The US-China Trade Negotiation: A Contract Theory Perspective
Philip K.H. Wong Centre for Chinese Law
黃乾亨中國法研究中心
International Speaker Series Spring 2024
In Spring 2024, the Philip K. H. Wong Centre for Chinese Law is excited to host our International Speaker Series, featuring distinguished scholars from the United States, Europe and China. These interactive talks will showcase the latest ideas and publications related to domestic and international laws, offering fresh perspectives on topics such as women's rights, EU competition law, legal compliance for Chinese companies in the United States, and Chinese tech regulation. Anyone with a keen interest in China is most welcome to join us!
Women’s Property Rights under CEDAW
Date & Time: January 25, 2024 (Thursday) 13:00 - 14:00
Platform: Zoom
(Delivered in English with Mandarin Simultaneous Interpretation)
Speaker: Professor José Alvarez, Herbert and Rose Rubin Professor of International Law, School of Law, New York University
Discussant: Professor Xin He, Professor, Faculty of Law, The University of Hong Kong
Chair: Professor Angela Zhang, Director of the Philip K. H. Wong Centre for Chinese Law, Associate Professor of Law, The University of Hong Kong
Description:
For over 40 years, the leading international treaty body on women's rights, the Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (the CEDAW Committee), has been generating jurisprudence interpreting CEDAW's obligations that states protect the equal rights of women. This book talk concludes that CEDAW's re-engendering of property—although a flawed and evolving work in progress—has the potential to be transformative for the half of the planet who is more likely to be treated as property than to have any. José summarizes criticisms made of CEDAW and international human rights regimes, as well as responses to the criticisms; and assesses the challenges facing the CEDAW regime as well as its potential to advance transformational change.
Negotiating Legality:
Chinese Companies in the US Legal Systems
Date & Time: February 29, 2024 (Thursday) 12:00 - 13:00
Venue: Academic Conference Room, 11/F, Cheng Yu Tung Tower, HKU
Speaker: Professor Ji Li, John & Marilyn Long Professor of US-China Business and Law, Irvine School of Law, University of California
Discussant: Professor Jedidiah Kroncke, Associate Professor of Law, The University of Hong Kong
Chair: Professor Angela Zhang, Director of the Philip K. H. Wong Centre for Chinese Law, Associate Professor of Law, The University of Hong Kong
Registration: Please click HERE
Description:
Despite escalating geopolitical rivalry, the US and China continue to be economically intertwined. Numerous Chinese companies have made substantial investments in the US and are reluctant exit this strategically important market. While the global expansion of Chinese companies has ignited intense policy and academic debates, their interactions with complex host-state legal systems have largely escaped systematic examination. To fill this knowledge gap, Negotiating Legality introduces a dual institutional framework and applies it to analyzing extensive interviews and multi-year survey data, thereby shedding light on how Chinese companies develop in-house legal capacities, engage with US legal professionals, and navigate litigation in US courts. As the first comprehensive investigation of these crucial topics, this talk is indispensable for anyone interested in China's rise, its global impacts-especially on legal systems of developed nations like the US-and the intricate dynamics of US-China relations.
Superpower Legal Rivalry and the Global Compliance Dilemma
Date & Time: March 4, 2024 (Monday) 12:00 - 13:00
Venue: Academic Conference Room, 11/F, Cheng Yu Tung Tower, HKU
Speaker: Professor Ji Li, John & Marilyn Long Professor of US-China Business and Law, Irvine School of Law, University of California
Discussant: Professor Jedidiah Kroncke, Associate Professor of Law, The University of Hong Kong
Chair: Professor Angela Zhang, Director of the Philip K. H. Wong Centre for Chinese Law, Associate Professor of Law, The University of Hong Kong
Registration: Please click HERE
Description:
The intensifying rivalry between the United States and China has spawned a proliferation of contradictory laws and regulations, plunging transnational actors into a vexing compliance dilemma—conformity with U.S. law often necessitates contravention of Chinese law, and vice versa. Ji illuminates this superpower legal rivalry and how multinational corporations (MNCs), as prime beneficiaries of post-Cold War economic globalization, navigate this fractured, intricate legal terrain when compelled to take sides amid the great power competition. He triangulates this comparative analysis with novel empirical evidence, leveraging two sets of original survey data to investigate Chinese MNCs’ varying exposure to the compliance dilemma. This talk formulates a theoretical framework that models the superpower legal rivalry and corporate reactions as parts of a dynamic, strategic, multi-actor process. Applying insights from neo-institutionalism, this paradigm-shifting account integrates the analyses of corporate internal and external responses to the fractured, intricate global compliance environment. The legal rivalry and the responses of transnational actors will profoundly reshape the existing international legal, economic, and political orders.
AI Outputs Are Not Protected Speech
Date & Time: March 13, 2024 (Wednesday) 12:00 - 13:00
Venue: Room 723, 7/F, Cheng Yu Tung Tower, HKU
Speaker: Peter N. Salib, Assistant Professor of Law, the University of Houston Law Center and Associated Faculty in Public Affairs
Chair: Professor Angela Zhang, Director of the Philip K. H. Wong Centre for Chinese Law, Associate Professor of Law, The University of Hong Kong
Registration: Please click HERE
Description:
AI outputs are not protected speech. When a generative AI system—like ChatGPT—outputs some text, image, or sound, no one thereby communicates. Systems like ChatGPT are designed to be able to “say” essentially anything, producing innumerable ideas and opinions that neither creators nor users have conceived or endorsed. Thus, when a human asks an AI a question, the AI’s answer is no more the asker’s speech than a human’s answer would be. Nor do AI outputs communicate their creators’ thoughts, any more than a child’s speech is her parents’ expression. In such circumstances, First Amendment law is clear. Absent a communication from a protected speaker, there is no protected speech. Peter explains why as a matter of First Amendment law, free speech theory, and computer-scientific fact, AI outputs are best understood as fitting into one or more of these less-protected First Amendment categories. These insights will be indispensable to the regulatory project of making AI safe for humanity.
How China Governs Big Tech and Regulates Artificial Intelligence
Date & Time: March 21, 2024 (Thursday) 13:00-14:30
Venue: Room 824, 8/F, Cheng Yu Tung Tower, HKU
Speaker: Professor Angela Zhang, Director of the Philip K. H. Wong Centre for Chinese Law, The University of Hong Kong
Registration: Coming Soon
Description:
China has long been recognized as a powerhouse in cultivating Big Tech firms that rival those in the United States. However, the Chinese government recently embarked on a massive regulatory crackdown, targeting its largest tech corporations such as Alibaba, Tencent, and Meituan. Many Western experts have perceived China’s tech crackdown as the government’s assault on private businesses, causing growing doubts among investors whether Chinese firms are still investable.
In this book talk, Professor Zhang will take us beyond the headlines to unravel the complexity of China’s regulatory governance. Drawing insights from her newly released book, “High Wire: How China Regulates Big Tech and Governs Its Economy,” she will introduce the dynamic pyramid model of regulation, a new analytical framework that demystifies Chinese regulatory governance. Professor Zhang will also apply this model to analyze China’s strategic approach to regulating artificial intelligence and discuss its implications for the global tech rivalry and the prospects for international cooperation. Join Professor Zhang as she uncovers how China regulates on the high wire by navigating the intricate balance between innovation, regulation and geopolitical contest.
The New EU Competition Law and the Transformations of Contemporary Enforcement
Date & Time: March 2024 (TBC)
Venue: Cheng Yu Tung Tower, HKU
Speaker: Professor Pablo Ibáñez Colomo, Professor of Law and Jean Monnet Chair in Competition and Regulation, London School of Economics and Political Science
Chair: Professor Angela Zhang, Director of the Philip K. H. Wong Centre for Chinese Law, Associate Professor of Law, The University of Hong Kong
Registration: Coming Soon
Description:
This book talk provides the first comprehensive account of the New EU Competition Law: an emerging understanding of the discipline that breaks from the consensus of the early 2000s and that ventures into uncharted territories. Pablo discusses the shift from traditional enforcement in the industrial era to the sort of intervention that a knowledge-based economy demands. The analysis includes an up-to-date evaluation of the Digital Markets Act and addresses the application of EU competition law to key areas, including energy, pharma, telecommunications and online platforms.
Date & Time: March 2024 (TBC)
Venue: Cheng Yu Tung Tower, HKU
Speaker: Professor Pablo Ibáñez Colomo, Professor of Law and Jean Monnet Chair in Competition and Regulation, London School of Economics and Political Science
Chair: Professor Angela Zhang, Director of the Philip K. H. Wong Centre for Chinese Law, Associate Professor of Law, The University of Hong Kong
Registration: Coming Soon