The International Bureau of Fiscal Documentation (IBFD) awarded Dr Qiang Cai the 12th IBFD Frans Vanistendael Award.

The honour was received for his publication Reassessing the Economic Allegiance Theory from a Transaction Cost Perspective: What’s the Benefit Principle Got to Do with It?

The €10,000 award “promotes and celebrates scientific research of the highest standards”.

Dr Cai’s work attempts to reconstruct the economic allegiance theory, which was endorsed and developed in the 1920s and has since been widely regarded as the bedrock of the modern international tax regime. He adopts an interdisciplinary approach by drawing on insights from transaction cost economics. The jury commented on his work as follows:

Qiang’s original approach to economic allegiance brings valid arguments to challenge the conventional view that the benefit principle underpins international taxation. The author’s conceptual framework makes economic allegiance suitable to operate without physical presence, thus in a way that might operate for both source and residence jurisdictions, stressing the value of human relations over things. (IBFD)

Dr Cai said: “The prize reinforces my belief that a law and economics approach may yield valuable insights for the theoretical construct of international taxation. I am also grateful for the generous support from the law school communities, where interdisciplinarity and multidisciplinarity have always been championed.”