Law and Political Economy Collective

What is Capitalism? Reading & Discussion Group #27
September 29, 2023
Scott Carter, Professor of Economics at the University of Tulsa, led a discussion of his work on Sraffa.

Heterodox Economics Meets Law and Political Economy: Institutions and Power
New School for Social ResearchFeatured Speakers: Kirstin Munro, New School For Social Research; Josh Mason, John Jay College of Criminal Justice

Workshop Program

Workshop CFP

What is Capitalism? Reading & Discussion Group #28
November 3, 2023
Paige Carmichael, PhD student in Economics at UMass Amherst, led a discussion of disability, work, and capitalism.

What is Capitalism? Reading & Discussion Group #29
December 1, 2023
Jessica A. Shoemaker, Steinhart Foundation Distinguished Professor of Law at Nebraska College of Law, led a discussion of her article, “Re-Placing Property,” University of Chicago Law Review 91 (forthcoming 2024).

ClassCrits XIV: Demanding Justice in the Face of Retrenchment
The 14th Annual ClassCrits conference, held at Southwestern Law School in Los Angeles, featured scholarship on the theme “Demanding Justice in the Face of Retrenchment: Finding Common Ground and Building Coalition Across Borders.”

Conference Materials:

2024_ClassCrits Call for Papers

2024 ClassCrits Program

What is Capitalism? Reading & Discussion Group #30
March 1, 2024
Ramsi Woodcock, Wyatt, Tarrant & Combs Associate Professor of Law, Secondary Appointment, Gatton College of Business & Economics University of Kentucky, led a discussion on his article, ” A Progressive Critique of the Law and Political Economy Movement” (rescheduled from January 12, 2023)

Heterodox Economics Meets Law and Political Economy: Power for a Just Transition
John Jay College, CUNY, New York CityFeatured Speakers: Isabel Estevez & Kate Aronoff

Roundtable with: Clara Mattei, An Li, JW Mason, Jamee Moudud

Moderated by: Martha McCluskey

Co-organizers and sponsors:

The Association for the Promotion of Political Economy and the Law (APPEAL)

John Jay College Economics Department, John Jay College Law and Political Economy Society, and the New School for Social Research Economics Department

Workshop Program

Global LPE Network Business Meeting at LSA
12:45 – 1:30 pm

Hyatt Regency Denver

LSA 2024 CRN 55 Program

Law and Political Economy Happy Hour at LSA
2024-06-07 19:01 - 20:01 (Africa/Abidjan)
6 – 8 pm

Mercury Cafe, Denver

Co-sponsored by the LPE Project and the Global LPE Network

What is Capitalism? Reading & Discussion Group #31
September 27, 2024
Frank Pasquale, a co-founder and former Board member of APPEAL, is Professor of Law at Cornell Tech and Cornell Law School led the discussion of his recent article The New Antitrust, co-authored with Michael L. Cederblom and published at 33 U.S.C. Interdisciplinary L.J. 235 (2023).

What is Capitalism? Reading & Discussion Group #32
October 25, 2024
David Ciepley presented his article Democracy and the Corporation: The Long View, Annual Review of Political Science 26:489–517 (2023) with comments by James J. Varellas, UC Berkeley.

Queering the Right-Wing Constitution? Trans Litigation and "Parents' Rights"
2024-10-30 17:00 - 18:00 (America/Halifax)
This fall, the Supreme Court will hear oral argument in United States v. Skrmetti, a case that challenges Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care for transgender people under 18. At the same time, anti-LGBTQIA+ legislation is proliferating across the country, with over 500 bills currently under consideration.
In a judiciary system deeply influenced by a right-wing worldview, how should constitutional scholars and advocates approach litigating for trans rights? How do we understand trans rights, not just within the frame of identity and equality, but also within the frame of political economy, freedom, and human flourishing? This panel seeks to address these questions.
Moderator: Kyle Velte, Associate Dean for Faculty, Professor, and Karelitz Chair in Evidence Law, University of Kansas School of Law
Panelists:
Meredith Taylor Brown, Assistant Attorney General – Civil Rights Bureau, Office of the New York State Attorney General
Mary Anne Case, Arnold I. Shure Professor of Law, the University of Chicago Law School

Hila Keren, Paul E. Treusch Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School
Commentator: Craig Konnoth, Martha Lubin Karsh and Bruce A. Karsh Bicentennial Professor of Law, University of Virginia School of Law

What is Capitalism? Reading & Discussion Group #33
November 15, 2024
Fernando Loayza Jordán presented his paper, on democracy and taxation, Contesting the Neoliberal Social Contract.

What is Capitalism? Reading & Discussion Group
December 6, 2024 at 3 pm ET
A discussion with Diana Reddy on her forthcoming article, Transaction Benefits at Work: Regulating the Future of Work for the Future of Society.
Click here to register.

Fair Shake Book Talk
December 12, 2024
2 pm ET
Zoom
Naomi Cahn, June Carbone, and Nancy Levit will discuss their new book, Fair Shake: Women and the Fight to Build a Just Economy.
Click here to register.

ClassCrits Annual Meeting
December 12, 3pm ET
All Members, non-members, past participants and friends of ClassCrits are welcome to attend and share ideas and feedback for future activities.
For those who are available and interested, we encourage you to also attend the online discussion with Naomi Cahn, June Carbone, and Nancy Levit of their new book Fair Shake: Women and the Fight to Build a Just Economy just prior to the meeting at 2 pm.

APPEAL Annual Meeting
December 12, 3pm ET
All Members, non-members, past participants and friends of APPEAL are welcome to attend and share ideas and feedback for future activities.
For those who are available and interested, we encourage you to also attend the online discussion with Naomi Cahn, June Carbone, and Nancy Levit of their new book Fair Shake: Women and the Fight to Build a Just Economy just prior to the meeting at 2 pm.

ClassCrits VIII: The New Corporatocracy and Election 2016
The 8th Annual ClassCrits conference, held at Loyola University Chicago School of Law, Chicago, IL featured scholarship on the theme “The New Corporatocracy and Election 2016.”

Conference Materials:

2016 Call for Papers

2017 Western New England Law Review symposium (vol. 39, no. 4)

Critical/Political Economy Happy Hour at AALS
4:30 – 6:30 pm

Novela, 662 Mission Street, San Francisco

Co-sponsored by the Critical Legal Collective, the LPE Collective, the LPE Project, and the Race and Private Law Section

What is Capitalism? Reading & Discussion Group
January 24, 2025 at 3 pm ET
Professor Akbar Rasulov, University of Glasgow Law, will lead a discussion of Duncan Kennedy’s classic article, The Role of Law in Economic Thought: Essays on the Fetishism of Commodities, 34 American University Law Review 939 (1985).
Register here.

What is Capitalism? Reading & Discussion Group
2025-02-28 15:00 - 16:00 (Africa/Abidjan)
February 28, 2025 at 3 pm ET
A discussion with Kimberly Kracman on her article, Code as Constitution: The Negotiation of a Uniform Accounting Code for U.S. Railway Corporations and the Moral Justification of Stakeholder Claims on Wealth, Critical Perspectives on Accounting.
Register here.

What is Capitalism? Reading & Discussion Group
2025-03-28 20:59 - 21:59 (Africa/Abidjan)
March 28, 2025 at 3 pm ET
A discussion with Paul Cammack, University of Manchester, featuring his article, Politics and Political Economy of Post-Reproduction Societies.
Register here.

Law and Political Economy Meets Heterodox Economics: Power, Freedom, Institutions, and the Law
2025-04-12 21:07 - 22:07 (Africa/Abidjan)
Saturday, April 12, 2025
9:00am–5:00pm ET
Yale Law School
127 Wall Street, New Haven, CT 06511
At our Spring 2025 workshop, we seek to feature multi-disciplinary and intersectional emerging scholarship reflecting on the relationships between politics, law, and economics, and society. We welcome papers both on and beyond the general workshop theme of “Power, Freedom, Institutions, and the Law.”
Students and emerging scholars interested in presenting law-and-political-economy-informed analysis of class, gender, race, imperialism, and more, are welcome to submit a 100–300 word abstract with titles by March 15, 2025, via the following link: https://bit.ly/4b0hAxa. In keeping with a commitment to methodological pluralism, research utilizing quantitative or qualitative methods, analytic or institutional approaches, and other techniques from a variety of disciplines, will all be considered. We are especially interested in soliciting abstracts that cut across disciplinary lines involving economics, law and institutionalism, politics, history, etc.
We encourage proposals and projects at every stage of their development; completed papers are not necessary at the time of the workshop. If you are unsure if your proposal fits the submission guidelines, please do not hesitate to contact the organizers by mailing to appeal@politicaleconomylaw.org.
The workshop will begin with a plenary panel on Third World internationalism today, and a masterclass on methods in law and political economy.
If you are interested in presenting or attending, please note that, while the workshop is free of charge and will include lunch and refreshments, we are unfortunately unable to provide support for travel or lodging.
Co-organizers and Sponsors:
The Association for the Promotion of Political Economy and the Law (APPEAL), a program of the LPE Collective;
Yale Law and Political Economy Student Group;
John Jay College Economics Department;
John Jay College Law and Political Economy Society;
With New School for Social Research students and faculty; and
UMass Amherst LPE Group

What is Capitalism? Reading & Discussion Group
2025-05-09 14:00 - 15:00 (America/New_York)
May 9, 2025 at 2 pm ET
Katherine Moos, University of Massachusetts Amherst Economics, will discuss her current book project.
Register here.

The Law and Political Economy of Social Reproduction
2025-05-21 09:00 - 18:00 (America/New_York)
This day-long workshop will be held in person at the University of Chicago on Wednesday, May 21st.
View the program here.
Read the call for papers at this link.

Law and Society Association Annual Meeting
2025-05-22 09:00 - 2025-05-25 14:00 (America/New_York)
View the program for the Law and Political Economy Collaborative Research Network at this link.

LPE Scholar Workshop
2025-07-08 15:00 - 18:30 (America/New_York)
Submit an abstract.
Download the below call for abstracts as a PDF.
This July, scholars of political economy will gather in Montreal just prior to the Society for the Advancement of Socio-Economics (SASE) annual conference. In the spirit of fostering community and generating interdisciplinary discussion, the LPE Collective invites scholars to network, share their research, and receive feedback over an afternoon workshop to be held at McGill University’s Faculty of Law.
We welcome faculty, students, and emerging scholars interested in presenting their work to submit a 200-500 word abstract with title by Monday, June 2. Click here to submit an abstract. We are especially interested in soliciting abstracts that breach disciplinary lines involving law, economics, politics, history, and sociology. Scholars and others who are interested in participating as commentators are also invited to attend by letting us know at appeal@politicaleconomylaw.org.
Workshop leaders will include Leanna Katz, Eric George, and Martha McCluskey.
We encourage proposals and projects at every stage of their development; completed papers are not necessary at the time of the workshop. If you are unsure if your proposal fits the submission guidelines, please do not hesitate to contact the organizers at appeal@politicaleconomylaw.org.
The event will be followed by an opportunity to gather for drinks and dinner together at nearby location to be determined.
If you are interested in presenting or attending, please note that, while the workshop is free of charge, we are unfortunately unable to provide support for travel, lodging, or dinner.

Global Law and Political Economy Summer Academy
2025-07-14 09:00 - 2025-07-18 17:00 (Europe/Rome)
July 14 – July 18, 2025, Roccella Ionica, Italy
View the program.
Apply by 25 April 2025.
The Summer School offers an interactive, non-hierarchical, and focused mentorship and skill-building experience for students and faculty. It engages critically with the diverse considerations of political-economy-law while fostering democratic dialogue with local cultures.
The program spans three days:

Day 1: Roundtable and writing workshop sessions (workshops modelled on IGLP format);
Day 2: Case study focused on interactive, problem-based group learning, a focused master class, and a cultural excursion exploring local custom and history; and
Day 3: Lectures from high-profile judges at the intersection of policy, power and law as well as a career mentorship session.

The Summer Academy is a collaboration between the INET YSI FLE Working Group, the Law and Political Economy Collective (LPE-C), the Initiative for Global Law and Political Economy at the University of Manchester (iGLPE), the European Association for Evolutionary Political Economy (EAEPE), and the City of Roccella, Italy.
Application Details:
We invite graduate students (Masters or Ph.D. students or within three years of completing Ph.D.) interested in exploring questions of law and political economy to apply.

Funding: Partial travel stipends and shared accommodation provided.
How to Apply: Submit a 200-word abstract on a theme related to law and political economy; and CV (including any references) by 25 April 2025.
Accepted participants will be requested to submit a working paper for the writing workshop between 3000-8000 words no later than 1 June 2025.

For more information contact: christina@youngscholarsinitiative.org.

Legal and Political Foundations of Capitalism: The End of Laissez Faire?
2025-07-30 10:00 - 11:30 (America/New_York)
Jamee Moudud’s new book, Legal and Political Foundations of Capitalism: The End of Laissez Faire? draws on the Original Institutional Economics and American Legal Realist traditions to propose a theory of institutional political economy. Focusing on property, money and credit, constitutional law, and corporations, this book argues that laissez-faire has never existed and that “state intervention versus de-regulation” and “market failures versus free markets” are false dichotomies. Moudud’s book proposes the need to engage with legal-economic theory and history to understand what institutions are, what economic regulation means, how law is intrinsically connected to the economy, and how power relations are distributed within capitalism.
Join the author and commentators Anna Chadwick and John Haskell for a Zoom discussion of this recent book on July 30, 2025 at 10 am eastern.
Speakers
Jamee K. Moudud (PhD) is a Professor of Economics at Sarah Lawrence College, Bronxville, New York. He is Co-Founder and Board Member of the Law and Political Economy Collective (LPE-C), on the Steering Committee of the Association for the Promotion of Political Economy and Law (APPEAL), and is also on the Editorial Board and a Co-Founder of the Journal of Law and Political Economy.
Anna Chadwick is a Senior Lecturer at the University of Glasgow School of Law. Anna’s monograph, Law and the Political Economy of Hunger, was published by Oxford University Press in 2019.
John Haskell is a Professor/Chair at University of Manchester Law School and a Faculty Member at Harvard Law School Institute for Global Law and Policy. At Manchester, he is Director of Manchester Law and Technology Initiative and Lead at Initiative for Global Law and Political Economy.

What is Capitalism? Reading & Discussion Group
2025-09-05 12:00 - 13:00 (America/New_York)
This session will discuss a working paper by Eric Scorsone and Fabrizio Esposito, The Doctrinal Myth of the Efficient Breach in the Overbid Scenario: Unduly Reducing Expected Performance to Expected Profit.
Register here.
In a contractual relationship, does the Promisor own the Promisee’s performance? If so, up to what extent? These questions are at the heart of contract law and contract law scholarship. The economic approach to law has long proposed a way to answer these questions, the so-called efficient breach. What do we owe when we break an existing contract to take advantage of a better deal? The authors argue that prominent economic analysis of breach of contract misunderstands the legal, moral, and practical aspects of contractual obligations and entitlements.
This session adds to our series of sessions over the last few years examining the legal complexities of basic economic concepts. The idea of voluntary market transactions for mutual gain is central to the logics of capitalism. Closer attention to how contract law and institutions shape transactions can clarify underlying assumptions and conflicts about who deserves what and why.
Eric Scorsone is Executive Director, Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service and Associate Professor of Public Policy by Courtesy, University of Virginia. He co-hosts the Legal-Economic Nexus Podcast with Sarah Klammer.
Fabrizio Esposito is Associate Professor of Private Law, NOVA School of Law and the Research & Development Centre in Law and Society in Lisbon, Portugal.
We’ll begin with a 10 minute introduction by the author, followed by extended conversation with participants.
