University of Georgia School of Law Professor Desirée LeClercq recently delivered a presentation for the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office’s Trade & Economic Diplomacy Faculty entitled “Growing Employment Through Trade: The Role of Fair Labour Standards.”
LeClercq discussed the evolution of international labor standards, noting how rules once designed to protect workers and improve living conditions are now used by countries such as the United States to enforce rights abroad and reshape global supply chains. Drawing on her experience as director of labour affairs at the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative and as a legal officer at the International Labour Organization, she illustrated this trend through examples from the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA).
LeClercq joined the University of Georgia School of Law in 2024 as an assistant professor. She teaches Contracts, International Trade and Workers Rights, International Labor Law, International Law and U.S. Labor Law, and Public International Law. She also serves as a faculty co-director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center and as the faculty adviser for the Georgia Journal of International and Comparative Law.
The daylong conference will take place on Friday, November 7 in the Larry Walker Room of Dean Rusk Hall at the University of Georgia School of Law. CLE credit is available for both in-person and virtual attendance. Registration information can be found on the conference webpage.
Sponsoring along with GJICL, a student-edited journal established more than 50 years ago, is the law school’s Dean Rusk International Law Center. GJICL Editor in Chief, Casey Smith (J.D. ’26) and Executive Conference Editor Kellianne Elliot (J.D. ’26) worked Georgia Criminal Law Review Editor in Chief Kerolls Gadelrab (J.D. ’26); Professor Jason A. Cade, J. Alton Hosch Professor of Law & Community Health Law Partnership Clinic Director; Center staff Sarah Quinn, Director; Catrina Martin, Global Practice Preparation Assistant; Taher S. Benany, Center Associate Director; and with the GJICL’s Faculty Advisor, Professor Desirée LeClercq, who is Assistant Professor of Law & Faculty Co-Director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center.
Below is the concept note of the conference:
Political and legal developments have precipitated a convergence of the fields of criminal law and immigration law. Now commonly referred to as crimmigration, this merger of previously distinct practice areas already has profoundly reshaped the legal and social terrain for migrants in the United States. While entry and removal decisions remain essentially administrative, enforcement practices and rhetoric increasingly embrace the punitive logic and carceral reach of the criminal legal system, but with fewer due process protections. As new legislation vastly expands detention authorization and other enforcement resources, it seems apparent that the rhetoric and mechanics of crimmigration will continue to dominate immigration policy in the United States for the foreseeable future.
This symposium, jointly sponsored by the Dean Rusk International Law Center, the Georgia Journal of International and Comparative Law, and the Georgia Criminal Law Review, invites scholars, immigration attorneys and judges to engage with these developments. We hope panelists will collectively address a number of important questions, such as the following: How does the new crimmigration landscape impact immigrants and communities in the Southeast and beyond? What new burdens does it put on the judiciary, and what role do federal courts have today in determining and upholding constitutional and statutory protections for migrants? Does the durability and continued expansion of crimmigration pose new challenges for immigration and criminal law attorneys; and, if so, how are the immigration and criminal law bars responding to those challenges? As crimmigration tactics expand, what new legal threats face U.S. citizens, including family members, employers, and immigrant advocates? Does the crimmigration paradigm contend with or obscure the structural forces that drive migration, particularly from the global south? Are there reasons to hope or expect the emergence of alternatives to crimmigration as the governing paradigm for the regulation of immigrants in the United States?
These conversations will occur through three panels and a lunchtime keynote speaker.
The day’s events are as follows:
9:30am | Opening Remarks
Usha Rodrigues, Dean, University Professor & M.E. Kilpatrick Chair of Corporate Finance and Securities Law
9:35am | Panel 1: Introduction to Crimmigration & the Current State of Affairs
Abel Rodríguez, Assistant Professor of Law, Wake Forest Law
Shalini Ray, Associate Professor of Law and Director of Faculty Research, Alabama Law
Gracie Willis, Attorney, National Immigration Project
Moderator: Christian Turner, Associate Professor of Law, University of Georgia School of Law
10:35am | Break
10:45am| Panel 2: The Impact of Crimmigration Policies on Communities and Advocates
Jessica Vosburgh, Senior Staff Attorney, Center for Constitutional Rights
Jenny R. Hernandez, Lead Senior Attorney at Immigration Defense Unit, City of Atlanta Office of the Public Defender
Carolina Antonini, Founding Partner, Antonini & Cohen Immigration Law
Moderator: Elizabeth Taxel, Clinical Associate Professor & Criminal Defense Practicum Director, University of Georgia School of Law
12:00pm | Keynote Introduction
Jason A. Cade, J. Alton Hosch Professor of Law & Community Health Law Partnership Clinic Director, University of Georgia School of Law
12:05 Keynote Address
Judge Ana C. Reyes, United States District Court, District of Columbia
1:00pm | Panel 3: Challenging the Legality of Migration Controls & Envisioning Reform
Daniel I. Morales, Associate Professor of Law; Dwight Olds Chair, The University of Houston Law Center
Rebecca A. Sharpless, Associate Dean for Experiential Learning, Professor of Law, Director, Immigration Clinic, University of Miami School of Law
Emily Torstveit Ngara, Director of Clinical Programs, Associate Clinical Professor and Director, Immigration Clinic, Center for Access to Justice, Immigration Law Clinic, Georgia State University College of Law
Moderator: Jason A. Cade J. Alton Hosch Professor of Law & Community Health Law Partnership Clinic Director, University of Georgia School of Law
2:00 | Closing Remarks
Casey Smith, Editor in Chief, Georgia Journal of International and Comparative Law
University of Georgia School of Law Professor Desirée LeClercq and former U.S. diplomat Christina Hardaway discussed their career trajectories and experiences working internationally in a recent law school panel discussion, “Working in Public International Law and Diplomacy.”
After introducing themselves and outlining their academic and professional paths, LeClercq and Hardaway took questions from the audience. They talked about the importance of soft skills in diplomatic work, how to develop your expertise in domestic affairs to make yourself more marketable overseas, the challenges of living abroad, and detailed both the rewards and complexities of committing to a career in public service.
Hardaway is a former diplomat (Foreign Service Officer) for the U.S. Department of State with a 14-year career spanning Latin America, Europe, and Africa. She most recently completed a diplomatic assignment at the U.S. Consulate General in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, where she advanced U.S. economic, security, and commercial priorities on the U.S.-Mexico border. Prior to that, Hardaway served as Deputy Chief of the Political-Economic Section at the U.S. Embassy in Cameroon leading the mission’s economic and commercial portfolio. Her previous assignments include gender and entrepreneurship officer in the Bureau of African Affairs, energy and environment officer at the U.S. Embassy in The Hague, consular officer at the U.S. Consulate General in Monterrey, Mexico, and a detail at the U.S. African Development Foundation.
LeClercq joined the University of Georgia School of Law in 2024 as an assistant professor. She teaches Contracts, International Trade and Workers Rights, International Labor Law, International Law and U.S. Labor Law, and Public International Law. She also serves as a faculty co-director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center and as the faculty adviser for the Georgia Journal of International and Comparative Law. From 2016 to 2020, she served as a director of labor affairs in the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR). Before joining USTR, LeClercq worked for nearly a decade as a legal officer at the International Labor Organization in Geneva, Switzerland, and served as staff counsel for the chairman of the National Labor Relations Board.
This event was part of the Dean Rusk International Law Center’s ongoing Consular Series, which presents students, staff, and faculty with global perspectives on international trade, cooperation, development, and policy.
University of Georgia School of Law Professor Desirée LeClercq recently organized and funded (through a grant won at Cornell University) a transnational conference of U.S., Mexican, and Canadian labor unions and leaders at Flacso Mexico in Mexico City. Patricia Campos-Medina (WI-ILR Cornell University), Alex Covarrubias (El Colegio de Sonora), and Cirila Quintero (El Colegio de la Frontera Norte) served as conference co-organizers.
This one-day transnational labor conference solicited the views of labor unions, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), organizers, and workers on the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA)’s Rapid Response Mechanism (RRM) in light of current geopolitical dynamics. Participants identified current challenges in filing petitions under the RRM, aligned strategic approaches to the 2026 re-negotiation of the USMCA, and discussed ways to work together notwithstanding current tensions in politics and trade. The conference was structured to first discuss the RRM on a technical level before broadening to account for political tensions and joint transnational strategies. It concluded with ways participants could remain organized and collaborate in the future.
LeClercq joined the University of Georgia School of Law in 2024 as an assistant professor. She teaches International Trade and Workers Rights, International Labor Law, International Law and U.S. Labor Law. She also serves as a faculty co-director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center and as the faculty adviser for the Georgia Journal of International and Comparative Law.
University of Georgia School of Law Professor Desirée LeClercq recently delivered a presentation on the future of multilateralism, trade, and worker rights to World Trade Organization officials and researchers in Geneva, Switzerland.
LeClercq received financial support to attend this workshop from the Dean Rusk International Law Center as a Rusk Scholar-in-Residence, an initiative promoting international opportunities for Georgia Law faculty that advance the mission of the Center.
LeClercq joined the University of Georgia School of Law in 2024 as an assistant professor. She teaches International Trade and Workers Rights, International Labor Law, International Law and U.S. Labor Law. She also serves as a faculty co-director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center and as the faculty adviser for the Georgia Journal of International and Comparative Law.
Convened by the Remaking Trade Project (RTP) and co-hosted by the Centre for Trade and Economic Integration (CTEI), this workshop brought together a diverse range of researchers, economists, legal experts and policy advocates to explore the creation of a dedicated research stream as part of the RTP. Their stated goal is “…to continue strengthening the intellectual foundations of the trade-sustainability agenda, while also responding to a rapidly changing trade landscape in ways that are agile, inclusive, and impactful.”
Over twenty-five colleagues joined the day of interactive roundtables, from over 20 global institutions and/or countries, drawing from participants of the RTP’s work to date.
LeClercq received financial support to attend this workshop from the Dean Rusk International Law Center as a Rusk Scholar-in-Residence, an initiative promoting international opportunities for Georgia Law faculty that advance the mission of the Center.
LeClercq joined the University of Georgia School of Law in 2024 as an assistant professor. She teaches International Trade and Workers Rights, International Labor Law, International Law and U.S. Labor Law. She also serves as a faculty co-director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center and as the faculty adviser for the Georgia Journal of International and Comparative Law.
University of Georgia School of Law Professor Desirée LeClercq served as a panelist in the virtual discussion “Inequalities and Violence at Sea.” This panel, moderated by Furaha Joy Sekai Saungweme and Costanza Hermanin, was part of a webinar series hosted by the Gender Justice and Harassment Working Group of UC Berkeley Law’s Center on Comparative Equality & Anti-Discrimination Law. The series was launched in recognition of the International Day for Women in Maritime, an annual observance on May 18 that highlights the contributions of women across the maritime industry.
LeClercq discussed her recent article, “Gender-Based Violence and Harassment at Sea”, which examines the Maritime Labour Convention (2006). She was joined by panelist Tim Springett, Policy Director of the United Kingdom Chamber of Shipping, as they explored the gendered dimensions of labor, safety, and inclusion in the maritime sector.
LeClercq joined the University of Georgia School of Law in 2024 as an assistant professor. She teaches International Trade and Workers Rights, International Labor Law, International Law and U.S. Labor Law. This semester, LeClercq is overseeing the International Law Colloquium, a for-credit course designed to introduce students to international economic law through engagement with scholars in the international legal field. She also serves as a faculty co-director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center and as the faculty adviser for the Georgia Journal of International and Comparative Law.
The University of Georgia School of Law’s spring 2025 International Law Colloquium welcomed Sarah Dadush, Professor of Law at Rutgers Law School, who presented her working paper, “Shared Responsibility in Contract Law.” Professor Christopher Bruner, Stembler Family Distinguished Professor in Business Law and Faculty Co-Director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center at Georgia Law, served as her faculty discussant. Dadush’s presentation marks the conclusion of the 2025 International Law Colloquium.
Dadush’s scholarly focus lies in business and human rights, consumer law, and social enterprise law. She also serves as the Director of the Responsible Contracting Project (RCP), a project designed to advocate for human rights and environmental due diligence in contract drafting. The RCP is located within the Rutgers Law School’s Center for Corporate Law and Governance.
Below is an abstract of Dadush’s working paper:
At first, the notion that there is such a thing as shared responsibility in American contract law may sound fanciful, if not absurd. A key reason why parties contract in the first place is to allocate risks and responsibilities between them and to clarify who must do what to move the collaboration forward. As such, contractual obligations are understood to be binary, belonging either to one party or the other, not both. In practice, this means that, if there is a breach, only the obligated party will be held responsible, not both. And, if remedies are awarded, they will flow only from the breaching to the non-breaching party, not between them. Thus, the notion that the parties might be contractually responsible not just for their own obligations, but also for those of their counterparty, seems incoherent.
And yet, as this Article shows, it is not uncommon for courts to go beyond the express terms of the contract to make the parties share responsibility for the performance of one another’s obligations. Thus shared responsibility: Each party is held responsible for the other’s contractual (non)performance, even in the absence of an express commitment to share responsibility for performance.
This Article “goes fishing” for shared responsibility in three key areas of contract law: The contents of the contract, breach, and remedies. It demonstrates that shared responsibility is brought to bear to resolve contract disputes more often and with greater legal effect than the simple, binary understanding of contract might predict. When it enters the judicial analysis, shared responsibility can drastically change the answers to the questions: Who had the obligation to perform? Who breached? And, finally, whose harm should be remedied and how?
Having shown that shared responsibility is already a prominent, if overlooked, feature of American contract law, this Article argues that, in certain situations, courts should employ shared responsibility as a default rule. Specifically, courts should employ a shared responsibility default (SRD) when the contract was breached, or otherwise failed, and (1) both parties contributed to the failure, and (2) the failure could, or has already, generated high social costs (e.g., public endangerment, human rights violations in supply chains, consumer deception). In such situations, the SRD would activate the tort law principles of comparative negligence and proximate cause in contract, holding both parties accountable for their respective contributions to the contract’s failure and related social costs. In doing so, the SRD would equip courts to resolve contract disputes in a manner that attends to both contract policy and public policy objectives.
This year, Professor Desirée LeClercq led the colloquium, which was designed to introduce students to features of international economic law through engagement with scholars in the international legal field. To view the full list of International Law Colloquium speakers, visit our website.
This program w made possible through the Kirbo Trust Endowed Faculty Enhancement Fund and the Talmadge Law Faculty Fund.
The University of Georgia School of Law’s spring 2025 International Law Colloquium welcomed Duke University School of Law’s Professor Rachel Brewster, who presented her working paper, “The Rise of Global FCPA Settlements.” Assaf Harpaz, Assistant Professor of Law at Georgia Law, served as Brewster’s faculty discussant.
Brewster is the Jeffrey and Bettysue Hughes Distinguished Professor of Law at Duke University School of Law. Her scholarly focus lies in international economic law, international dispute settlement, World Trade Organization (WTO) law, anti-corruption law, and international relations theory. Brewster currently serves as the co-director of Duke’s Center for International and Comparative Law and is co-chair of Duke’s JD-LLM in International and Comparative Law Program.
Below is an abstract of Brewster’s working paper:
For the last two decades, the United States has been the dominant enforcer of anti-bribery norms worldwide. Using the broad extraterritorial jurisdiction granted by the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), the Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission have prosecuted domestic and foreign corporations for bribing foreign government officials. This transnational enforcement system has been described as a negative comity regime: foreign governments defer to American prosecutions even if the case involves their nationals. This system has created a robust enforcement environment but often faces foreign resistance to the perceived “American dominance” of the regime.
This Article analyzes the recent rise of a new enforcement model: the global FCPA settlement, where multiple governments enter into parallel deferred prosecution agreements or other non-trial resolutions with corporate entities. This enforcement model is now the principal form for concluding “blockbuster” FCPA cases and has significant implications for the evolution of the transnational anti-bribery law regime. The Article argues that the rise of global settlements results from (1) a greater demand by foreign governments to be involved in foreign bribery resolutions when their national firms are on trial and (2) American prosecutors’ willingness to accommodate this demand when it results in more effective prosecutions (i.e., new cases, more claims, or stronger evidence). This Article contends that the rise of global FCPA settlements marks a significant shift in the international anti-bribery enforcement regime, transitioning from a negative comity to a coordinated comity regime. The global resolution model addresses some of the concerns of the negative comity regime by permitting multiple governments to have a voice in negotiating the level of the penalties, the distribution of the penalties, and any structural reforms that the firm will be required to adopt. It also can potentially increase the effectiveness of the enforcement regime by expanding the geographic scope of the investigations and quality of evidence. The Article concludes by discussing the importance of this Article to the Trump Administration’s recent executive order on FCPA enforcement.
This year, Professor Desirée LeClercq is overseeing the colloquium, which is designed to introduce students to features of international economic law through engagement with scholars in the international legal field. To view the full list of International Law Colloquium speakers, visit our website.
This program is made possible through the Kirbo Trust Endowed Faculty Enhancement Fund and the Talmadge Law Faculty Fund.
The University of Georgia School of Law’s spring 2025 International Law Colloquium recently hosted Temple Law’s Trang (Mae) Nguyen, who presented her working paper, “Goods’ Nationalities.” Pamela Foohey, Allen Post Professor of Law at Georgia Law, served as Nguyen’s faculty discussant.
Nguyen is an Associate Professor of Law at the Temple University Beasley School of Law and is an Affiliated Scholar at the U.S.-Asia Law Institute at the New York University School of Law. Her research focuses on business law, contracts, transnational law, and international law. Nguyen also previously held research appointments at the University of Hong Kong Faculty of Law, the National University of Singapore Centre for Asian Legal Studies, and the Singapore Management University Yong Pung How School of Law.
Below is an abstract of Nguyen’s working paper:
Products’ nationalities are at the center of today’s fast-changing global order. The Trump administration’s liberal use of tariffs against friends and foes, sanctions against Russian products, the banning of Chinese goods, and efforts to revitalize American manufacturing, to name just a few, all hinge on classifications of where a product is deemed “from.” But in today’s globalized economy, what exactly makes something “American” or “Chinese” or of any other nationality, for that matter?
This Article reexamines how goods acquire their designated nationalities at a time when such designation matters well beyond traditional commerce. It advances two main arguments. First, a product’s nationality is not fixed; rather, it is malleable and can vary depending upon the substantive legal regime under which the good is regulated—once predominantly trade law but now increasingly through a trade-security nexus and a trade-human rights nexus. Second, such malleability occurs through what I call an “attribute selection” process. In effect, each legal regime pivots the nationality analysis on certain “attributes” of a product, swapping and switching them as befit underlying interests and policy goals. The construction of product nationality thus occurs through mapping two separate sets of variables: first, the bundle of attributes of a product, and second, the “prisms” through which laws place significance on these attributes.
This Article makes several contributions. First, descriptively, it charts an updated account on product nationality’s expanded use, particularly in trade law’s nexus with national security and human rights. Second, conceptually, building on this updated descriptive account, it advances a novel framework—the attribute selection process—to unpack the making of product nationality. Third, normatively, it underscores how the need to use product nationality as proxy fits uneasily with the reality of global production, and how efforts to move away from nationality-based rules are likely vulnerable to similar challenges. Ultimately, while the Article makes clear that the concept of nationality is doing heavy lifting across various legal fields, it does not take a strong normative stand, opting instead to explain why taking a strong normative position is premature during fast evolving developments. Finally, the Article offers some practical considerations for policymakers, businesses, and other stakeholders as they consider product-nationality regulations going forward.
This year, Professor Desirée LeClercq is overseeing the colloquium, which is designed to introduce students to features of international economic law through engagement with scholars in the international legal field. To view the full list of International Law Colloquium speakers, visit our website.
This program is made possible through the Kirbo Trust Endowed Faculty Enhancement Fund and the Talmadge Law Faculty Fund.
exchange of notes 