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In little more than two centuries the United States has transformed itself from a fledgling nation built on an agrarian economy to the strongest industrial power the world has ever seen. One of the major reasons why the country was able to undergo such a change so rapidly was the high availability of cheap energy. This energy was almost exclusively in the form of fossil fuels: oil, gas and coal. While this system created great economic and industrial success, many problems have been detected in the past few decades regarding the use of fossil fuels. These issues include limited supply, increased cost, higher dependence on erratic foreign nations and most notably, effects on climate. Some of these problems are more immediate than others, but all of them have prompted lawmakers, corporations and nonprofits to take a closer look at how to best combat the American reliance on fossil fuels. Proposals for change include a wide array of suggested solutions, ranging from simply making current technologies as energy efficient as possible to implementing alternative energy sources across the country. This thesis seeks to address the changes that should be made, and the role the government should play in inducing change, in a transition away from fossil fuels.

Im Zuge der Intensivierung der Handelsbeziehungen zwischen Indien und Deutschland stellen Unternehmenskäufe eines der häufigsten Formen dar, in die jeweils anderen Märkte einzutreten. Für deutsche Unternehmer ist es bei Geschäftsaktivitäten in Indien daher unerlässlich, sich einen Einblick in das entsprechende indische Recht zu verschaffen. Aufgrund der zahlreichen Risiken besteht hier ein großes Bedürfnis nach Rechtssicherheit bei der Gestaltung indischer Unternehmenskaufverträge. In der Arbeit werden im Wege eines funktionellen Rechtsvergleiches zunächst die Themenbereiche des einschlägigen indischen Rechts anhand von Gesetzen und Rechtsprechung herausgearbeitet. Ausgangspunkt sind die vorvertraglichen Pflichten der Vertragsparteien. Den Schwerpunkt der Untersuchung bildet die Gestaltung der wesentlichen Vertragsklauseln nach indischem Recht. Anschließend werden die relevanten öffentlich-rechtlichen Vorgaben bei Unternehmenskäufen in Indien erörtert. Durch eine Analyse der einzelnen Themenbereiche aus der Sicht des deutschen Unternehmenskaufrechts wird ein umfassender Blick auf die vielfältigen Rechtsfragen im Zusammenhang mit indischen Unternehmenskaufverträgen ermöglicht

Dem Betriebsverfassungsrecht liegt ein anderes Konzernverständnis zugrunde als dem Gesellschaftsrecht. Aus betriebsverfassungsrechtlicher Sicht kann es deshalb zu Problemen kommen, wenn Konzernvorgaben auf betrieblicher Ebene umgesetzt werden sollen. Dies zeigt sich insbesondere bei der Sozialplandotierung im Konzern und der Frage der Geltung von Mitwirkungs- und Mitbestimmungsrechten im Konzern. Die bislang angebotenen Lösungen für derartige Konflikte an der Schnittstelle zwischen Betriebsverfassungs- und Konzernrecht sind auf den Einzellfall bezogen und können nach der Ansicht des Verfassers nicht überzeugen. Das Werk entwickelt auf der Basis des geltenden Konzerngesellschaftsrechts ein einheitliches Lösungskonzept für diese Fälle. Ansatzpunkt der Lösung ist die konzernrechtliche Einflussnahmemöglichkeit der herrschenden Gesellschaft, welche diese zu einem verantwortungsvollen Handeln in Bezug auf die betriebsverfassungsrechtliche Situation der abhängigen Gesellschaft verpflichtet

The dual income tax combines a progressive tax on labor income and a lower flat rate tax on income from capital. Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden adopted dual income taxes to address a set of tax challenges that arose in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Although developing countries face much different economic, political, and tax environments from the Nordic countries, the dual income tax may be the right solution to the different set of challenges facing many developing countries. Providing separate tax rates for labor and capital income allows countries greater flexibility in addressing tax competition while retaining progressive tax rates for labor income. A dual income tax regime may also allow developing countries to rationalize the taxation of income from active business operations under the personal and corporate tax systems and the taxation of passive investment income under the personal tax system. Developing countries could also use the move to a dual income tax system as an opportunity to make broader reforms in their personal, corporate, and payroll tax systems. Finally, recent tax reforms in Russia, Ukraine, and several countries in Central and Eastern Europe have led to flat tax regimes that generally apply a single tax rate to all types of income above some zero0bracket amount. We contend that a dual income tax may provide policymakers in developing countries with an attractive alternative that addresses tax competition concerns while maintaining a progressive tax on labor income.

This Article seeks to explain when an international legal framework like the WTO can facilitate international cooperation and when it fails to do so. Using an empirical inquiry into different agreements that the WTO has attempted to facilitate — specifically, intellectual property and antitrust regulation — it reveals more general principles about why the WTO can facilitate agreement in some situations and not in others. Comparing the successful conclusion of the TRIPS Agreement and the failed attempts to negotiate a WTO antitrust agreement indicates that international cooperation is likely to emerge when the interests of powerful states align and when concentrated interest groups within those states actively support cooperation. The comparison further suggests that the WTO provides an optimal forum for cooperation when states need to rely on cross-issue linkages to overcome existing distributional conflicts, when the underlying issue calls for an enforcement mechanism, or when both the net benefits of the agreement and the opportunity costs of nonagreement are high. Contrasting the key differences between IP and antitrust cooperation, this Article disputes the widely held view that the strategic situations underlying IP and antitrust cooperation are similar and that the conclusion of the TRIPS Agreement is a relevant precedent predicting a successful WTO negotiation of antitrust or a host of other new regulatory issues. Given the ongoing changes in the economic and political landscape, cooperation in the WTO is even more challenging today. It is possible that — absent institutional reforms — the WTO's recent expansion may well have met its limits.

Arbitration under International Investment Agreements: a Guide to the Key Issues contains in one volume what everybody needs to know on this evolving topic. Calling on the most renowned experts in this field, private practitioners, academics, government and international organization officials, it describes the process in all its phases from A to Z, providing a comprehensive insight in the way investor-state arbitration works from the perspective of the main actors involved. Its analyses of all key aspects of the topic are pragmatic and reliable.

This Article seeks to explain when an international legal framework like the WTO can facilitate international cooperation and when it fails to do so. Using an empirical inquiry into different agreements that the WTO has attempted to facilitate – specifically intellectual property and antitrust regulation – it reveals more general principles about when and why the WTO can facilitate agreement in some situations and not others. Comparing the successful conclusion of the TRIPs Agreement and the failed attempts to negotiate a WTO antitrust agreement reveal that international cooperation is likely to emerge when the interests of powerful states are closely aligned and when concentrated interest groups within those states actively support cooperation. They further suggest that the WTO provides an optimal forum for cooperation when states need to rely on cross-issue linkages to overcome existing distributional conflicts, when the underlying issue calls for an enforcement mechanism, or when both the net benefits of the agreement and the opportunity costs of non-agreement are high. Contrasting the key differences between IP and antitrust cooperation, this Article disputes the widely held view that the strategic situation underlying IP and antitrust cooperation are similar and that the conclusion of the TRIPs Agreement is a relevant precedent predicting a successful WTO negotiation on antitrust or a host of other new regulatory issues. Given the ongoing changes in the economic and political landscape, cooperation in the WTO is even more challenging today and it is possible that – absent institutional reforms – the WTO's recent expansion may well have met its limits.