Courses

In 1977, the United States adopted the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (“FCPA”) to combat bribery of foreign public officials. This effort was initially seen as one that handicapped US companies, making them less competitive with their Western European peers, and in any case doomed to fail. A little more than 20-years later, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (“OECD”) adopted its Convention on Combatting Bribery of Foreign Public Officials, and as required by the Convention, most of the world’s leading exporters adopted national legislation modeled, in large measure, on the FCPA. Over the ensuing decade and a half, prosecutions of corporations for foreign bribery have become a significant prosecutorial priority for the Department of Justice (“DOJ”) and Securities & Exchange Commission (“SEC”), and that effort has played a substantial role in the development of US government policies and practices around prosecution of corporations, voluntary disclosure, cross-border law enforcement cooperation, and the evaluation of corporate compliance programs. And outside the US, lackluster enforcement has, in fits and starts, begun to give way to prosecutions in the UK, Brazil, France and elsewhere. This course will cover the development of U.S. and international initiatives against public-official bribery; address cutting edge issues around key provisions of the FCPA and its extraterritorial application; related offenses such as money laundering and private sector bribery; and the anti-corruption legal practice, both before the DOJ and SEC, and advising clients. We intend to organize our classes generally around the following themes: (1) Why shouldn’t US companies be able to bribe around the globe? The History and Text of the FCPA; the DOJ and SEC and enforcement theories; (2) The dawn of FCPA enforcement (1977-2003); (3) The modern era of FCPA enforcement (2004-present); Related offenses: commercial bribery; sanctions; money-laundering; securities fraud; (4) The internationalization of anti-corruption enforcement; OECD Convention; World Bank & MDBs; (5) The “public-private” partnership around the FCPA; voluntary disclosure; The rise of corporate compliance, US and international standard setting; (6) FCPA advisory practice: third parties, mergers & acquisitions and joint ventures; (7) The future of FCPA enforcement and cutting edge issues; and (8) An FCPA legal practice - corporate internal investigation, presentations to DOJ and SEC, and settlement discussions