Abstract
Federal agencies are increasingly interpreting international labor rights and imposing a wide array of economic and financial penalties, or “rights-based sanctions,” under various laws and regulations. Congress recently vested the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) with authority to impose targeted rights-based sanctions on foreign factories. USTR has begun administering its new authority with vigor. Policymakers and rights advocates hope that USTR’s enforcement activities will strengthen the protection of workers abroad.
Hidden from view, and thus largely overlooked, are the exclusory procedures that agencies follow when they administer rights-based sanctions. The Treasury Department’s Office of Financial Asset Control (OFAC) has investigated and enforced rights-based sanctions against governments and foreign targets under national security legislation for decades. Its programs show how exclusory procedures harm vulnerable communities and undermine rights protections. Yet, like OFAC, USTR investigates and decides enforcement actions behind closed doors and without always consulting regulated communities. Under its newfound authority, USTR also imposes financial penalties on foreign entities without offering advanced notice, a public hearing, or meaningful judicial review.
The Biden Administration has launched a “worker-centered” trade policy to protect workers abroad. If it hopes to achieve those cosmopolitan objectives, USTR’s procedures must draw lessons from OFAC’s harmful model. By reframing labor rights as participatory processes, this Article advances a framework for rights-based sanctions procedures capable of achieving the Administration’s rights-based objectives.
Repository Citation
Desiree LeClercq,
Rights-Based Sanctions Procedures
, 75 Administrative Law Review 105
(2023),
Available at: https://digitalcommons.law.uga.edu/fac_artchop/1691
Previously posted on SSRN.