Research Profile

Professor Chin Leng Lim

 

Email | Research Profile | HKU ResearcherPage | SSRN |

C.L. Lim’s research concentrates on international economic law, particularly trade and investment treaties, international business law, sovereign and international commercial disputes. His recent writings have addressed aspects of trade law, international commercial arbitration, state immunity and the use of economic sanctions. His latest books are the “Trans-Pacific Partnership: A Quest for a Twenty-First Century Agreement” (Cambridge University Press, 2012), co-edited with Deborah Elms and Patrick Low and “Law of the Hong Kong Constitution” (Sweet & Maxwell, September 2011) with Johannes Chan S. C. He is working on a volume of essays provisionally entitled “International Economic Law After the Crisis”, with Bryan Mercurio.

Selection of Recent Articles (2008-date)

  •  “You Don’t Miss Your Water ‘Til Your River Runs Dry: Regulating Industrial Supply Shortages after ‘China Raw Materials’”, (Fall 2012) 18.1 Stanford Journal of Law, Business & Finance 72-120 (with J.H. Senduk)
  •  “East Asia’s Engagement with Cosmopolitan Ideals under its Trade Treaty Dispute Provisions”, (2011) 56 McGill Law Journal 821-862
  •  “Cast Light and Evil Will Go Away: The Transparency Mechanism for Regulating Regional Trade Agreements After Three Years”, (2011) 45:2 Journal of World Trade 375-400 (with Jo-Ann Crawford)
  • “China and the Doha Development Agenda”, (2010) 44:6 Journal of World Trade 1309-1331 (with JiangYu Wang)
  •  “Australia’s ‘Rudd Proposal’: Business As Usual”, (2008) 14 Asian Yearbook of International Law 287-306
  •  “Saving the WTO from the Risk of Irrelevance”, (2008) 11 Journal of International Economic Law 899-925 (with Henry Gao)

Shorter Articles/Commentaries

  • "Beijing's 'Congo' Interpretation, Commercial Implications", Note, (2012) 128 Law Quarterly Review 6-10
  • “Absolute Immunity for Sovereign Debtors in Hong Kong”, Note, (2011) 127 Law Quarterly Review 495-499
  • “State Immunity in Post-Handover Hong Kong”, Note, (2011) 127 Law Quarterly Review 159-162
  • Withdrawing from Custom ”, (2010) 20 Duke Journal of Comparative & International Law 143-156 (with O. A. Elias)

Selection of Recent Book Chapters (2007-date)

  • “What is ‘High Quality, Twenty-First Century’ Anyway?”, in Lim, Elms & Low (eds.), Trans-Pacific Partnership (Cambridge, 2012), 3-18 (with Deborah K. Elms)
  • “An Overview and Snapshot of the TPP Negotiations”, in Lim et al (eds.), Trans-Pacific Partnership, 21-44 (Cambridge, 2012) (with Deborah K. Elms)
  • “What is to be Done with Export Restrictions?”, in Lim et al (eds.), Trans-Pacific Partnership (Cambridge, 2012), 211-220
  •  “The Conventional Morality of Trade”, in C. Carmody, F. Garcia & J. Linarelli (eds.), Distributive Justice and International Economic Law, American Society of International Law Studies in International Legal Theory (Cambridge, 2011) 129-152  
  • “On Free Trade and the Post-American World” in S. Hoque & S. Clark (eds.), What Lies Ahead? Debating the Prospects for a “Post-American World”, (Routledge, 2011) 230-236
  • “Who’s Afraid of Asian Trade Regionalism, and Why?”, in R. Buckley et al (eds.), East Asian Economic Integration: Law, Trade and Finance (Elgar, 2011) 25-48
  • “Competing WTO and RTA Jurisdictional Claims”, in T. Broude, A. Porges & M. Bush (eds.), The Politics of International Economic Law (Cambridge, 2010) 282-314 (with Henry Gao)
  • “The China-ASEAN Tariff Acceleration Precedent”, in M. Sornarajah & J. Wang (eds.), China, India and the International Economic Order (Cambridge, 2009), 427-453
  • “Saving the WTO from the Risk of Irrelevance” in D. Steger (ed.), Redesigning the World Trade Organization for the 21st Century (Laurier Press, 2009), 389-416 (with Henry Gao) (reprinted from the JIEL)
  •  “Free Trade Agreements in Asia and Some Common Legal Problems”, in Y. Taniguchi, A. Yanovich & J. Bohanes (eds.), Dispute Settlement, Multilateral Negotiation and Regional Integration (Cambridge, 2007) 434-456

Books & Essay Collections

  • THE TRANS-PACIFIC PARTNERSHIP: A QUEST FOR A 21ST CENTURY AGREEMENT (Cambridge, 2012), co-edited with Deborah K. Elms & Patrick Low, xvii + 337 pp.
  • LAW OF THE HONG KONG CONSTITUTION (Sweet & Maxwell, 2011), Co-General Editor with Johannes Chan S.C., with Forewords by Geoffrey Ma & Andrew Li, xciii + 1,011 pp.
  • ECONOMIC DIPLOMACY (Institute of Policy Studies, 2011), co-edited with Margaret Liang, xxvi + 317 pp.
  • RENEGOTIATING WESTPHALIA (Nijhoff, 1999), co-edited with Christopher Harding,  xi + 389 pp.
  • THE PARADOX OF CONSENSUALISM IN INTERNATIONAL LAW (Kluwer, 1998), co-authored with O. A. Elias, with a Foreword by Martti Koskenniemi, (Kluwer, 1998), xix + 322 pp.

Published Lectures/Talks

  • “The Turn to Trade”, (2008) 103 Proceedings of the American Society of International Law 231-237
  • “From Constructive Engagement to Collective Revulsion: The Myanmar Precedent of 2007”, The Twenty-First Singapore Law Review Lecture, (2008) 26 Singapore Law Review 204-225

Festschriften

  • “The Chief Justice and International Law”, in Chao Hick Tin et al (eds.), The Law in His Hands: A Tribute to Chan Sek Keong (Academy, 2012)
  • “Did Captain America Kill International Law?” in M. Frick & A. Oberprantacher (eds.), Power and Justice in International Relations (Ashgate, 2009)
  • “I Have Come Undone”, in D. Neo et al (eds.), Lives in the Law - Essays in Honour of Peter Ellinger, Koh Kheng Lian and Tan SookYee (Academy, 2007)

Reports

  • “Hong Kong’s Bridging Role in China-India Economic Exchanges”, A Study on Hong Kong in the Region: Role, Issues and Strategies, Central Policy Unit, Government of the HKSAR, July 2009
  • “A Mega Jumbo Jet: Southeast Asia's Experiments with Trade and Investment Liberalisation", in The New International Architecture in Trade and Investment (APEC#207-HR-01.2) (APEC, 2007) 115-140

Selection of Keynote Speeches, Conference Papers and Speaking Engagements (2007-date)

  • “The Trans-Pacific Partnership, and the HKSAR’s Request to Accede to the China-ASEAN Free Trade Agreement”, Headquarters, MATRADE, Kuala Lumpur, 13 July 2012
  • “Regional Trade Negotiations:1992-2012”, by invitation of the EU Office in Hong Kong and Macao, 7 March 2012
  • "The Trans-Pacific Partnership Talks", Joint UNESCAP-WTO Seminar on Regional Trade Agreements, UNESCAP, 25-27 July 2011
  • Chair, Panel on "Evaluating the Contribution of Regional Trade Agreements to the Governance of Services Trade", PECC-ADB Institute Conference, 3 June 2011
  • Stakeholder Meeting, Sixth Round of Treaty Negotiations, Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, Singapore, 27 March 2011
  • “China’s State-Centric Model of Steered Economic Liberalisation”, Conference on European and Global Economic Governance After the Financial Crisis, Brussels, 8-9 February, 2011
  • Speech, Launch of “Economic Diplomacy: Essays and Reflections by Singapore’s Negotiators”, Traders Hotel, Singapore, 19 November 2010
  • “Should the WTO Promote Socially-Bounded Economies?”, VIII Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung Public International Law Conference, Derag Hotel Kanzler, Bonn, 11-12 November 2010
  • “Regional FTAs and Global Governance”, Workshop on Comparative Regional Economic Governance: Learning from Crises?, School of International Studies, Peking University, 29-30 June 2010
  •  “Hong Kong’s Strategies on Regional Cooperation”, Central Policy Unit, Government of the HKSAR, 17 December 2009
  • “The Future of FTAs & BITs”, NY State Bar Association, Seasonal Meeting 2009, 29 October 2009
  • Roundtable on Free Trade Agreements, WTO Headquarters, Geneva, 15 April 2009
  • “The Trade Lawyer’s Guide to Development”, Harvard JIL Symposium, Harvard Law School, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 6 March 2009
  • “Listening to What Developing Countries Say in Disbelief”, Fletcher School, Medford, Massachusetts, 5 March 2009
  • Keynote Speech, “The Conventional Morality of Trade”, Symposium on “Distributive Justice and International Economic Law”, IGLT, ASIL, Tillar House, Washington D.C., 7 November 2008
  • “Australia’s Asia-Pacific Community Proposal”, Melbourne University Law School, Melbourne, Australia, 3 October 2008
  • “Do International Financial Institutions Repress Development?”, 102nd Annual Meeting of the American Society of International Law, Washington D.C., 9-12 April 2008
  • “Saving the WTO from the Risk of Irrelevance”(with Henry Gao), WTO Institutional Reform Project, EDGE Network, Waterloo, Ontario, 13-15 March 2008

 Press Coverage

  • “Pollution the Big Barrier to Freer Trade in Rare Earths”, Reuters, 19 March 2012
  • “China Must Boost Imports to Avoid Trade War”, Reuters, 1 March 2012
  • “China Bans Airlines from Joining EU Emissions Scheme”, Reuters, 6 February 2012
  • "Analysis – After 10 Years, China's WTO Ride Could Get Bumpier", Chicago Tribune (Chicago), 29 November 2011; Asahi Shimbun (Tokyo), 30 November 2011 (Reuters)
  • "China's Help for Europe Has a Political Price-Tag", Guardian (London), 15 September 2011 (Reuters)
  • "China Vows to Appeal Raw Materials Case", Guardian (London), and Chicago Tribune (Chicago), 24 August 2011 (Reuters)
  •  “China’s Coming of Age in the WTO War”, Forbes (New York), 20 April 2009
  • “Where Are China’s WTO Lawyers?”, Forbes (New York), 27 April 2009