Law, Society & State: Derivatives Law & Crypto Contracts

Introduction course – Derivatives products have exploded in the last 30 years from being used for important risk hedging in the institutional sector to large speculative trading.  We are now seeing a similar explosion of activity for retail investors particularly in the crypto trading area.
 
This is a two hour weekly seminar that provides a history of the development of derivatives,  and overview and explanation of derivatives and derivatives regulation in Canada and internationally, including crypto assets and the regulation of crypto trading, from the perspective of a regulator. We will review the Ontario Securities Act, regulations and policies, as it relates to derivatives and also look at futures oversight under the Commodity Futures Act and have an in-depth discussion of the post financial meltdown derivatives regulatory reform.  We will also provide an introduction to documentation of OTC derivatives.
 
We will examine blockchain technology and how it is used in crypto contracts and currencies, Defi, NFT’s, stablecoins, and staking. We will review the developing oversight regimes for these products and participants in Canada and internationally.  We will discuss the gaps in regulation in this area and look at the Canadian Quadriga and the FTX collapse examples to assess the risks involved in trading in these markets and the role of regulation to prevent further investor losses.
   
In a fast developing new area of the law this will provide students an up to date discussion that will be adjusted through the course to accommodate new developments, particularly as it relates to the oversight of the crypto markets.  We will also ask questions regarding these new volatile markets like: Is there anything underlying these assets?  Is this the present day version of tulip mania? Will crypto currencies be around for decades or will they be short term speculative investments that benefit some to the detriment of many?  Or are they the future that will replace sovereign currencies and provide cheaper sources of payment that will remove the costs associated with financial intermediation from Banks?  Who should invest in these products?  Who shouldn’t?
The goal is to have students leave the course with a solid grounding in derivatives and crypto trading and the related areas of law.  We will use a multi media approach using a variety of related printed and online materials.  There will also be expert guest lecturers for some of these topics.

Comparative Law: International & Comparative Labour Law

Artificial Intelligence and management-by-algorithms are reshaping the modern world of work in industrialized and developing countries. This is exemplified by the rise of platform work in the so-called gig-economy but is spreading in every sector and affects both blue-collar and white-collar occupations. Besides the intuitive risks in terms of automation of jobs, this seminar will focus specifically on less-known challenges, including algorithmic discrimination, augmented work surveillance, privacy invasion, increase in non-standard forms of work, and disruption of collective rights. We will look at these challenges from an international and comparative standpoint. We will focus specifically on international labour law and developments concerning the International Labour Organization, and other regional and national developments at the European level to compare them with the Canadian legal landscape.

Law & Social Change: Corporate Responsiblity

This course provides students with perspectives into corporate social responsibility both as a governing mechanism for businesses as well as a form of business practice. The course will examine the theoretical paradigms surrounding the corporate objective and corporate accountability, international movements in corporate social responsibility led by organizations such as the OECD and the UN, as well as the legal frameworks in human rights protection and corporate risk management. The course will devote a significant proportion of time to the role of corporations in human rights and furthering social welfare and will discuss key critical perspectives on other social rights, including labour and the environment. This course will challenge students into viewing the role and responsibility of the corporation from perspectives beyond the traditional paradigm of shareholder primacy and is well placed to complement traditional corporate law and regulation courses as well as courses in international law.

Securities Regulation

A primary objective of this course is that students obtain a solid grounding in the basic concepts of Ontario securities law, as well as an understanding of the underlying policy objectives that regulators and decision-makers seek to achieve in implementing and interpreting statutory provisions.  Students should also develop some appreciation of how the requirements of securities law shape and influence business transactions and the activities of public issuers, as well as how courts and regulators deploy securities law concepts and policies in resolving disputes.  Participants will also be introduced to a variety of intellectual perspectives that critique or support current precepts of doctrine.  By the end of the course, students should be well positioned to recognize and apply the relevant securities law doctrines and concepts in the context  of examples of business transactions or activities, to understand the various roles that securities lawyers play as advisors to issuers or as litigators of securities law disputes, as well as to analyse the policy goals underlying securities law requirements.  For those students who do not necessarily intend to practice securities law, the expectation is that the course will provide a working knowledge of key aspects of capital markets operation and their governance by law.

Immigration Law

This course begins with an overview of the Canadian immigration system and international migration patterns with the objective of understanding who is coming to Canada and why. The basic features of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Regulations will then be discussed including: family sponsorship, economic immigration and inadmissibility. Embedded in this discussion will be an overview of how immigration decision-making takes place and the reviewability of immigration administrative decisions. A portion of the course will be devoted to looking at current topics in immigration law.

International Trade Regulation

This introductory course surveys the laws of international trade regulation from a Canadian perspective. The course focuses on the public international law and domestic public law regimes regulating the conduct of international trade to and from Canada, with a particular focus on the multilateral World Trade Organization (WTO) and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT).  Necessarily, an additional focus will be on the relation between the multilateral WTO-GATT order, and the increasing number of preferential trade agreements relevant to Canada such as the Canada-US-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA, renegotiation of the NAFTA), the Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), and the Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA).  Particular trade subjects for discussion include: WTO/GATT treaties and institutions; dispute settlement; trade in goods; non-discrimination principles; trade law and non-trade objectives such as environmental protection; subsidies and countervailing duties; anti-dumping measures; trade in services; trade and intellectual property; trade and investment. This course will also discuss the relation of trade to matters of national security, including economic sanctions.

Please note that while no particular background is expected of students in terms of prior legal or other disciplinary knowledge (such as economics), the course is heavy in terms of reading of both legal and policy material, some of which is taken from other fields.  Indeed, the course has as an express objective providing all students with some introduction to basic policy aspects of international trade law drawn from economic theory, international relations theory, and international legal theory.  

Please also note that for this course, the instructor emphasizes synchronous learning and that, other than for accommodation requirements, there will be no posting of recordings of scheduled class sessions.

Bankruptcy & Insolvency Law

The lingering effect of Covid 19, supply chain challenges, war in Ukraine, inflation- the world is facing uncertain and challenging times. These challenges will effect financial stability of Canadian businesses and individuals. Some, no doubt, will become insolvent.How do we address the societal and practical consequences of these insolvencies?  

Bankruptcy and insolvency laws provide a framework for restructuring or liquidating insolvent businesses or rehabilitating insolvent individuals.

This course will take a practical approach to reviewing the principal insolvency and restructuring regimes in Canadian law – bankruptcies, receiverships and restructuring under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act or the proposal provisions of the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act.  In addition to learning the substantive and procedural rules with respect to each regime, we will consider the practical implications of insolvencies with respect to various stakeholders such a workers, retirees, pensioners, landlords and governments.

This course combines an analysis of the relevant statutory material and case law with an understanding of the policy choices in insolvencies, as well as the different roles which an insolvency system may play in contemporary society.

Emerging Technologies: Law, Policy and Governance

Established technologies like the internet and social and emerging ones like artificial intelligence, machine learning, and robotics, are transforming how we live, work, and interact. These changes raise a host of complex law, policy, ethical, and governance challenges in a range of domestic and global contexts, including internet censorship, the role and regulation of social media platforms, disinformation and online abuse, legal automation, algorithmic discrimination, privacy, surveillance, fintech, and cyber-warfare. Among the kinds of questions pursued in this course: Who is responsible when technology causes harms? Do we have to forego privacy for either technological innovation or security? How best to regulate social media, if at all? What can we do to prevent algorithmic discrimination and other forms of technology-enabled human rights abuse? What is “ethical” AI and how can we incentivize it?

These issues and other significant challenges and controversies in the law, policy, and governance of emerging technologies will be contextualized and brought to life via case-studies and real world scenarios involving issues that are often currently in the news and unfolding in real time outside the classroom in government, industry, and civil society. The course aims to introduce and provide a foundation in law and technology issues — to identify them, understand and think critically about them, and manage them in practice.  

Public International Law

Public International Law is the system of law relating to inter-state relations, the functioning of international institutions, the relations of such bodies with each other, and their relations with States, individuals, groups and other entities. It seeks an understanding of certain rules of law relating to individuals and non-State entities. This course is intended as an introduction to the norms, rules and practices of international law that are recognized as being binding obligations on sovereign states in their mutual relationships.
Topics will be covered from among the following: sources of international law; subjects of international law (States and non-State actors; self-determination; individuals; international organizations); rights and duties of States; recognition of States and governments and legal effects thereof; state responsibility for international delinquencies; international law applying processes in domestic legal systems; state and diplomatic immunities from suit in foreign courts; the United Nations Charter and limitations on the use of force and international dispute settlement.

Refugee Law

Refugee protection is in a perpetual state of crisis, both domestically and abroad. Many refugee law practitioners and scholars argue that states are retrenching from their duty to provide refugees with the protection to which they are entitled under international law. At the same time, some government actors, media figures and civil society groups contend that existing refugee determination processes are excessively generous and are subject to widespread “abuse” by economically motivated migrants. Still others suggest that refugee protection regimes either distract from or help reinforce a deeper problematic: control over migration that serves to entrench global disparities in income, wealth and security.

This course offers students an opportunity to engage critically with these and other debates over refugee law at the level of theory, policy and practice. This critical engagement will occur through a collaborative examination of refugee law instruments, institutions and jurisprudence in international and domestic forums, with a heavy emphasis on Canada.  

The course will be offered through lectures and class discussions. The course will also include several weeks of student-led teaching in the second half of the term. There will be two written assignments. The course requires consistent and active student participation throughout the term, including participation in evaluated group work. There is no final exam or final paper. The course, including all evaluated work, will be complete by December 1.

Note that the course will be offered in a hybrid remote/in-person format (hyflex). Students can attend classes either on campus or remotely via Zoom.