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By Rachel Holt and Jo Wojtkowski

Oxford University Press is excited to be attending the twenty-second International Council for Commercial Arbitration (ICCA) conference, to be held at the InterContinental Miami, Florida, on 6-9 April 2014. This year’s theme, “Legitimacy: Myths, Realities, Challenges” gives opportunity for practitioners, scholars and judges to explore the issues surrounding, what has been dubbed by some, the legitimacy crisis. To find out more take a look at this year’s exciting program devised by Lucy Reed and her team.

The four-day conference is packed with informative panel discussions, interactive breakout sessions, ICCA Interest Groups lunch meetings and networking events. With over 1,000 participants from around the world, highlights include “Legitimacy: Examined against Empirical Data” chaired by Jan Paulson, Holder of Michael Klein Distinguished Scholar Chair, University of Miami, and the opening session “Setting the Scene: What Are the Myths? What Are the Realities? What Are the Challenges?”, where Oxford author Eric Bergsten is to receive the ICCA Award for Lifelong Contribution to the Field of International Arbitration. Here are some of the conference events we’re excited about:

• Monday 7 April, 12:15 -13:30p.m.: Latin America: The Hottest Issues, Country-by-Country
  Lunch seminar chaired by Doak Bishop.
• Monday 7 April, 13:45-15:00p.m.: Proof: A Plea for Precision
  Proof is fundamental and can be maddeningly elusive. But must proof of fact and law so often be so imprecise? This session will explore the often fudged and occasionally ignored elements of burden of proof, the standard of proof, methods of proof to establish applicable law, and the importance of addressing these topics in a procedural order.
• Monday 7 April, 15:30 – 16:45p.m.: Premise: Arbitral Institutions Can Do More To Further Legitimacy. True or False?
  Have arbitral institutions been steady stewards of legitimacy in arbitration? Or, as more say, are they stagnant and protective of the status quo? In particular, can arbitration be legitimate if the arbitrator selection process is opaque, the quality of awards is variable, and the arbitral process lacks foreseeability? Particularly as the growth in regional institutions continues, are there consistent practices to be encouraged, and others to be eschewed, to promote and preserve legitimacy? This session will challenge whether institutions are doing enough to ensure the availability of diverse, well-trained arbitrators and to ensure first-rate, timely performance of their duties.
• Tuesday, 8 April, 8:45 – 10:00p.m.: Matters of Evidence: Witness and Experts
  Witness statements and expert reports tell the story, but whose story is it to be told? How rigorous are tribunals in “gating” witnesses? This session will explore the “do’s and don’ts” of drafting witness statements; whether the weight given to statements should vary and, if so, precisely why; and the impact of witness nonappearance on the admissibility and weight of testimony. It will also examine parallel questions for experts and expert reports.
• Tuesday, 8 April, 13:45 – 15:00p.m.: ‘Treaty Arbitration: Pleading and Proof of Fraud and Comparable Forms of Abuse’
  This session will explore and catalogue standards that govern the presentation and resolution of issues of fraud, abuse of rights, and similarly serious allegations that may impugn either a claim or the investment in treaty arbitrations. How do these issues arise? And how do tribunals address them? Is there a common understanding of pleading and proof standards for fraud, abuse of rights, or the bona fides of an investment? These are easy questions to ask, but precise answers are vexing.
• Tuesday, 8 April, 12:15 -13:30p.m.: Spotlight on International Arbitration in Miami and the United States
  A mock argument of BG Group PLC v. Argentina—the first investment treaty arbitration case to be heard by the US Supreme Court—will be one of the stops on a tour of international arbitration in Miami and the United States. Other stops will include Miami’s favorable arbitration climate, enforcement of arbitral awards in the United States generally and Florida specifically, arbitration class actions in the US, and an update on the Restatement (Third), The US Law of International Commercial Arbitration.

There is even a “Spotlight on International Arbitration in Miami and the United States” session which is not to be missed, but there is more to this amazing city than just arbitration. Located on the Atlantic coast in south-eastern Florida, Miami is a major centre and a leader in finance, commerce, culture, and international trade. In 2012, Miami was classified as an Alpha-World City in the World Cities Study Group’s inventory. In her upcoming title, Ethics in International Arbitration (publishing summer 2014), author Catherine Rogers argues:

“Ultimately, the challenge of ethical self-regulation is a challenge for the international arbitration community to think beyond its present situation, to future generations and future developments in an ever-more globalized legal world. It is a challenge for international arbitration to bring to bear all the pragmatism, creativity, and sense of the noble duty to transnational justice that it has demonstrated in the very best moments of its history.”

This comment highlights just one of the challenges facing arbitral legitimacy in the ever-growing world of international arbitration, which further highlights the importance of the ICCA’s chosen theme for the 2014 conference. If you are joining us in Miami, don’t forget to visit the Oxford University Press booth #16 where you can browse our award-winning books, and take advantage of the 20% conference discount. Plus, enter our prize draw to for a chance to win an iPad Mini, and pick up a free access password to our collection of online law resources including Investment Claims. See you in Miami!

Jo Wojtkowski is the Assistant Marketing Manager for Law at Oxford University Press. Rachel Holt is Assistant Commissioning Editor for Arbitration products at Oxford University Press.

Oxford University Press is a leading publisher in arbitration including the Journal of International Dispute Settlement, edited by Dr Thomas Schultz, and the ICSID Review edited by Meg Kinnear and Professor Campbell McLachlan, as well as the latest titles from experts in the field, and a wide range of law journals and online products. We publish original works across key areas of study, from trademarks to patents, designs and copyrights, developing outstanding resources to support students, scholars, and practitioners worldwide.

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The post Preparing for International Council for Commercial Arbitration 2014 appeared first on OUPblog.

        

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Ashraf Ghani has taught at Johns Hopkins, Berkeley, and Kabul University, worked at the World Bank, served as Finance Minister of Afghanistan, and been credited with a range of successful reforms in Afghanistan in the years following 9/11. He is currently the Chairman of the Institute for State Effectiveness. Clare Lockhart is Director of the Institute for State Effectiveness. She has worked for the World Bank and the UN and played a key leadership role in developing the National Programs approach to Afganistan’s reconstruction efforts. Together Ghani and Lockhard wrote Fixing Failed States: A Framework For Rebuilding A Fractured World, which explains through vivid on-the-ground examples why past attempts to rebuild states have failed and advance a groundbreaking new solution to the crisis. In the original article below they outline what makes a successful state.  Listen to a podcast of Ghani at the Carnegie Council here.

Given the historical and geographic variability of state functions, it might seem bold to declare that there are ten of them (why not nine of eleven?). Nevertheless, based on our reading of history, our engagement with international development, and our first hand experience with the challenge of state building in one of its most difficult contexts, we have concluded that states in the world today must perform the following ten key functions to succeed.

1) Rule of Law

The most crucial function of the state is law making (i.e. establishing the rules by which society operates). Laws define both the powers and the limits of the state and the people within that state.2) A Monopoly on the Legitimate Means of Violence
State controlled use of violence (military/police activity), encompasses three distinctive elements. Complete authority over the means of destruction and the use of force. The legitimacy needed to subordinate violence to the decision making process (voting/elections/laws). And in extreme cases, the use of force, according to the rules of law, against those citizens of the state who challenge its legitimacy.3) Administrative Control
The state must establish a bureaucratic system of checks and balances. A system that is managed by governmental professional who are accountable to the citizenry. Each division of the government performs specialized functions, has continuity over time, and is overseen at a higher level.

4) Sound Management of Public Finances
Create a budget and stick to it! A proper budget brings both the rights and duties of citizenship into balance. Each entitlement must have a line of expenditure and each expenditure must be matched by a source of revenue. The key elements are wealth creation and involvement of the citizenry in taxation and redistribution.

5) Investment in Human Capital
Among the many investments are the creation, development, and growth of institutions of Higher Education and the availability of a national healthcare infrastructure. Health and education produces a mentally and physically vital citizenry, which is in turn crucial to a successful state.

6) Creation of Citizenship Rights Through Social Policy
Empower citizens through equal opportunity. When the state uses social policy as an instrument for the establishment of equal opportunities, the social fabric created can lead to a sense of national unity and a shared belief in common destiny. Key social policy starts with the right to vote, and extends into regulating labor practices and establishing fiscal welfare programs.

7) Provision of Infrastructure Services
The state must provide everyday necessities such as adequate transportation, power, water, communications, and pipelines to establish its overall ability to produce less mundane functions such as security, administration, investment in human capital, and the necessary conditions for a strong market economy.

Formation of a Market
The state must support the creation and expansion of an open economic market through three major measures: setting and enforcing rules for commercial activity, supporting the operation and continued development of private enterprise, and intervening at times of market failure.

9) Management of Public Assets
Every state has three areas of natural resources to oversee: the management and allocation of rights to land and water, the sustainable use of natural capital, including extractive industries (i.e. mining and drilling), the management, and protection of the environment, including forests, and the licensing of industrial commercial activities.

10) Effective Public Borrowing
Put simply, do not take on bad debt or take on too much debt. Beware of the sovereign guaranty from international lenders. Maintain public disclosure and monitoring of the fulfillment of debt obligations.

The performance of these ten functions produces a clustering effect. When the state performs all ten functions simultaneously, the synergy creates a virtuous circle in which decisions in the different domains reinforce enfranchisement and opportunity for the citizenry. This supports the legitimacy of the decision makers and their decisions, builds trust in the overall system, and thereby produces a “sovereignty dividend.”

Conversely, when one or several of the functions are not performed effectively, a vicious circle begins: Various centers of power vie for control, multiple decision-making processes confuse priorities, citizens lose trust in the government, institutions lose their legitimacy, and the populace is disenfranchised. In the most extreme cases, violence results. This negative cycle creates a “sovereignty gap.”

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I love reading what other children’s writers have to say about the craft of writing for children, being a writer, reading, or really anything that relates. Here are a few quotes that I hope you’ll enjoy, too.

“A real adult, someone who is really grown up and adult, someone like Mrs Thatcher, couldn’t possibly write a book for children. Somebody like me, even when I’m 85, is pretty damned childish. I laugh at things that young children laugh at.”
–Dick King-Smith

“You have the power to make the reader feel something. That’s what you have when you’re writing books.”
–Anne Margaret Lewis

“It’s the ability to bring events and characters to a resolution that draws me to writing, especially writing for children. I don’t want to ever be didactic, but if there’s something I do want to say, it’s that you can bring things around. You can make a change. Adult novels are about letting go. Children’s novels are about getting a grip.”
–Tim Wynne Jones

“”I never [wrote for children]… for the money, though it’s very nice; nor the critical acclaim, which is very nice too. … The most satisfying aspect of [my] work is the … fan letters that [I] receive from children.”
–Dick King-Smith

Many children’s and teen fiction books address painful subjects, and are honest in a way that the adults around children and teens may not be. I believe that fiction with painful truths in them can help children and teens to know that they are not alone, or to think about and experience issues in a safe way that they may not yet have had to deal with, but might have a friend who has. I think truth in children’s fiction is vital. And I love reading what children’s and teen authors have to say. So here are a few quotes about this:

“We read to know we are not alone.”
- C.S. Lewis

“Children read to learn what might happen to them next. As writers, we have an obligation to be honest in our writing. We’ve lived longer, had more thoughts about our experiences; we know what life is like. We do children a disservice if we present life in a sentimental light. We need to be completely honest, as long as we use common sense about the type of experiences that are suitable to the readers’ ages.
…Children want to know what might happen next. A story is a safe place for them to experience dangerous situations. When a child reader finds him/herself in a real-life dangerous situation, they can remember the lesson they learned from the book.”
-Barbara Greenwood

“I like to feel that a children’s book can address worrying or even terrible things, but I’m not in the business of worrying children unnecessarily. I try to have realistic endings, and there are hard times, but I also try to show that, with a bit of luck, you can get through things.”
-Jacqueline Wilson

“Edgy is REAL without hesitation, even if it’s not a reality we all want to acknowledge.
But those books, with their inclusionary, ’so I’m not alone after all,’ value, can literally save lives.”
- Kelly Milner Halls

“These sad, unfair, frightening, discouraging, impossibly hard things come at us–if we let them, if we keep working to peck our way out, they can help to make us stronger.
What I try to do in my novels is create characters that are pecking out of hard shells. I use humor to help them through. I pull from experiences I had, feelings I remember. … I hope you’ll see some of yourselves in the lives of my characters. We’re all in this struggle together. The best part about stories is how they help us remember that.”
-Joan Bauer

“The Y.A. books I was reading seemed to have such strong voices and such heart. No B.S., no filler. I was hooked. … Some of the most compelling, tightly written, emotionally honest, risky, taboo, glorious work I’ve read is Y.A.”
- Libby Bray

“You get into that place where you’re writing from deep inside. You just want to tell the best stories you can. With me, I wanted to be honest - maybe because I felt grownups hadn’t been honest with me when I was a kid.”
-Judy Blume

“It’s a tough world out there that kids are exposed to. … I think we need to show that life can be hard, but we need to show how things can be overcome through emotional strength and getting help. I see being a writer to young people as a bearer of light. We are teaching whether we think about it that way or not. You can teach by all kinds of examples. …
I try to show how great adversity, if it’s addressed, can really make us stronger. Having traveled some difficult roads myself as a teenager, I can underscore the importance of strategically placed adults in my life.”
- Joan Bauer

“I believe in the healing power of love and creative expression in the face of fear. It’s not a conscious thing, but it is in my books.”
- Francesca Lia Block

Books can give so much, in so many ways, and I love reading about that. It’s so affirming, and just speaks to the book lover in me, as well as the writer. I love reading quotes about reading and books–especially quotes from children’s and YA writers. So I’ve pulled together a few quotes from some of my favorite children’s and YA authors on both what they get out of reading, and how to help children and teens read (or how not to put them off reading).

“Why do I read?
I just can’t help myself.
I read to learn and to grow, to laugh and to be motivated.
I read to understand things I’ve never been exposed to.
I read when I’m crabby, when I’ve just said monumentally dumb things to the people I love.
I read for strength to help me when I feel broken, discouraged, and afraid.
I read when I’m angry at the whole world.
I read when everything is going right.
I read to find hope.
…
Reading isn’t passive — I enter the story with the characters, breathe their air, feel their frustrations, scream at them to stop when they’re about to do something stupid, cry with them, laugh with them.
Reading for me, is spending time with a friend.
A book is a friend.
You can never have too many.

-Joan Bauer
–From Shelf Life: Stories by the Book, Simon and Schuster Books for Young Readers

“I always loved stories that could carry me away from day to day life. I’m not saying I had a hard or sad life–because I didn’t–but I loved how words could transport me to a different time, a different place. Stories could even make me feel as though I was a different person. It was like magic.”
-Vivian Vande Velde

“Children should learn that reading is pleasure, not just something that teachers make you do in school.”
- Beverly Cleary

“The best thing I know to tell parents and teachers about motivating young readers is that reading should not be presented to them as a chore, a duty. It should, instead, be offered as a gift: Look, I will help you unwrap this miraculous present. I will show you how to use it for your own satisfaction and education and deep, intense pleasure. It distresses me that parents insist that their children read or make them read. I think the best way for children to treasure reading is for them to see the adults in their lives reading for their own pleasure.”
- Kate DiCamillo

“Parents have to bring the book to the child, so when the children go to school they’re familiar with them. They need to read with the child at least 20 minutes a day. It gives the parents a little island of privacy and love. With the proper encouragement the child will become a reader, and learning to love books and stories will be something important for the rest of their lives.”
-Rosemary Wells

“Parents risk putting children off reading by dragging them around bookstores and force-feeding them literary classics. … We…forget the inestimable value of spending 15 minutes a day reading with our child. There is no better way to get to know your child than to share their books with them.”
- Anthony Horowitz