On September 30, 2019, at the University of Warsaw, the Public Procurement Law Association of Poland held a conference (program below) on exclusion of contractors (called “debarment” in the United States and elsewhere), which looked at rules and practices in the European Union (EU), the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) and the United States. The conference featured a report (below) summarizing procedures used in 31 EU and EFTA nations, which was sponsored by the Association. The presentation by Professor Christopher Yukins is also set forth below.
Prof. Michal Kania (U. Silesia) and Collin Swan (World Bank), presenters at the conference
Effective international trade in government procurement depends on predictable legal structures, including those that address corruption and misconduct in tender processes. But at this point, the purchaser’s primary tools to maintain integrity — debarment or exclusion — remain wildly out of sync on both sides of the Atlantic. This annual free symposium on transatlantic issues in procurement, hosted by King’s College London and George Washington University Law School, focused this year on debarment and exclusion. In a highly successful day of frank and collegial discussions, judges, officials, attorneys and professors from the multilateral development banks, the European Union and the United States joined to discuss the best ways forward to harmonize a common approach to debarment in international trade.
Please note (see below) that because of the strong interest in this program, it was moved to a larger room at Gray’s Inn.
Members of the “GWU” team at the symposium at Gray’s Inn (left to right): Professor Michal Kania (Fulbright scholar), Program Director Karen Thornton, Ruairi Macdonald (alumnus), John Pachter (alumnus and panelist), Paul Khoury (alumnus and panelist), Collin Swan (alumnus and panelist), Alix Town (alumna), and Professor Christopher Yukins (symposium co-chair)Collin Swan (World Bank), Michal Kania (University of Katowice) and Dominique Casimir (Arnold & Porter, Washington DC)
Panel II: Sanctions and Exclusions at the Multilateral Development Banks (11:30-12:30)
Panel II: Lisa Miller (World Bank), Prof Christopher Yukins (GWU), Collin Swan (World Bank) and Paul Kearney (European Bank for Reconstruction and Development)
Panel III: John Pachter (Smith Pachter, McLean VA), Paul Khoury (Wiley Rein, Washington DC), Vera Eiro (Linklaters, Lisbon), Michael Bowsher QC (symposium co-chair/moderator, Monckton Chambers & King’s College, London) and Pascal Friton (BLOMSTEIN, Berlin).
John Pachter, Christopher Yukins & Jessica Tillipman, U.S. Debarment: An Introduction (discussion draft 24 February 2019), forthcoming in Cambridge Handbook of Compliance (Cambridge University Press, Daniel Sokol & Benjamin van Rooij eds.).
Pascal Friton, Debarment in EU Public Procurement Law – Tentative progress or treading water? (presented at Thomson Reuters Government Contracts Year in Review (Feb. 2019))
Panel V: Judge Marc Steiner (Swiss Federal Administrative Court), Judge Christopher Vajda (Court of Justice for the European Union), Prof Carl Baudenbacher (former Chief Judge of the EFTA Court, Monckton Chambers), Michael Bowsher QC (Monckton Chambers/King’s College, London), Judge Katja Hoegh (Chair, Ostre Landstret (High Court of Eastern Denmark), Copenhagen), Judge Helena Rosen Anderrson (Swedish Supreme Administrative Court)
Emmanuelle Auriol & Tina Søreide, An Economic Analysis of Debarment, 50 Int’l Rev. L. & Econ. 36 (2017) (arguing that debarment needs to be rethought in light of its competitive impacts)
Christopher R. Yukins & Michal Kania, Suspension and Debarment in the U.S. Government: Comparative Lessons for the EU’s Next Steps in Procurement, 19-2 UrT 47 (2019), available at https://ssrn.com/abstract=3422499
Background materials by panelists (from a fall 2018 seminar at GWU):
