Human Rights in the Scottish Courts

This article looks at the use made of the human rights legislation in the Scottish courts since the devolution of legislative and executive power to Scotland, based on research undertaken in all the ordinary courts, but excluding tribunals. It concludes that the incorporation of the Convention via the human rights legislation has had significant effects within the Scottish court system and on policy development without amounting to a major upheaval.     

仲裁员法律责任之检讨(上)——兼评“枉法仲裁罪”

仲裁员的法律责任是一个复杂而敏感的问题,学者们对这些问题的观点分歧较大,不能形成定论,而我国《仲裁法》对此也无明确规定。最近,在提请十届全国人大常委会第十九次会议审议的刑法修正案(六)草案中有关于枉法仲裁罪的规定。此规定立即引起社会各界的广泛关注和热烈讨论,形成为相互对立的两种观点。2006年6月29日十届全国人大常委会第22次会议通过了此修正案。仲裁的本质特征在于其契约性,仲裁机构是民间性的事业单位法人,仲裁员的行为是私人裁判行为,所以仲裁员对其不当仲裁行为应只承担有限的民事责任,而不应该承担行政责任,更不应该承担刑事责任。不应用《刑法》规制仲裁。     

Genetic Testing and the Future of Disability Insurance: Thinking about Discrimination in the Genetic Age

This article considers the future of genetic testing and disiblity insurance, and explores the potential for discrimination when using genetic information.     

论我国《仲裁法》中仲裁程序的修改——以程序价值论为视角

本文从我国《仲裁法》修改的历史背景出发,在明确了仲裁程序在《仲裁法》修改中的地位之后,以程序价值论为理论基础提出仲裁程序应通过当事人的意思自治以及仲裁庭的仲裁权两个方面实现仲裁程序的主体性价值,并以此为理论基础对我国《仲裁法》中仲裁程序的修改提出笔者的修改建议。     

Insider trading and the public enforcement of private prohibitions: some complications in enforcing simple rules for a complex world

Accepting the argument made by Manne, Epstein and others that firms wishing to allow their employees to insider trade should be permitted to do so, this article shows that there is still a crucial role for government in regulating insider trading. In particular, allowing employees to profit by insider trading is a form of employee compensation that, in contradistinction from conventional forms of equity compensation, results in unknowable and effectively unlimited costs to the company. Since providing employee compensation in this form causes the company to lose control of its compensation expense, even if insider trading were legal, virtually every company would rely on conventional forms of employee compensation and prohibit its employees from insider trading. But, pace Manne, Epstein and others, companies lack the means to detect insider trading by their employees, and even when they do catch employees insider trading, companies can impose only mild contractual sanctions, generally not exceeding disgorgement of profits and dismissal. As a result, although an efficient agreement between a company and its employee would prohibit the employee from insider trading, this prohibition cannot be effectively enforced by the company. Government, with its usual law enforcement powers, is better able to detect insider trading and can impose more severe sanctions on violators, including criminal penalties. Government should thus enforce a ban on insider trading in those instances, which will be virtually all instances, in which a company prohibits its employees from insider trading. The efficient solution is thus a hybrid system of private prohibition and public enforcement. Such a system is not unusual but the norm. Employers prohibit employees from embezzling their money and stealing their property, and employees are subject to contractual sanctions and dismissal for violating these prohibitions, but we still need statutes against theft to generate an optimal level of deterrence. This is all the more true when the employee misappropriates information, which is much harder to detect than a theft of money or property.