Draw Breath

There are two interesting articles in today's Times, suggesting at major extensions of domestic law in response to globalisation. The first reports on the US Supreme Court's decision (though in odd circumstances) to allow a lawsuit to go ahead, under the Alien Tort Claims Act (see also here), of companies that collaborated with the Apartheid regime in South Africa. If lawyers establish that these companies knowingly assisted the South African regime in breaching human rights, they may be liable for millions of dollars.

Second, there's an article on the implications of corporations being found responsible for bribery in both developing and developed countries. It's always one of those things denied by the sorts of twats who advocate cutting aid to developing countries because of corruption: corrupters are just as guilty and they tend to be a lot closer to home. Certainly, the BAE probe was depressing, but corruption is very much coming onto the agenda. Again, the Alien Tort Claims Act may be start to be employed in interesting ways here. In which case, private action will emerge as one of the major sources of regulation of globalisation.