Blog Tax Haven
Order Description
Read the article: Cobham, A., Janský, P. and Meinzer, M. (2015), The Financial Secrecy Index: Shedding New Light on the Geography of Secrecy. Economic Geography. doi: 10.1111/ecge.12094 and outline the definitional challenges surrounding the term ‘tax haven’. Please use references from academic journals, texts and case law.

This is your first critical blog. Each blog should be laid out as follows:

Title of blog

Main blog

References

Bibliography

Words Count
This should be contained in one word document and submitted altogether. It is good practice to undertake each blog as you move through the course.
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How to write a critical blog

Aim and purpose
The aim of the critical blog is to demonstrate your knowledge over the whole course in a concise, academic and effective manner. The purpose of it is to demonstrate your ability to write critically at an academic legal level.
Getting started
As with any piece of coursework or oral presentation question you must first read the question and consider what it is actually asking you to do. I find it useful to make a spider diagram of all the points and thoughts you have relating the question at this time. You can then go back and re-order your points/thoughts and work out a logical structure for your argument.
Remember this is a critical blog and therefore you will need to be critical and provide an argument. To ensure you are not being descriptive you will need to use legal journals/ text and legislation (among other primary and secondary sources) to provide a legal argument.
Critical blogs as with any other piece of work must be written in the third person, therefore I feel or think is not appropriate for an academic piece of work.
If you are stating facts or opinions these need to be fully referenced with the universities referencing system OSCOLA. A guide to this system can be found here: http://www1.uwe.ac.uk/students/studysupport/studyskills/referencing/oscola.aspx
Once you have produced a spider diagram of your initial thoughts, think about whether you have read any contradictory or supportive work by academics. If you have then add these into your planning notes. Also consider if there is anything in the national press/ government legislation etc… which also could be of use. The more references and evidence you provide the more you will be able to critically analyse your work.
As the word limit is tight you need to work out your plan very carefully. Do not waste time by spending too long on the introduction, a sentence will do. Make sure it is concise and demonstrates your understanding of the subject area and your argument you are putting forward.
Make several good points in your blog which are backed up with legal references and then conclude your argument. Again making sure you are not wasting too much time of reiterating points.
Research and References
All work must be referenced.
This cannot be stressed enough. You need to use academic journals/ text/ government papers/ press information etc… to ensure you are fully analysing the question.
Therefore you need to fully research the area. You need to find journal articles etc… that relate to your question. UWE’s library has a vast amount of legal information from which you can produce your argument and most of this is online. If you are unsure as to how to perform searches please visit the library website or see one of your tutors on the LLM module.
At the end of the blog and not included in the word count please state your bibliography in the OSCOLA reference style. Please also use footnotes for references but these are not to be used to put main body material in.
Collating the document for hand in day

Once you have completed all the blogs then please use the normal coursework front page cover. After this please collate all the blogs and put them into one document. Please ensure they are double spaced, TNR size 12 and are presented in a professional manner. Check and double check spellings and silly errors that easily occur but detract from the overall impression of the piece of work.