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University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School

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2008

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Articles 31 - 60 of 105

Full-Text Articles in Law

Shareholder Democracy On Trial: International Perspective On The Effectiveness Of Increased Shareholder Power, Lisa Fairfax Apr 2008

Shareholder Democracy On Trial: International Perspective On The Effectiveness Of Increased Shareholder Power, Lisa Fairfax

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Shareholder democracy - efforts to increase shareholder power within the corporation - appears to have come of age, both within the United States and abroad. In the past few years, U.S. shareholders have worked to strengthen their voice within the corporation by seeking to remove perceived impediments to their voting authority. These impediments include classified boards, the plurality standard for board elections, and the inability to nominate directors on the corporation's ballot. Shareholders' efforts have also extended to seeking a voice on the compensation of corporate officers and directors. Advocates of shareholder democracy believe that such efforts are critical to …


Evidence And Ideology In Assessing The Effectiveness Of Financial Literacy Education, Lauren E. Willis Apr 2008

Evidence And Ideology In Assessing The Effectiveness Of Financial Literacy Education, Lauren E. Willis

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Financial literacy education has long been promoted as key to consumer financial well-being. Yet the claim has never had more than negligible statistically significant empirical support. This review (1) sets forth the model of financial literacy education underlying public support for these programs today, (2) identifies pervasive and serious limitations in existing empirical research used by policymakers as evidence of the effectiveness of this education, and (3) recommends a number of alternative public policies suggested by the existing research.


Against Financial Literacy Education, Lauren E. Willis Mar 2008

Against Financial Literacy Education, Lauren E. Willis

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The dominant model of regulation in the United States for consumer credit, insurance, and investment products is disclosure and unfettered choice. As these products have become increasingly complex, consumers’ inability to understand them has become increasingly apparent, and the consequences of this inability more dire. In response, policymakers have embraced financial literacy education as a necessary corollary to the disclosure model of regulation. This education is widely believed to turn consumers into “responsible” and “empowered” market players, motivated and competent to make financial decisions that increase their own welfare. The vision is of educated consumers handling their own credit, insurance, …


Introducing A "Different Lives" Approach To The Valuation Of Health And Well-Being, Matthew D. Adler, Paul Dolan Mar 2008

Introducing A "Different Lives" Approach To The Valuation Of Health And Well-Being, Matthew D. Adler, Paul Dolan

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We introduce a new “different lives” survey format, which asks respondents to rank hypothetical lives described in terms of longevity, health, happiness, income, and other elements of the quality of life. In this short paper, we show that the format is of policy relevance whether a mental state, preference satisfaction or extra-welfarist account of well-being is adopted and discuss some of the advantages the format has over standard formats, such as contingent valuation surveys and QALY-type methods. An exploratory survey indicates that the format is feasible and that health and happiness might be more important than income and life expectancy.


Miscalculating Welfare, Michael B. Dorff, Kimberly Kessler Ferzan Mar 2008

Miscalculating Welfare, Michael B. Dorff, Kimberly Kessler Ferzan

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In their quest to maximize efficiency, law and economics scholars often produce novel, creative, and counterintuitive legal rules. Indeed, legal economists have argued for baby selling, against anti-discrimination laws in the workplace, and for insider trading. In this essay, we discuss some concerns about this form of legal scholarship that privileges the creative and counterintuitive over the fair, mundane, and intuitive. Drawing on a range of empirical evidence, this essay argues that the failure to include, and to give sufficient weight to, fairness preferences undermines legal economists' policy recommendations. Specifically, after setting forth three examples of this phenomenon, in the …


Hate Speech, C. Edwin Baker Mar 2008

Hate Speech, C. Edwin Baker

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This paper describes the rationale that a full protection theory of free speech, a theory based on respect for individual autonomy, would give for protecting hate speech. The paper then notes that such a rationale will be unpersuasive to many (including this author) if the harms associated with a failure to outlaw hate speech are as great as often suggested – most dramatically, if the failure to prohibit makes a substantial contribution to the occurrence of serious racial/ethnic violence or genocide. The article then attempts to outline what empirical evidence would be needed to support this conclusion and gives reasons …


Competing Conceptions Of Modern Desert: Vengeful, Deontological, And Empirical, Paul H. Robinson Mar 2008

Competing Conceptions Of Modern Desert: Vengeful, Deontological, And Empirical, Paul H. Robinson

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The dispute over the role desert should play, if any, in assessing criminal liability and punishment has a long and turbulent history. There is some indication that deserved punishment -- referred to variously as desert, just punishment, retributive punishment, or simply doing justice -- may be in ascendance, both in academic debate and in real world institutions. A number of modern sentencing guidelines have adopted it as their distributive principle. Desert is increasingly given deference in the purposes section of state criminal codes, where it can be the guiding principle in the interpretation and application of the code's provisions. Indeed, …


Bounded Rationality And Legal Scholarship, Matthew D. Adler Feb 2008

Bounded Rationality And Legal Scholarship, Matthew D. Adler

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Decision theory seems to offer a very attractive normative framework for individual and social choice under uncertainty. The decisionmaker should think of her choice situation, at any given moment, in terms of a set of possible outcomes, that is, specifications of the possible consequences of choice, described in light of the decisionmaker’s goals; a set of possible actions; and a "state set" consisting of possible prior "states of the world." It is this framework for choice which provides the foundation for expected utility theory, as demonstrated in the work of Leonard Savage. Problems arise, however, when the decisionmaker is boundedly …


The Argentine Financial Crisis: State Liability Under Bits And The Legitimacy Of The Icsid System, William W. Burke-White Jan 2008

The Argentine Financial Crisis: State Liability Under Bits And The Legitimacy Of The Icsid System, William W. Burke-White

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This essay examines the jurisprudence of the International Center for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) arbitral tribunals in a series of cases brought against the Republic of Argentina in the wake of the 2001-2002 Argentine financial collapse. The essay considers the ICSID tribunals' treatment of non-precluded measures provisions in Argentina's bilateral investment treaties (BITs) and the customary law defense of necessity and argues that the ICSID tribunals have sought to radically narrow the opportunities available to states to craft policy responses to emergency situations while strengthening investor protections beyond the intent of the states parties to the BITs under …


Engines Of Inequality: Class, Race, And Family Structure, Amy L. Wax Jan 2008

Engines Of Inequality: Class, Race, And Family Structure, Amy L. Wax

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The past 30 years have witnessed a dramatic divergence in family structure by social class, income, education, and race. This article reviews the data on these trends, explores their significance, and assesses social scientists’ recent attempts to explain them. The article concludes that society-wide changes in economic conditions or social expectations cannot account for these patterns. Rather, for reasons that are poorly understood, cultural disparities have emerged by class and race in attitudes and behaviors surrounding family, sexuality, and reproduction. These disparities will likely fuel social and economic inequality and contribute to disparities in children’s life prospects for decades to …


The Paths Of Christian Legal Scholarship, David A. Skeel Jr. Jan 2008

The Paths Of Christian Legal Scholarship, David A. Skeel Jr.

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The history of twentieth century Christian legal scholarship– really, the absence of Christian legal scholarship in America’s elite law schools– can be told as a tale of two emblematic clashes: the first an intriguing historical footnote, the second a brief, explosive war of words. In the first, a tort action in Nebraska circa 1890,William Jennings Bryan and Roscoe Pound served as opposing counsel; the second was a war of words in the 1940s between a group of neo-Thomist scholars and defenders of Oliver Wendell Holmes. Using these two incidents to frame as a starting point, this essay briefly chronicles the …


Health Law’S Coherence Anxiety, Theodore Ruger Jan 2008

Health Law’S Coherence Anxiety, Theodore Ruger

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Academic health law is often said to suffer from a "law of the horse" problem, or, more particularly, to lack various dimensions of theoretical coherence. In conventional legal academic discourse, the "coherence" ideal prioritizes a cluster of attributes, all of which health law lacks: sparse conceptual singularity, a reductionist focus on particular legal forms, institutional centralization, and historical determinism and orderly development of a legal field. Health law is a singularly poor fit with this traditional model of field coherence. It is a mishmash of various legal forms, applied by divergent and often colliding institutions, and has developed much more …


Confidentiality: An Expectation In Health Care, Anita L. Allen Jan 2008

Confidentiality: An Expectation In Health Care, Anita L. Allen

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The practice of confidentiality has continued in an era of increased, voluntary openness about medical information in everyday life. Indeed the number and variety of state and federal laws mandating confidentiality by medical professionals has increased in the last dozen years. Moreover, personal injury suits alleging breach of confidentiality or invasion of privacy, along with suits asserting evidentiary privileges, reflect the reality that expectations of confidentiality of medical records and relationships remain strong.


Undressing Difference: The Hijab In The West, Anita L. Allen Jan 2008

Undressing Difference: The Hijab In The West, Anita L. Allen

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On March 15, 2006, French President Jacques Chirac signed into law an amendment to his country’s education statute, banning the wearing of "conspicuous" signs of religious affiliation in public schools. Prohibited items included "a large cross, a veil, or skullcap." The ban was expressly introduced by lawmakers as an application of the principle of government neutrality, "du principe de laïcité." Opponents of the law viewed it primarily as an intolerant assault against the hijab, a head and neck wrap worn by many Muslim women around the world. In Politics of the Veil, Professor Joan Wallach Scott …


The Rhetoric And Reality Of Regulatory Reform, Cary Coglianese Jan 2008

The Rhetoric And Reality Of Regulatory Reform, Cary Coglianese

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In January 2007, President George W. Bush stirred up widespread controversy by issuing amendments to an executive order on regulatory review adopted initially by President Clinton. The Bush amendments variously require agencies to issue written regulatory problem statements, assign gate-keeping responsibilities to Regulatory Policy Officers within each agency, and undertake analytic reviews before adopting certain kinds of guidance documents. Both legal scholars and policy advocates charge that the Bush amendments place significant new burdens on administrative agencies and will delay the issuance of important new regulatory policies. This paper challenges the rhetorical claims of obstructionism that have emerged in response …


Proactive Complementarity: The International Criminal Court And National Courts In The Rome System Of Justice, William W. Burke-White Jan 2008

Proactive Complementarity: The International Criminal Court And National Courts In The Rome System Of Justice, William W. Burke-White

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When the International Criminal Court (ICC) was established in 2002, States, NGOs, and the international community had extraordinarily high expectations that the Court could bring an end to impunity and provide broad-based accountability for international crimes. Nearly five years later, those expectations appear unfulfilled, due to political constraints, resource limitations, and the inability of the ICC to apprehend suspects. This article offers a novel solution to the misalignment of resources, expectations, and legal mandate of the ICC, arguing that the Court must more actively engage with national governments and encourage States to undertake their own prosecutions of international crimes. The …


The Domestic Influence Of International Criminal Tribunals: The International Criminal Tribunal For The Former Yugoslavia And The Creation Of The State Court Of Bosnia & Herzegovina, William W. Burke-White Jan 2008

The Domestic Influence Of International Criminal Tribunals: The International Criminal Tribunal For The Former Yugoslavia And The Creation Of The State Court Of Bosnia & Herzegovina, William W. Burke-White

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International criminal tribunals are often criticized for having minimal influence on the states over which they exercise jurisdiction. This article argues that the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia has had a far more positive impact on domestic governance in Bosnia & Herzegovina than previously assumed by both the academic and policy communities. The article develops a theoretical model to explain the impact of international criminal tribunals on domestic governance and tests that model against the ICTY¹s influence in Bosnia. More specifically, the article advances the claim that the nature of the tribunal¹s jurisdictional relationship with domestic judicial institutions …


The Social Costs Of Property Rights In Broadcast (And Cable) Signals, Shyamkrishna Balganesh Jan 2008

The Social Costs Of Property Rights In Broadcast (And Cable) Signals, Shyamkrishna Balganesh

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No abstract provided.


The Accidental Promise: Remaking The Law Of Misrepresented Intent, Aditi Bagchi Jan 2008

The Accidental Promise: Remaking The Law Of Misrepresented Intent, Aditi Bagchi

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Insincere Promises advances an economic theory of promissory fraud. Ayres and Klass argue that the doctrine of promissory fraud helps to induce efficient reliance from promisees by penalizing promisors who misrepresent the objective probability of their performance. The authors propose a revised doctrine aimed at inducing optimal reliance with minimal transaction costs. I show that Ayres and Klass have all but abandoned the role of intent in the common law of misrepresented intent. Ayres and Klass are concerned only with making available to promisees accurate information about the probability of performance by promisors. I suggest that whatever the merits of …


Commentary On Class Settlements Under Attack, Catherine T. Struve Jan 2008

Commentary On Class Settlements Under Attack, Catherine T. Struve

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No abstract provided.


Polyphonic Stare Decisis: Listening To Non-Article Iii Actors, Kermit Roosevelt Iii Jan 2008

Polyphonic Stare Decisis: Listening To Non-Article Iii Actors, Kermit Roosevelt Iii

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This article explores the input that non-Article III actors can and should have in the Supreme Court’s decision to reconsider a prior constitutional decision. It employs a model of constitutional decision-making that distinguishes between the articulation of constitutional meaning and the construction of constitutional doctrine to identify several different stages at which a court can adhere to or depart from precedent and examines the persuasive power of non-Article III input at each stage.


From The States Up: Building A National Renewable Energy Policy, Shelley Welton Jan 2008

From The States Up: Building A National Renewable Energy Policy, Shelley Welton

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In 2006, a U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) report concluded that “[r]educing the nation’s dependence on oil and carbon dioxide emissions in the next 25 years is not unlike the 1960s challenge to put a man on the moon.” In fact, this analogy may be understated. While the scope of the two challenges is similarly daunting, the consequences of failure are potentially much more serious in the case of the energy challenge. One key component of addressing this challenge will be changing the ways in which the U.S. meets its seemingly insatiable electricity demand. The environmental, foreign policy, health, and …


The Hanging Chads Of Corporate Voting, Marcel Kahan, Edward B. Rock Jan 2008

The Hanging Chads Of Corporate Voting, Marcel Kahan, Edward B. Rock

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Never has voting been more important in corporate law. With greater activism among shareholders and the shift from plurality to majority voting for directors, the number of close votes is rising. But is the basic technology of corporate voting adequate to the task? In this Article, we first examine the incredibly complicated system of US corporate voting, a complexity that is driven by the underlying custodial ownership structure, by dispersed ownership and large trading volumes, and by the rise in short-selling and derivatives. We identify three ways in which things predictably go wrong: pathologies of complexity; pathologies of ownership; and …


Human Freedom And Two Friedmen: Musings On The Implications Of Globalization For The Effective Regulation Of Corporate Behavior, Leo E. Strine Jr. Jan 2008

Human Freedom And Two Friedmen: Musings On The Implications Of Globalization For The Effective Regulation Of Corporate Behavior, Leo E. Strine Jr.

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In this essay, which was delivered as the Torys Lecture at the University of Toronto, Vice Chancellor Strine considers the implications of globalization for the effective regulation of corporate behavior affecting interests other than those of stockholders against the backdrop of the West’s political and economic experience. He concludes that consistent with prior experience, the globalization of corporate markets will require a corresponding expansion of the polity to protect those aspects of human freedom that are affected in important ways by corporate behavior. As a practical matter, this means that if the U.S. and other Western nations wish to limit …


The Ancient Roots Of Modern Financial Innovation: The Early History Of Regulatory Arbitrage, Michael S. Knoll Jan 2008

The Ancient Roots Of Modern Financial Innovation: The Early History Of Regulatory Arbitrage, Michael S. Knoll

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Recent years have seen an explosion of financial innovation. Much of this innovation seeks to exploit inconsistencies in the regulatory environment, and one of the most popular techniques for doing so uses put-call parity. Nonetheless, regulatory arbitrage using put-call parity is not a new phenomenon, as is frequently suggested. This Essay traces the use of put-call parity to avoid the usury prohibition back to Ancient Israel. It also describes the important role that put-call parity played in developing the equity of redemption, the defining characteristic of a modern mortgage, in Medieval England. In addition, this Essay describes how Muslims living …


Determinism And The Death Of Folk Psychology: Two Challenges To Responsibility From Neuroscience, Stephen J. Morse Jan 2008

Determinism And The Death Of Folk Psychology: Two Challenges To Responsibility From Neuroscience, Stephen J. Morse

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No abstract provided.


The Economics Of International Labor Migration And The Case For Global Distributive Justice In Liberal Political Theory, Howard F. Chang Jan 2008

The Economics Of International Labor Migration And The Case For Global Distributive Justice In Liberal Political Theory, Howard F. Chang

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Estimates of the magnitude of the gains that the world could enjoy by liberalizing international migration indicate that even partial liberalization would not only produce substantial increases in the world’s real income but also improve its distribution. Although the economic effects of immigration on native workers and distributive justice among natives are often advanced as reasons to reduce immigration, these concerns do not provide a sound justification for our restrictive immigration laws. Instead, the appropriate response to concerns about the distribution of income among natives is to increase the progressivity of our tax system. Protectionist immigration policies are not only …


The Complexity Of Modern American Civil Litigation: Curse Or Cure?, Stephen B. Burbank Jan 2008

The Complexity Of Modern American Civil Litigation: Curse Or Cure?, Stephen B. Burbank

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Originally prepared for the 2007 meetings of the Italian Association of Comparative Law, this paper seeks to excavate the roots of procedural complexity in modern American litigation. Proceeding from the view that there is no accepted definition of complex litigation in the United States, the paper discusses five related phenomena that the author regards as consequential: (1) the architecture of modern American lawsuits and the procedural philosophy that architecture reflects, (2) the volume of litigation and the public and private policies, attitudes and arrangements that affect it, (3) the dynamic nature of, and dispersed institutional responsibility for, American law, (4) …


The Law And Economics Of Environmental Federalism: Europe And The United States Compared, Michael G. Faure, Jason S. Johnston Jan 2008

The Law And Economics Of Environmental Federalism: Europe And The United States Compared, Michael G. Faure, Jason S. Johnston

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This article describes the evolution and key features of the centralized environmental regulatory systems that emerged in the United States and Europe during the latter half of the twentieth century. It applies insights from the positive economic analysis of regulatory centralization in an attempt to explain a striking paradox found in both the European and American centralized environmental regulatory regimes: the fact that in both systems, centralized environmental regulation has been adopted not as a solution for transboundary pollution (interjursidictional externalities), but rather for pollution that is primarily local. The paper develops a positive account that explains the tendency of …


Climate Change Confusion And The Supreme Court: The Misguided Regulation Of Greenhouse Gas Emissions Under The Clean Air Act, Jason S. Johnston Jan 2008

Climate Change Confusion And The Supreme Court: The Misguided Regulation Of Greenhouse Gas Emissions Under The Clean Air Act, Jason S. Johnston

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In the spring of 2007, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Massachusetts v. EPA that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) must promulgate automobile tailpipe greenhouse gas emission standards under Section 202 of the Clean Air Act (CAA). American environmentalists hailed the Supreme Court's decision as an important victory in the battle to curb global warming. This article argues to the contrary that: 1) a large body of economic work demonstrates that the likely geographic and temporal pattern of costs and benefits to the U.S. from climate change bears no resemblance to the pollution problems that Congress intended to deal …