Thesis Abstract Banks have done factoring for 10 years and have always viewed the operation as a self-compensatory and low-risk sort-term loan. Hoever, banks have suffered great credit losses in cases such as Procomp, Ya-Hsin and Everskill in recent years, which have made banks adopt a more careful approach when dealing this kind of business. By collecting rules of factoring of some banks and making references to international practices, this research attemps to recognize alarming signs and builds a better warning system in the hope of reducing or avoiding potential Credit losses. This warning system does audits from different approaches such as 3 major transaction subjects of factoring, 4 risk aspects, and 6 operation processes. It also uses analytical double-checking mechanism to audit the accuracy and rationality of each transaction from both the seller and the buyer, thus greatly reduces risks by detecting fake transaction at earliest possible time. Key Words: Factoring, Dispute, Fake deal, Risk Management.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, San Diego, 2001. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 443-454).

Thesis (M. Sc.)--University of Hong Kong, 2001. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 182-188).

<p> This study analyzes the connection between U.S. foreign policy and its mechanisms for either the resolution or protraction of conflict using the case of North Korea. This case is particularly ripe for resolution with regard to the United States&rsquo; recent &ldquo;Pivot to Asia.&rdquo; Moreover, now that North Korea is under the new leadership of the young, relatively unknown leader Kim Jong-un, this may be an essential the time to explore and implement alternative methods for ending this conflict. The purpose of this study is to enquire whether combining conflict analysis and resolution (CAR) tools and practices with alternative and dynamic soft foreign policy efforts might play a positive role in resolving this conflict. This study was conducted by analyzing current and historical documents on U.S. foreign policy, studying its desired or stated effects and comparing them to the known actual effects on the North Korean regime and its people. To help understand these effects, this study also sought the unique foreign policy perspectives, opinions, needs and desires of former North Korea refugees. The significance of this is in understanding and evaluating where CAR opportunities surface by promoting the participation of stakeholders as catalysts for change from the group of people directly affected by foreign policy: North Koreans themselves. The findings show that the U.S. foreign policy approach towards North Korea has not significantly evolved over the past 60 years. Moreover, even those North Koreans interviewed who steadfastly support a continued U.S. hard policy approach toward their former homeland conceded that positive change would also require alternative approaches that promote direct and indirect high quality contact. The findings also show even in a controlled interview environment, North Korean Refugees can change how they think, interact, and receive information, based on direct HQC and the positive repositioning of self and other. Many also had sustained contact with their loved ones still living in the North, and provide them with aid. Most North Koreans interviewed had received indirect and or direct information about the outside world when they had lived in North Korea including such things as listening to radio, watching movies or drama and receiving aid, which had a positive effect on them. While most North Koreans (still in the north) do not believe in religion, it can be an effective tool for change. The regime has continued for so long due to the structural violence and deprivation it has over society. Finally, local markets in North Korea play a key role in changing the lives of North Koreans and that North Korean diaspora can help change North Korea. The analysis provides innovative conflict resolution methods and offers potential tools and recommendations for a multi-dimensional foreign policy approach, which may affect and alter foreign policy discussions and decisions. This study, the results and recommendations are intended to be an initial step toward rethinking U.S. foreign policy for purposes of &ldquo;provention.&rdquo; </p>

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This thesis focuses on the current court mediation institution in China against the worldwide movement of alternative dispute resolution in searching for more consensual and more efficient ways of resolving disputes. When the West is seeking more informality-oriented forms of dispute resolution, China, on the other side of the world, is making great efforts to improve its formal justice system rather than conventional means of dispute resolution like mediation. This thesis attempts to identify the role court mediation has played in Chinese legal history, to explore its current functions, to examine the rationale underlying the system, and to suggest its future reform. The economic analysis of law, particularly Posner's economic analysis of civil procedure and the Coase Theorem, and the ideas of Rawls' theory of justice provide theoretical underpinnings for this study. A review of these classical theories is conducted from the perspectives of efficiency and fairness. Although it is generally understood that both efficiency and fairness cannot be equally achieved by a legal policy, a good one should be concerned with both efficiency and fairness. The article concludes that the balance between efficiency and fairness should be presented in an optimal court mediation form. China's court mediation has remained an important means of dispute resolution, but left much to be improved. The author argues that the current court mediation is not as successful as it declares; it is, in fact, neither efficient nor just. The existing law governing court mediation does not provide a clear function and purpose for court mediation, nor does it consider the efficiency and fairness of court mediation. In practice, although it remains the dominant position in resolving disputes, it is merely a substitute for adjudication rather than a substantive alternative dispute resolution. By analyzing the current allocation of cases for different dispute resolutions, the author suggests that considering the overloaded court caseloads and the lack of a variety of alternative dispute resolutions in today's China, court mediation should be preserved, but thoroughly reformed, as a more acceptable and efficient means of resolving disputes. Upon its reform, this conventional means of dispute resolution with Chinese characteristics will play a positive role in the future.

This thesis examines the promises and challenges of internal dispute resolution (IDR) in the corporate workplace of Canada and the United States. The focus of inquiry is twofold: a theoretical and socio-historical study of the corporation followed by a practical analysis of dispute resolution of human or civil rights. The examination of the role of the corporation begins with a review of the statutory and jurisprudential underpinnings of the "corporate person," which have legitimized the corporation and its powerful place in society. Such power, sanctified by the law, impacts not only society at large but also employees of the corporation. Internalization of legal systems into the corporate workplace has shifted some dispute resolution responsibilities from the public to the private domain, relegating further power to the corporation. This public to private shift has deputized the corporation as an enforcer of its employees' civil rights. Two predominant theories of the corporation - the Contractarian and Communitarian - provide understanding about power relationships among the corporation and its constituents. U.S. and Canadian courts and legislatures have demonstrated a preference for the Contractarian theory, which holds that the corporation is a nexus of contracts, and that firm managers should prioritize its contract with its shareholders, governing the corporation so as to maximize shareholder wealth. A careful examination of corporate theory and governance illustrates the corporation's conflict of interest in holding shareholder interests primary while resolving employment disputes. The power differential between the corporation, as agents of its shareholder principals, and employees presents the greatest challenge in equitably resolving employment disputes. The practical aspects of internal dispute resolution in the corporate workplace focus on the potential benefits and risks to employees. In-house mediation, with certain procedural safeguards, has potential for benefits that outweigh risks to individual employees. Building on principles and structures of formal procedural fairness found in courts of law and administrative tribunals, five essential features can best guarantee fairness in IDR: voluntary participation, retention of employees' right to judicial review, prohibition against reprisal for raising the dispute, use of an external mediator, and oversight of the corporation's IDR program by a neutral, external body.

On the eve of the launch of the first round of multilateral negotiations within the framework of the new WTO system, the so-called Millennium Round---which may be officially opened by the Seattle Ministerial Conference on 30 November 1999---the review of the WTO dispute settlement system should deserve the attention of WTO Members as one of the most essential topics to be considered. / Within this context, this thesis raises the question whether the future developments of the WTO dispute settlement system could be influenced by the successful European model. / In an attempt to answer this question, this thesis first highlights the grounds on which the EC approach to the GATT dispute settlement system has changed so that the EC has finally become an active supporter for "judicialization" of the new system (Introductory Part). The impact of the new WTO dispute settlement system on the EC participation in its development is then analysed (Part I). Finally, the last part of this thesis focuses on the reasons of the EC success in order to conclude to its potential influence on the further developments of the WTO dispute settlement system (Part II).

Various characteristics of commercial space activities, such as their exceptionally rapid development, the special environment and legal framework in which they develop or the significant risks their participants are facing generate for the latter specific needs in terms of dispute settlement methods. / A systematic analysis of all existing mechanisms reveals that arbitration is and is likely to remain in the future the mode of settlement which is the most appropriate to the interests of the commercial space actors.

The World Trade Organization has its own binding dispute settlement system. To ensure compliance with the outcome of the dispute settlement procedures, the claimant Member is authorized to retaliate in case the respondent Member fails to comply within a certain period of time. However, the rules and procedures regarding retaliation and determination of compliance are ambiguous and have caused an interpretational problem called the sequencing problem. To address the problem, the parties to any dispute generally conclude bilateral ad hoc procedural agreements. However, by examining the procedural agreements concluded to date and by analyzing the potential problems of these agreements, this thesis concludes that due to the dependence on the will of the parties and the uncertain legal status of the agreements, the procedural agreements do not constitute a satisfactory method for addressing the sequencing problem. Alternatives such as amendments to the dispute settlement rules, an authoritative interpretation of them or ― if consensus cannot be reached soon ― clarification by means of a precedent from the Appellate Body, should be considered and attempted.