In April 2010, the Obama Administration announced a
comprehensive export control reform effort. The goal of the reforms
was to modernize the export control system to respond to the
current threats the U.S. faces by strengthening controls over key
strategic goods and technologies, while reducing controls over
items that have less strategic significance. The Administration
sought a new export control system whose guiding principle is
"building high walls around a smaller yard." See
Fact Sheet on the President's Export Control Reform Initiative,
April 20, 2010, available at
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/fact-sheet-presidents-export-control-reform-initiative.
A little more than a year into this reform effort, it is
worthwhile to look back at what has been accomplished thus far,
look forward to the next stages of the effort, and consider some of
the biggest challenges to the reform process going forward.
