Professor Peter K. Yu, the Kern family chair in intellectual property law and the founding director of the Intellectual Property Law Center at Drake University Law School, wrote an opinion piece for The Des Moines Register on potential changes in U.S.-China policy.
The piece, published Sunday, Feb. 22, coincided with U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s visit to China.
“Although her interests, focus and approach will be different from those of her predecessor, making major changes to U.S.-China policy is likely to be very difficult,” Yu wrote.
He also noted that every new president is tempted to introduce a new U.S.-China policy, adding, “Yet all presidents in the recent past, Democrat or Republican, have been forced to change their U.S.-China policies midway through the administration.”
Professor Yu concludes by saying “Secretary Clinton has seen that change first-hand in the White House. Let’s hope she and the Obama administration can avoid falling into the same trap. China needs the United States, and the United States also needs China.”
On Monday, Feb. 23, Yu was in Geneva, Switzerland, offering his analysis of the recent WTO panel decision regarding China’s failure to protect and enforce intellectual property rights.
The event was jointly organized by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development and the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development.
Professor Yu’s presentation, which was followed by comments from academics and representatives of nongovernmental organizations, was well attended by U.N. diplomats and members of intergovernmental and nongovernmental organizations. The slides for his presentation are available online.
Professor Yu is one the world’s preeminent experts in intellectual property law and policy in China. Born and raised in Hong Kong, he is also a Wenlan scholar chair professor at Zhongnan University of Economics and Law in Wuhan, China, and a visiting professor of law at the University of Hong Kong Faculty of Law.
In the past year, he delivered lectures at Tsinghua University Law School in Beijing, Fudan University Law School in Shanghai, South China University of Technology in Guangzhou, and Zhejiang Gong Shang University School of Law in Hangzhou.
Last summer, he spoke at a high-level conference on the WTO dispute settlement process in Beijing. The event featured participants from the World Trade Organization, the Chinese Ministry of Commerce and the WTO missions of various developing countries.
Under Yu’s leadership, the Drake Intellectual Property Law Center has been active in promoting intellectual property developments in China. The center has served as the host of three visiting Chinese legal scholars and published a number of occasional papers on intellectual property laws and polices in China.
Professor Yu’s lectures and presentations have spanned more than fifteen countries on five continents, and he is a frequent commentator in the national and international media. His publications, which have been translated into Chinese, Japanese and Portuguese, are available online.
Before joining Drake University, he was a member of the core faculty of the Asian Studies Center at Michigan State University. He also taught at the university’s college of law and served as the founding director of its nationally renowned Intellectual Property and Communications Law Program.