Scott L Cummings & Louise G Trubek, Globalizing Public Interest Law, 13 UCLA J. Int'l L. & Foreign Aff. 1 (2008).
Abstract
This essay examines the structural factors shaping the globalization of public interest law in the post-Cold War era and offers a preliminary appraisal of its emerging global role. Part I traces public interest law's shift from an insular American project toward a more globalized set of practices, suggesting two reasons for this change. First, the ascendance of the Rule of Law movement has promoted public interest law in developing and transitional countries as a crucial component of good governance. Second, the increasing power of international institutions has drawn public interest lawyers into global advocacy arenas to challenge the deregulation of global markets and leverage the human rights system to advance social justice movements. Part II explores the implications of public interest law's emergence as a global institution and a tool of global governance. It outlines the factors shaping public interest law's institutional design, which incorporates elements imported by global sponsors, while building upon unique national- and regional- level opportunities. This essay concludes by offering a provisional map ofpublic interest law's evolving role in global governance, highlighting the global arenas in which it operates, the strategies it deploys, and the networks it helps to construct.
