International Law Courses

A study of the law of the sea, including admiralty jurisdiction, maritime liens, limitation of liability, collision, towage, charter parties, and the rights of injured maritime workers and passengers.

This course provides an introduction to Chinese law, although it meets once a week in a seminar format in order to probe the themes of the course in as much depth as possible. Although the focus is on Chinese law, its tradition and evolution in the 20th century, the discussions and research assignment are aimed at a broader exposure, that is, to a legal system distinctive from that in the United States, and to the skills needed to research and analyze foreign law more generally. Topics include "How to Study Chinese Law," "The Historical Context," "Legislation," "Dispute Resolution," "The Judiciary and the Courts," "The Legal Profession," "Administrative Law" and "The Role of Law in Economic Development." The requirements of the course are regular attendance, participation in class discussion, and completion of a research paper of approximately 25 pages in length. If you seek to satisfy the Upper Level Writing Requirement with this paper, you must turn in at least one preliminary draft before spring break and respond to Professor Lee’s comments written on it. Where appropriate to the topic under discussion in class, you will be asked briefly to report on your research and how it relates to issues raised by that topic. 

This seminar will explore selected topics in comparative constitutional law through readings of both scholarly articles and major foreign cases (in translation). The focus of the readings will be on non-U.S. systems, but throughout the course we will use the U.S. as a primary point of comparison. Topics will include: comparative federalism and separation of powers, appropriateness and methodologies for enforcing socio-economic rights in different contexts, and the links between domestic and international legal systems.

An introduction to the characteristic features and functioning of non-common law legal systems, with emphasis on the civil law tradition. This course seeks to provide American lawyers with a basic framework for understanding foreign legal systems.

Discusses the initial courts; the emergence of the dominant royal courts, King's Bench and Common Pleas; the writ system and development of the pleading forms and the methods of proof used in trials. Considers tenures, the principal Real Actions for the recovery of land at Common Law and selected writs. Culminates in a consideration of the doctrine of estates. Briefly surveys future interests, perpetuities and the rise of uses and trusts.

An examination of the basic institutional and constitutional framework of the European Union and the fundamental legal principles that structure the internal market and the Union's external relations. The Union is studied comparatively as a legal system, as a fundamental modern legal development, and as the leading example of regional economic integration.

Students in this course will study American constitutional law pertaining to the conduct of foreign relations. Topics include: the war powers of Congress and the president, the constitutional status of treaties and customary international law, the effect of international judgments in domestic law, federal pre-emption of state law in international affairs, international human rights litigation in American courts, the law of foreign immunity and the act of state doctrine. These topics will be examined not only from a doctrinal perspective, but in their historical, political and philosophical contexts.

This seminar introduces students to the global system addressing public health matters, including the international institutional framework (e.g., the World Health Organization). It examines how national legal systems integrate within this global framework. A major part of the course addresses innovation and access to pharmaceutical products, including vaccines, therapeutics and diagnostics. Intellectual property and regulatory frameworks relevant to the pharmaceutical sector are considered. It is anticipated that the next several years in global public health will pay close attention to preparing for and responding to pandemics and other “pathogen events”. The evolution of negotiations in this area will be studied. Students will have the opportunity to prepare papers on a wide range of topics that may be of interest to them.

A course addressing the legal and policy implications of U.S. immigration law including removal proceedings, family reunification and employment-based, which also incorporates a survey of international refugee and domestic asylum law issues. There are no prerequisites, and no prior immigration law study is presumed.

This course will introduce students to basic concepts, sources, and specialized tools used in foreign and international legal research. Students will learn how to efficiently locate needed information for particular legal systems including cases, statutes, and codes. Students will also learn how to access the primary sources of public and private international law. The topics include, subjects such as secondary sources, treaties, custom and general principles, international jurisprudence, and human rights law.

This course introduces the global system for the regulation of intellectual property rights (IPRs). It discusses the institutions and treaties regulating the grant and enforcement of IPRs and the policies underlying the international IP system. The course considers each major form of IP from an international perspective, including patents, trademarks, copyrights, geographical indications, design rights and trade secret/data protection. Various important issues regarding the interface between IPRs, industrial policy, economic and social interests, are considered. These include the role of IPRs and transfer of technology in addressing climate change and other environmental matters, the interplay between IPRs and public health, and the set of issues affecting the digital environment.

This course provides an introduction to the work performed by lawyers in international business transactions and to the specific skills and knowledge needed to negotiate multinational transactions. International and several domestic regulatory frameworks for foreign trade and investment will be analyzed. We will focus on single, commodity trades; distributorships; technology transfer; and joint venture vehicles for direct foreign investment. Negotiating strategies and cultural considerations in multinational transactions will be discussed. There will be specific coverage of the business and legal contexts of Europe, China and Japan.

This problem-oriented course is designed for students seeking a general understanding of the subject as well as for students wishing to acquire specific skills for personal involvement in the promotion of International Human Rights, whether in government service or private practice. The course includes consideration of substantive international human rights norms, especially civil and political rights; the role of such norms in international and domestic law; fora-international, regional, and domestic-available for adjudicating or promoting the observance of human rights standards; the procedural rules that govern such fora; the methods by which decisions are made and increasingly enforced; and problems of including human rights concern as an integral part of the country's foreign policy.

Students will take part in one or two role playing exercises - for example, a U.N. debate, an appellate court argument, a congressional hearing, an ABA debate, or a Department of State decision-making meeting. This participation, as well as class discussion based upon regular attendance and a thorough reading of the assigned materials, forms a significant part of the course and will be taken into account in determining the student's grade.

This course addresses the field of women’s human rights in an international context. Various topics will be covered in terms of their impact on women’s human rights globally including discrimination and intersectionality; gender-based violence; sexual orientation and gender identity; COVID-19; #MeToo, non-state actors, and social protest; sexual and reproductive rights; economic, social, and cultural rights; the environment and climate change; regional human rights systems; culture and religion; and the digital world.

This course covers the law and institutions governing the global trading system, including that of the World Trade Organization (WTO) and regional trading arrangements (e.g., the European Union and NAFTA). The WTO incorporates a dispute settlement system, including the Appellate Body, the jurisprudence of which is followed by other trading regimes. The laws and institutions of the United States that are relevant to international trade are addressed, including constitutional aspects, import and export rules, and rules providing border protection for intellectual property. For the past several decades, the United States has actively negotiated bilateral and regional trading arrangements to promote US interests, and current negotiating efforts (e.g., the TransPacific Partnership) are discussed. A substantial part of new trading arrangements address protection of investment, including in many cases investor-to-state dispute settlement (ISDS). The course covers investment rules, including ISDS, as a feature of trading arrangements. International trade policy and rules affect a range of other subject matters, including the environment, innovation, public health, labor and human rights.

This is the first Internet course for American and Chinese students of international trade. In it, American and Chinese students simultaneously participate in simulated trade transactions with one another. Using an Internet-based program and a workbook designed just for this course, students will play the role of simulated corporations in their respective countries who are seeking to trade goods between China and the United States. To do this, students at both the Florida State College of Law and the Shanghai Institute of Foreign Trade (SIFT) log on regularly to receive news about trading opportunities. Using guidance provided in introductory lectures and in the workbook, and under the guise of simulated corporations provided in the Internet environment of the course, students will contact one another across the Pacific Ocean and carry out the actual steps of an international trade transaction. Students will also regularly maintain online records of their company's transactions, in order to track the results of their deals. In addition, Florida State students will meet once a week for a two-hour session in which the week's transactions are discussed and any problems that cropped up can be analyzed and solved. Florida State and SIFT students will also log onto the program during one designated hour per week, at which time they will converse about their respective legal and business cultures and have an opportunity to collaboratively solve problems that typically crop up in Sino-American business transactions. At the end of the semester, a banquet will be held at which time stock will be taken of the financial health of each of the simulated corporations.

This course begins by providing a basic introduction to international law and research. When the Jessup Problem is released in late September, the class divides into teams to prepare memorials for their team. The class culminates in November with the intramural oral competition to choose the Florida State College of Law Jessup Team. The four-person team is chosen based both on the written memorial and the oral argument, and the winning team continues during the Spring semester to represent Florida State Law in the regional and international competitions.

An introduction to a wide range of legal and policy issues centered around the relationships among nations and the role of law in world order. Problems studied include the nature and sources of international law, the existence and activities of states, the status of individuals and associations within the international legal system, and issues of war, development, and environmental protection. 

This course explores the jurisdiction and role of the Supreme Court in comparative perspective. It examines the case law of the Supreme Court and compares it to that of other supreme or constitutional courts in the following areas: federalism, the separation of powers, constitutional rights, judicial review, remedies, and methods of interpretation. The course gives students the opportunity to understand the constitutional underpinnings of selected legal systems and the role of supreme courts in shaping them. It takes as a basis the jurisprudence of the Supreme Court and compares it to that of other courts which exercise comparable jurisdiction. Particular attention is paid to constitutional rights.

In this course we will study the legal, ethical and political aspects of war. The course is in three parts. The first part will cover the theoretical frameworks used to explain war: just war theory, realism and pacifism. The second part will explore the law of the use of force, with special emphasis on the UN Charter and past and current cases. Finally, we will conduct an introductory survey of the laws of war as established in the Geneva Conventions. Students must read the assigned materials, participate in class, and write a final examination.