Trade Usage
When interpreting disputed contractual language, courts often introduce evidence of industry trade usage. Learning about typical trade practices and methods of dealing helps courts determine what the non-breaching party reasonably could have expected from the breaching party. Absent knowledge of special circumstances, reasonable expectations generally are based on typical behaviors or practices in an industry.
Up until this morning, the compliance work that Shaun and I have been doing was on hold. While I wait to resume drafting IBJ’s new procurement policy, I have been working on two new projects. Shaun and I have started developing a practitioner’s manual for Sri Lanka, and Sammy and I have been writing a grant proposal for an innovative IBJ app. In the process of executing both projects, I have had to learn about trade usage in both the Sri Lankan legal industry and the global technology/app development industry.
As someone with a background in law, social science/humanities research, computational biophysics research, nonprofit work, and financial consulting, it should not come as a surprise to anyone that I like interdisciplinary work. One of my favorite things about both the law generally and my specific work this summer has been the constant need to learn about new donors, clients, and industries. Although I am developing a specialized set of legal skills in law school, neither my coursework nor my internship work is monotonous because I constantly have to adapt those specialized skills to solve new problems. Applying different parts of my multifaceted background to my varied work at IBJ has been rewarding.
The Sri Lanka practitioner’s manual will serve as a practical, how-to guide for criminal lawyers and other justice-sector actors in Sri Lanka. Under the supervision of a British law professor who is living and working in Sri Lanka, Shaun and I are adapting IBJ’s existing Defender Manual template to Sri Lanka’s unique cultural, political, and legal context. So far, we have analyzed Sri Lanka’s constitution, criminal code, and international treaty obligations, and we have reviewed human rights reports that detail the most common rights violations. Because Sri Lanka has a common law legal system and three branches of government, there are several similarities between its legal system and the U.S. system. However, there also are fascinating differences. For example, Sri Lanka’s constitution names Buddhism as the official religion and includes a provision detailing how to treat each of the three most widely-spoken languages. I am looking forward to making additional progress on the manual and, hopefully, to reading and analyzing specific Sri Lankan cases.
Although I cannot discuss the specifics of the app, working with Sammy to create a product that is both technologically attractive and legally effective has been fun. When my teammates are similarly driven to create the best possible work product, I thrive in collaborative environments. Sammy and I have very compatible work styles, so our brainstorming sessions have been efficient, productive, and filled with laughter. In order to write a compelling proposal, I have had to use not only my legal skills, but also my experience in scientific and technological research, economic and financial consulting, and nonprofit strategic development. Because I am involved in finalizing the budget, partnerships, project structural design, project narrative, and M&E narrative, I have had the chance to apply problem-solving paradigms that I used only infrequently during law school.
Moreover, because I have never developed or marketed an app before, this project has motivated me to reconnect with a former colleague and a former classmate. Hirsh explained some app-related jargon and gave me a general overview of the procedure for building an app, and Ryan helped me to learn common marketing effectiveness metrics for online campaigns. Thanks to Hirsh and Ryan, as I discuss and write the proposal, I have a better understanding and command of technology and marketing industry terms and procedures.
After reconnecting with old friends during the week, I spent my weekend with new friends. The highlight of my weekend was attending Geneva’s multicultural street food festival in Old Town. As we sampled cuisine from at least five continents, our conversations spanned multiple industries and ranged from particle physics, to politics, to favorite travel destinations. As our night drew to a close, I realized that my time abroad this summer was helping me to understand more than just legal, technological, and marketing trade usage; it also was teaching me “expat trade usage.”
Specifically, I’m learning that, amongst my group of European and American expat friends, “going to the lake” means bringing elaborately prepared food and cheap drinks to a particular spot that expats from around the world frequently visit. “Hiking” could mean anything from taking a leisurely stroll along the flat lakeside trail to climbing an entire mountain. “Getting some food” may or may not entail actually purchasing food, depending on how broke people feel at any given moment. A "hen party" is the British version of a bachelorette party. “Talking about politics” almost always involves answering questions about the socioeconomic and cultural forces that led to President Trump’s election and debating the merits and weaknesses of civil law and common law legal systems. Finally, “venting” usually includes complaints about time differences, long distance relationships, the fact that food in Switzerland is much more expensive than food in most of our home countries, and the inability to find a particular favorite type of food or beverage in Geneva. (Yes, our lives here are pretty carefree and wonderful.)
Learning all of this different trade usage information is keeping life vibrant and exciting, and I am looking forward to learning even more as the summer progresses.
Street food festival
