. However, they extensively use non-financial customer related measures to monitor excellent customer service provision in order to enhance future profitability. The courier company uses activity-based costing to produce historical customer profitability analysis which reports direct margin, gross margin and earnings before interest and tax. The analysis discloses significant profitability differences between customer segments, and even between individual customers within segments where customer relationship management is employed. They do not measure full customer lifetime value but the next year’s customer profitability can be modelled using historical cost drivers. Financial CA measures drive initiatives to enhance customer profitability and/or trigger price negotiations. Non-financial CA measures are used to drive the customer-focused strategy and enhance profitability. The three cases demonstrate a considerable diversity in their usage of financial CA practices, with Betabank choosing to use no financial CA at all. Competitive intensity and the use of customer relationship management are found to be key drivers of CA usage at the individual customer level. Segmental customer profitability analysis is used when a large number of customers receive standard services at standard prices. No individual customer profitability analysis is needed for such homogenous customers as they can be efficiently managed using revenue. Non-financial CA measures were found to be widely used and hence a key contribution of this study is that in practice customer-related, non-financial performance measures are a key component of CA practices and may be extensively used to drive a customer-focused strategy. From case analysis a contingency-based framework has been develop which identifies combinations of factors with strong interrelationships and common influences on the choice and usage of CA measures. This framework provides three main groupings of contingent factors (type of competitive advantage, level of customer heterogeneity, and stage of organisational development) which together potentially have strong predictive power in relation to the nature of CA measures which benefit firms with a customer-focused strategy.

This study investigates whether there is a relationship between corporate governance and derivatives, whether corporate governance influence in firms impacts the association between derivatives and firm value, and whether corporate governance influence affects the association between derivatives and cash flow volatility, stock return volatility and market risk. This study uses two different data samples of publicly traded firms listed on the New York Stock Exchange. The first sample comprises a panel of 6900 firm year observations and the other consists of a panel of 6234 firm year observations both over the eight-year period from 2004-2011. With regard to whether there is a relationship between corporate governance and derivatives, the findings from the empirical results show that corporate governance does influence derivatives and therefore is an important determinant in the firm’s decisions to use derivatives. Of the thirteen corporate governance variables examined, board size, institutional shareholders, CEO age, CEO bonus, CEO salary, insider shareholders and total CEO compensation show significant association with derivatives. This study finds that derivative users exhibit higher firm value on account of the corporate governance influence, which is correspondingly largely insignificant for derivative non-users. Further the research indicates that the impact of corporate governance varies according to the different types of risks examined. Generally, the board of directors and CEO governance mechanisms reduce stock return volatility to achieve hedging effectiveness. This supports the view that directors and management take actions to reduce stock return volatility to protect their personal portfolios without having to bear the costs of hedging themselves. With respect to cash flow volatility, the board of directors and CEO related corporate governance mechanisms largely exhibit increased risk to show evidence of speculative behavior. It supports the perceptions that managers and directors have a strong motivation to show higher earnings to protect jobs and reputation and to enhance compensation. All the shareholder governance mechanisms encourage risk taking with respect to stock return volatility, without any increase in firm value. This is in line with research findings of market granularity by institutional and other larger block holders to indicate that these investors increase stock price volatilities and play the markets for their own financial gain. Besides they have little interest in diversifying firm risk as they already have well protected portfolios and would not want to incur additional costs of hedging. The study finds evidence of association between corporate governance and hedging, speculation and selective hedging. Of the thirteen corporate governance variables examined in the study board diversity consistently shows hedging effectiveness, with accompanying increase in firm value. While board meetings, institutional shareholders, block shareholders, CEO age, CEO base salary and CEO compensation exhibit exclusive speculative behavior. The remaining corporate governance mechanisms: board size, insider shareholding, CEO tenure, CEO bonus and audit committee size, show evidence of selective hedging behavior. The concurrent hedging and speculative behavior evidenced in this study supports literature in respect of selective hedging by non-financial firms. It also validates the idea that corporate governance delves in risk allocation strategies that have been evidenced by past research. The results remain unchanged, after using alternative measures for firm value and firm risk, and alternative methods of analyses.

This thesis is a policy-based study of the regulation of agency work in South Africa. It is set against the contextual background of a recent legislative overhaul and an increase in the number of precarious workers. The study aims to appraise the extent to which the South African regulatory framework complies with international norms in respect of agency work. The research considers how German and Namibian regulation might improve the current model of the regulation of agency work in South Africa. The study identifies the purpose of labour law in South Africa as offering diversified rights as well as being economic in nature. The premise upon which the thesis is based is a social justice approach to the function of labour law. An analysis of ILO and EU regulations on agency work is conducted, and identifies a combined list of norms in respect of the protection of agency workers. South Africa?s labour law policy approach is explored together with the amended regulation on agency work. A comparison is drawn with foreign countries? regulations and policy approaches: the appraisal identifies shortcomings in South Africa?s regulatory model. The study focuses on the evolutionary improvement of agency workers? protection based on international approaches. The research culminates by formulating an amended model for the regulation of agency work in South Africa, in which these proposed adaptations seek to remedy the shortcomings which were observed in the appraisal process.

The practice of foreign agro-investment (FAI) for the production of food crops and biofuel crops has been a recent phenomenon in sub-Saharan Africa and other developing countries. In fact, the present era of climate change has caused foreign countries to acquire vast tracts of land - often through multinational corporations - in order to propagate biofuel or expand their home industries abroad. Practices of FAI have resulted in a form of land grabbing, as local communities are often evicted from their land without their consent. FAI activities are reported to have considerable impact on people in areas where they occur, which range from environmental to social and economic impacts. There is compelling evidence that FAI land deals are not transparent and inclusive, which raises pertinent concerns with respect to participatory rights, access to information, the compatibility of property rights, environmental protection and the protection of the rights and interests of local communities generally, among other issues. The lack of respect for and protection of local communities’ rights and interests during FAI land deals and activities form the crux of this study. In this light, the overall aim of this thesis is to investigate and ascertain how the procedural aspects of a rights-based approach (RBA) could be used to provide adequate protection to local communities’ rights and interests during FAI activities in Cameroon, Uganda and South Africa. The study is premised on the notion of a RBA to FAI governance and captures the procedural aspects of the right to access to information, public participation and the right to access to justice in international, regional, sub-regional and national human rights legal regimes. It is argued that because these rights have the potential to significantly contribute towards the protection of the rights and interests of people that are adversely affected by development activities, their incorporation remains useful and relevant in the FAI context. It is further claimed that the implementation of the procedural RBA in FAI land deals could strengthen the ability and capacity of the state to increase opportunities for more meaningful dialogue with local communities, while concomitantly helping the state to fulfil its international and national obligations as a duty-bearer to respect, protect and fulfil the rights and interests of its people. In addition, procedural rights encompass elements of good governance and democracy and could be used as a necessary and vital tool to prevent a government’s exercise of arbitrary power generally and in the context of development activities. This is predicated on the belief that procedural rights serve inter alia to strengthen democratic structures and processes and to curb corruption and the mismanagement of national resources, and ultimately to promote sustainable development. In this study, it is argued that a RBA generally and its procedural aspects specifically could play an important role in setting the standards and defining the processes that are appropriate to repudiate the unacceptable impacts of FAI and simultaneously address distributive concerns with the hope of promoting and ensuring more responsible and sustainable FAI. Conversely, the absence of such a normative baseline suggests that large-scale land transfer under the guise of FAI practices would endlessly levy an unacceptable toll on the fundamental rights of the vulnerable host population. The first step in this thesis is to analysis the theoretical concepts of governance and good governance in order to establish the eventual objective of what FAI governance and good FAI governance should entail. A further component of the theoretical analysis includes an analysis of a RBA and a RBA to FAI governance. These components are investigated in order to determine a possible solution to the impacts of FAI activities from a rights-based perspective. Second, the thesis investigates and analyses the procedural aspects of a RBA espoused in international, regional and sub-regional legal regimes. It distils generic characteristics and minimum requirements of the RBA for good FAI governance to be used as benchmarks in the context of project development-related activities, including FAI. As benchmarks, the international, regional and sub-regional legal regimes provide minimum criteria to which the legal frameworks of countries must adhere to and conform with. This part also examines the procedural RBA frameworks in Cameroon, Uganda and South Africa and critically evaluates the legal frameworks in these countries against the distilled generic characteristics and minimum requirements of the RBA in terms of good FAI governance. Third, the thesis concludes with a set of recommendations on the procedural RBA frameworks in Cameroon, Uganda and South Africa. These recommendations are meant to address the current lacunae in these domestic procedural RBA frameworks, and to propose measures designed to enable a situation where the rights and interests of local communities are better protected in the event that FAI land deals are concluded.

Araştırmamız bugüne kadar ülkemizde İslam hukukçularınca doktora düzeyinde girilmemiş ve değerlendirilmemiş bir mesele olan İslam hukuku açısından elektronik ticareti konu edinmiştir. Bu manada ilk bölümde İslam hukuku açısından ticaret hukuku kavramlarına kısa bir değini yapılmış ve bununla ilgili çok temel bilgiler verilmiştir. İkinci bölümde İslam hukuku açısından e-ticaret incelenmiş, E-ticaretin İslam hukuk kavramlarıyla nasıl anlaşılabileceğine ve anlatılabileceğine dair görüş ve tespitlerimiz sunulmuştur. Elektronik ortamda akitleşme, irade beyanı gibi yeni durumların analizi yapılmıştır. Üçüncü bölümde ise fıkhî hükümleri açısından e-ticaret incelenmiştir. Bu bölümde de e-ticarette yeni ortaya çıkan durumlar, kavramlar ve olgular incelenmiştir. Fıkhî açıdan hangi kavramlarla açıklanacağı hususunda kanaatlerimiz sunulmuştur. İkinci bölüm değerlendirme ve analiz ağırlıklı iken üçüncü bölümde daha çok pratik sonuçları açısından durum incelenmiş, bu hususta literatüre girmesi gerektiğini düşündüğümüz yeni kavramlar ve tasnifler de zikredilmiştir. Son olarak da mevcut modern yasalarda e-ticaretin nasıl ele alındığı gösterilmiş, İslam hukuku açısından nasıl değerlendirilebileceğine dair görüşlerimiz arz edilmiştir. This work is about electronic commerce in İslamic law which has not been studied or evaluated by anyone with such a scale until now. In this sense, at the first section, the concepts of commerce law have been mentioned briefly by the view of Islamic law, and has been given basic knowledge. At the second section, E-commerce regarding to concepts of Islamic law has been examined. Our opinions and detections about it like how this is must be understood with the notions of Islamic law have been presented. The conceptual analysis of new situations such as contracting, declaration of intention, on the İnternet has been done. At the last section, e-commerce regarding rules of Islamic law has been examined. In this section, new situations and concepts that just emerged have been examined. Our opinions have been presented. As the second section weighted with assessment and analysis, at the third section, the case has been examined rather practically. New concepts and categorizations that must be added to the literature have been mentioned.

The present study aims at analyzing the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (CISG) by examining most thoroughly the different interpretations of its text on the light of several western legal traditions. This analysis of the implications of such different interpretations will give rise to a discussion on the level of interpenetration among different legal systems. This, in turn, leads to an analysis of the impact of the conditions imposed by the Convention on its interpretation, which is considered a selfcontained autonomous ruling within the text of the Convention. As can be seen from a historical overview of the matter, the pursuit of unified regulations governing the international purchase and sale of goods is precisely the result of trade practices and of the consolidation of customary laws and principles. This thesis is thus based on the dynamics of this unifying process. The analysis will focus on its innovative feature of a consonant interpretation; an important structural element which may determine the success or failure of the text of the Convention when observed in different legal environments. It will be taken into consideration the role of the relation between governments and their institutions established with International Organizations, as well as that of the need for predictability when signing international agreements. Therefore, elements such as sovereignty and globalization are essential for a proper understanding of the impacts of this Convention in international law, namely, international trade laws

We develop a conceptual model of contracts as regulatory instruments in over-the-counter (OTC) financial markets. The model is informed by the functional understanding of financial regulation as addressing problems of counterparty risk, liquidity, information and systemic risk and structural understanding of regulation as a process of standard-setting, monitoring and enforcement. The justification of conceptualization contracts as regulatory instruments is found in the nature of the political economy considerations that inform the definition of certain contracts used in OTC financial markets. While many scholars rely on conceptualization of the said contracts as boilerplate, we argue that there exist important qualitative differences between boilerplate and regulatory contracts, which we link to a broader spectrum of interests taken into account in their definition in the process of standard-setting. The model and its application to loan and derivatives markets help to highlight the impact of governance features of the organization developing the contract and the regulatory competition to which the organization is exposed on the scope of the regulatory function. We also use a number of indicators and attributions to examine the effectiveness of regulatory contracts. While the contractual model displays some weaknesses in terms of both standard-setting (conflicts of interest) and enforcement (reliance on delegation) compared to its better established counterpart – the organizational model associated with exchanges – the contractual model helps to account for important self-regulatory features of OTC financial markets and offers suggestions as to how the structure of OTC financial markets can be improved.

Au cours des dernières décennies, les restructurations d'entreprises ont connu une transformation majeure. En plus des restructurations ponctuelles, de type « crise » dans des secteurs de l'économie en déclin, il est possible de constater des restructurations de type « permanent » dont l'objectif principal est la quête de profit et l'augmentation de la productivité de l'entreprise. Perçus comme nuisibles à la rentabilité des entreprises, la syndicalisation, la négociation collective et les moyens de pression, poussent ainsi certaines entreprises à se restructurer. Les restructurations d'entreprises, produit de l'exercice de la liberté d'entreprendre, impliquent des conséquences importantes sur l'emploi des travailleurs, en plus d'affecter à bien des égards leur liberté d'association. Dans cette perspective, il est pertinent de s'interroger sur l'articulation entre la liberté d'entreprendre et la liberté d'association dans le contexte de restructurations d'entreprises. Les différentes théories du droit s'accordent quant à l'importance de la cohérence du système juridique tant à l'interne qu'à l'externe. L'essentiel de notre analyse repose, en conséquence, sur un souci de cohérence du système juridique lors de l'affrontement des libertés d'entreprendre et d'association dans le cadre de restructurations d'entreprises, par le biais, entre autre, de l'étude de la juridicité et de la normativité de ces principes du droit. D'une part, la liberté d'association est un principe du droit à statut constitutionnel, d'ordre public et qui occupe une place importante en droit international. D'autre part, la liberté d'entreprendre est un principe du droit implicite, dont les fondements et la mise en œuvre demeurent ambigus. Pourtant notre étude démontre que la jurisprudence accorde une interprétation restrictive à la liberté d'association et large à la liberté d'entreprendre. Cette réalité accorde à la liberté d'entreprendre une mainmise sur la liberté d'association, particulièrement dans les cas de restructurations d'entreprises. Il n'y a qu'à citer comme exemple le droit de cesser de faire affaire même pour des motifs socialement condamnables, énoncé à plusieurs reprises par la Cour suprême du Canada. Le principe de cohérence du système juridique devrait nous amener à une interprétation plus large de la liberté d'association afin de respecter la hiérarchie des droits et d'autres principes généraux du droit, tels que l'égalité, la dignité et la bonne foi, et ce, même si cette interprétation a parfois pour effet de restreindre la liberté d'entreprendre dans le contexte de restructurations d'entreprises.

Sovereign Wealth Funds have been the new 'rising star' of the global economy for a few years. Host States have reacted to their rise cautiously and have quite frequently cited 'national security' as a justification for maintaining an absolute degree of freedom in regulating their entry into their markets. This thesis is arguing that a substantial proportion of regulatory concerns that surround the operation of SWFs are actually not of a national security nature—at least as perceived by the relevant instruments regulating investment in International Economic Law. As a consequence, the current regulatory framework screening SWFs investments a priori is both legally and normatively problematic and, in fact, it constitutes a form of protectionism. As an alternative, this thesis suggests that SWFs ought to be primarily regulated after their entry into Host States' markets. In that context, a proper conceptualisation of the principle of non-discrimination that takes into account the 'regulatory unlikeness' between SWFs and other market suppliers/investors will allow the Host States to properly regulate them after their entry into their markets. Such a conceptualisation – contrary to usual analyses – draws heavily from International Investment law in order to interpret the relevant provisions of the GATS.

The launching of the T-FTA in June 2015 presents an opportunity for accelerating regional integration in Africa towards the establishment of a single market through deepening COMESA-EAC-SADC integration. This milestone can contribute positively to African development. Nevertheless, it faces different structural and technical challenges, including the risk of aggressive export strategies and unfair trade practices, which may wipe away a substantial part of the integration gains. This could undermine African integration plans and the largely infant industries in Africa, especially since many African countries lack sufficient technical skills, institutional capacity, and the legal framework to deal efficiently and effectively with unfair trade practices and to respond to situations which may require the application of emergency tools to better adapt to economic challenges. Apart from Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, South Africa and Zambia national Trade Defence Instruments (TDIs) are not well developed. This could further constrain the ambitious African plans of economic integration. The thesis concludes that, although an effective TDI system is crucial for African integration as it can provide the required protection for African infant industries and unlock the potentials of African economic integration, the current African TDI systems are not effective. This is confirmed by the limited resort to TDIs in the African continent and the general perception that an effective TDI system is not a priority on the integration agenda. The concluded T-FTA TDI legal regime is not supportive for African integration plans in the long run. Africa should envisage how to upgrade its TDI system to make better use of the tools available under the WTO to deal with unfair trade measures, including anti-dumping to face dumped imports, countervailing measures to face subsidized imports, and safeguard measures to temporarily suspend concessions in the face of surge in imports. Africa can improve its national and regional TDIs system by learning from more developed TDI systems incorporated by other economic blocks such as the EU, NAFTA, Mercosur, and ASEAN. This thesis submits that the EU TDIs system is the most suitable to the African integration objectives. This submission is made while recognising the different level of development on both sides. The thesis submits that the long-term objective of the T-FTA is to have a regional investigating authority. It draws several recommendations to enhance African TDI system by working on five main categories: (A) The strategic direction; (B) The institutional framework; (C) Enhancing engagements; (D) Application of TDIs; and (E) The supportive factors.

Depuis le milieu du XXe siècle, l'arbitrage commercial international a connu un développement phénoménal et acquis une importance significative dans le monde des transactions commerciales internationales. Il est effectivement devenu la juridiction mondiale la plus acceptable, la plus fiable et la plus usuelle pour résoudre les différends relatifs au commerce et aux investissements internationaux. Toutefois, il a rencontré des difficultés en ce qui concerne les mesures provisoires et conservatoires ce qui explique la tendance des parties à éviter d’y avoir recours devant les arbitres, au profit des juridictions étatiques pour obtenir les mesures d’urgence dont ils avaient immédiatement besoin. L’inexistence d’un régime procédural capable de bien régir cette matière était la raison principale qui a réduit l’efficacité de l’arbitrage. Pourtant, ce fait a changé grâce aux modifications majeures qui ont été apportées à la Loi type de la CNUDCI en 2006. Cette loi a établi un régime arbitral spécifique aux mesures provisoires et conservatoires. À un stade ultérieur, les règlements modifiés récemment par les centres d’arbitrage qui agissent sur la scène internationale ont beaucoup développé ce régime en le mettant en pratique. Maintenant, en présence d’un régime arbitral particulier régissant les mesures provisoires et conservatoires, il est opportun d’en évaluer en profondeur l’efficacité par rapport à celle du régime étatique classique régissant la même matière. Voilà l’objectif de cette thèse de doctorat qui présente nombre des propositions doctrinales et normatives dans le but d’améliorer autant que possible ce régime arbitral récent.

<p>This DPhil thesis enhances existing understandings of collective action through a comparative and empirical study. Empirical analysis of economic, political, juridical, and social dimensions of the Brazilian experience reveals that some central understandings in existing literature are not borne out in this empirical context. In particular, the assertion that low monetary incentives for individuals hinder growth in use of collective action is strongly challenged.</p> <p>The Brazilian experience is contextualised through comparative analysis of three legal traditions of collective action: class actions; collective redress; and civil public actions. The Brazilian system presents a setting with potential for regulatory enforcement of consumer protection law, but rare episodes of consumer compensation or the imposition of punitive damages on corporations. With low monetary incentives, the growth of collective actions is explained by non-monetary incentives and investment in social capital through development of institutional trust and legal institutions.</p> <p>Collective actors develop their organisational infrastructure and perform their roles as representatives through institutional dynamics of concentration, competition, cooperation, and deference. The coexistence of multiple institutional actors in the regulatory space reduces agenda control, increases opportunities for consumer participation, and increases oversight of regulatory capture.</p> <p>The categories of diffuse, collective, and homogeneous individual rights explain the role of law in establishing procedural pathways and special features. This study is broadened through analysis of the legal environment and the potential regulatory impact of collective actions on the social relationships between businesses and consumers. I also evaluate limitations and possibilities regarding access to justice, judicial economy, compensation, and deterrence.</p> <p>This thesis indicates the possibility of developing a socio-legal theory of collective action, which would enhance our understanding of the complex dynamics at play by going beyond analysis of the consumer experience as merely an economic transaction or a legal object, analysing them instead as a complex social relationship.</p>

The thesis aims at explaining current regulatory crisis of copyright law (understood as its inability to regulate social dynamics as regards production, reproduction, dissemination of and access to information goods) through the application of systems theory. It refers to the concept of autopoietic legal system in order to draft a model representing the ecosystem in which copyright law functions. This model not only allows for observing copyright regime as it stands currently but also for analysing how it evolved over time. It scrutinises the interdependencies between the legal system and other constituent elements of its ecosystem: politics, economy, art, science, technology, religion, mass media, education as well as non-functionally differentiated segments of society: circles of relatives and friends. The main goal of this analysis is to highlight the fact that the current regulatory crisis of copyright is the result of the legal system's failure to equally acknowledge all the diverse rationalities constituting its ecosystem. The primary hypothesis of the study is that the core of the problem may be attributed to the divergence between legal norms, and competing non-legal copynorms constructed in the process of co-evolution within various elements of the model in question. In the analysis all the relevant copynorms understood as segmented social norms regulating social dynamics with respect to production, reproduction, dissemination of and access to information goods have been reconstructed to indicate their potential to oppose legal regulations. The thesis pivots around the concept of reflexive justice which refers to the equal acknowledgement of colliding rationalities. It concludes with the firm statement that copyright law in the digital environment needs profound reform. The concept of reflexive justice as developed within the systems theoretical approach is perceived by the author of this thesis as the most promising starting point for the new philosophy of copyright law.

Transparency of trade regulations by all WTO Members is essential for open, fair and predictable trade relations. Because of the negative integration process followed by the WTO Agreements, a myriad of different regulations apply in all WTO Members and have the potential of affecting international trade. With the progressive lowering of tariffs since 1947, these differing regulations remain the most significant barriers to trade, and the most difficult to reduce. The Agreements on Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) measures and on Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) provide the most comprehensive frameworks to address the costs arising from such regulatory diversity, through extensive obligations on regulatory transparency and cooperation and introducing elements of positive integration. Does transparency, within the SPS and TBT Agreements prevent disputes from rising, or ensure all Members access necessary information to raise more and better disputes? Through a presentation of the legal obligations and institutional framework of the two agreements (Part I), an in-depth analysis of the issues encountered by WTO Members in the implementation of the two Agreements and raised as trade concerns in the SPS and TBT Committees (Part II), and a study of the factors leading to disputes and transparency's role in addressing them (Part III), this thesis will demonstrate that transparency as it exists under the two agreements has the potential to both complement dispute settlement, by giving equal access to information for Members to raise disputes, and substitute dispute settlement, by fostering dialogue between Members before their frictions escalate to formal disputes. In this sense, the strength of the WTO legal and institutional system goes well beyond its dispute settlement system, with enforcement of WTO obligations fostered by better information sharing and dialogue among Members themselves, through non-judicial means.