For two decades, collective action clauses (CACs) have been part of the official-sector response to sovereign debt crisis, justified by claims that these clauses can help prevent bailouts and shift the burden of restructuring onto the private sector. Reform efforts in the 1990s and 2000s focused...

This paper examines the intersection between two fundamental attributes of Euro Area sovereign debt. The first is that sovereigns tend to issue bonds governed by their own law, which makes a debt restructuring comparatively easy. The second is the standardized collective action clause (CAC)...

In 2016, its economy in shambles and looking to defer payment on its debts, the Venezuelan government of Nicolás Maduro proposed a multi-billion dollar debt swap to holders of bonds issued by the government's crown jewel, state-owned oil company Petroleós de Venezuela S.A. (“PDVSA”). A new...

The 20th century witnessed a transformative, “tectonic” shift in international law, from “absolute” to “restrictive” theories of sovereign immunity. As conventionally understood, however, this dramatic transformation represented only a shift in the default rule. Under absolute...

The law of foreign sovereign immunity changed dramatically over the course of the 20th century. The United States abandoned the doctrine of absolute immunity and opened its courts to lawsuits by private claimants against foreign governments and officials. It also pursued a range of other...

The sovereign debt crisis in the Eurozone has prompted a number of policy responses. Among the most significant is an initiative by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development to identify what it has termed “Principles of Responsible Sovereign Lending and Borrowing.” The...