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Call for Papers AALS Sections were encouraged to issue a “Call for Papers” to select one or more presenters for their program. The following Sections incorporated a “Call for Papers” into their programs. Those whose papers were selected have been added to the list of speakers and appear here:
Thursday, January 3, 2008 2:00 - 5:00 p.m. Speakers Selected from Call for Papers: The globalization of markets for capital, products, and managers has cast a bright spotlight on domestic legal regimes, including U.S. corporate governance laws. In the first half of the session, a roundtable discussion among scholars from the U.S. and Europe will explore the international competition of corporate governance laws. The second half of the session will feature paper presentations based on submissions made in response to the Section’s Call for Papers. While possible topics include regulatory competition, the Executive Committee of the Section encouraged submissions on other aspects of comparative corporate governance; the implications of reincorporation of U.S. corporations; the regulation of multinational corporations; inter-jurisdictional litigation and enforcement; the role of stock exchanges; and the like. 2:00 - 5:00 p.m. Speaker selected from Call for Papers: The American legal profession is in the midst of a profound demographic transformation. Over the last forty years, law has gone from being an exclusive club for White Anglo-Saxon Protestant men of means to one in which women comprise fifty percent of new entrants and racial and ethnic minorities nearly twenty percent. Scholars exploring this transformation have tended to concentrate on two broad themes. The first is largely descriptive: How are women and minorities faring, particularly with respect to obtaining high level positions in law firms and similar institutions, and what does this say about the structure of opportunity in the profession? The second is more expressly normative: How will the growing presence of women and minorities affect the legal profession’s traditional normative commitment to what Sanford Levinson has referred to as a “bleached out” conception of the lawyer’s role? In this session we will attempt to bring these two strands of scholarship together. We will do so in the context of Professor David Wilkins’s forthcoming book The Black Bar: The Legacy of Brown v. Board of Education and the Future of Race and the American Legal Profession (Oxford University Press), which explores how the generation of black lawyers who entered the corporate hemisphere of legal practice beginning in the late 1960’s have attempted to integrate the upper echelons of the bar while at the same time negotiating its own understanding of the relationship between personal identity (including group-based commitments) and professional role. The program will begin with a keynote talk from Professor Wilkins. The panelists will examine his evidence and arguments from a variety of disciplines and perspectives. Friday, January 4, 2008 8:30 - 10:15 a.m. The development of contemporary biologics and how they interface with human subjects outpaces legislative and judicial response. Commentators suggest that there is a lack of guidance on contract, tort, and constitutional issues related to genetic materials. The jurisprudence in this domain is neither clear nor responsive to contemporary biotechnology or those who claim to be harmed by aggressive researchers and doctors. Informed consent may be an illusory concept in a field where violating such norms is a small penalty where tremendous profits are to be made. This panel debates whether there is room for private enterprise in the human body. It asks who owns the body and what recourses should be made available for trespass to human flesh. Panelists scrutinize whether and to what extent government regulation should be invited into the spheres of enhanced reproductive technology, genetic developments, organ transplantation and the expanding field of cosmeceuticals. 8:30 - 10:15 a.m. Speakers Selected from Call for Papers: After the collapse of Enron, Adelphia, Worldcom and other high flyers of the 1990s, there was a crisis of confidence in American business and securities regulators. Numerous federal and state enforcement and regulatory actions occurred in the wake of these scandals. The most important was the passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, but prosecutions of research analysts and mutual funds also resulted in reform. A torrent of criminal prosecutions and civil litigation under Rule 10b-5 and other securities law statutes also occurred. Currently, several high-powered decision makers have asserted that the U.S. capital markets are becoming less competitive than overseas markets due, in part, to the U.S. regulatory and litigation environment. Further, there has been a push back in the courts as to expansive interpretations by the SEC of its authority with regard to hedge funds and mutual fund governance, and expansive district court opinions regarding the reach of the anti-fraud provisions. After a call for papers for the January 2008 meeting of the AALS Securities Regulation Section in New York discussing any aspect of these developments, five papers were selected. A special issue of the Brooklyn Journal of Corporate, Financial and Commercial Law will be devoted to these papers. 10:30 a.m.- 12:15 p.m. We will highlight ways in which academic support professionals and other faculty members can work collaboratively to enhance law student education throughout the student body. Participants will be asked to think broadly and critically about what constitutes effective teaching in law school in ways that reach the student population as a whole. Included among the topics will be the following: results of an empirical study involving writing assignments integrated within a doctrinal course; suggestions about effective ways for legal writing faculty and academic support professionals to work together; and the synergy that results when academic success skills are taught using material covered in doctrinal classes. The program will be geared towards both casebook and skills professors. 10:30 a.m.- 12:15 p.m. Speakers Selected from Call for Papers: It can be said that agency law is the source of all modern unincorporated business organizations, and certainly questions of agency law permeate all business associations. This year’s program focuses on agency law and, more particularly, on the newly- approved Restatement (Third) of Agency. The program will consist of three or four papers pertaining to the Restatement (Third), selected via a Call for Papers and reflecting a wide range of methodologies and perspectives. Professor DeMott, who served as Reporter for Restatement (Third), will provide commentary. The ALI gave final approval to the Restatement (Third) of Agency in 2006. Coming almost one half century after the Restatement (Second), the new Restatement differs from its predecessor both in substance and style. It addresses the role of agency law within modern organizations (e.g., imputation of knowledge within an organization’s “chain of command”), as well as relationships between common-law agency doctrines and statutes. Restatement (Third) adopts new nomenclature, for example jettisoning the terminology “master-servant,” “inherent agency power,” and “partially disclosed principal” while articulating a broad definition of “manifestation.” It revisits many familiar problems, including the bases on which the legal consequences of an agent’s actions may be attributed to the principal, the standard for an employer’s liability under respondeat superior, and the duties that agents and principals owe to each other. 10:30 a.m.- 12:15 p.m. Speakers Selected from Call for Papers: 10:30 a.m.- 12:15 p.m. Speakers Selected from Call for Papers: One of the most hotly contested issues in contract law these days is the unconscionability of mandatory arbitration terms in employment and consumer contracts. Some aspects of this phenomenon are well understood: how widespread these terms are, and what are the doctrinal aspects of the unconscionability test. But a basic aspect of this debate is not yet well-informed: how bad is mandatory arbitration in reality? How much worse, if at all, are breached-against parties when they have to arbitrate? When does mandatory arbitration bar recovery and prevent vindication of legitimate claims? Are there unintended implications to the use, or the elimination of, mandatory arbitration terms? The presentations in the panel are intended to move beyond myth, conjecture, and assumption, and to shed a more concrete empirical light on these questions. Speakers will present and debate insights and findings regarding the reality of mandatory contract arbitration. Four presentations will be made: two by invited speakers and two by scholars selected through this call for papers. The Michigan Journal of Law Reform has agreed to publish their papers and is potentially interested in publishing several additional papers in the same 2008 issue on this topic. The two invited speakers are Professor St. Antoine, formerly the President of the National Academy of Arbitrators, whose lecture is titled “Mandatory Arbitration: Why It’s Better than It Looks,” and Professor Eisenberg, who will talk about “Realities of Mandatory Arbitration Clauses.” 10:30 a.m.- 12:15 p.m. Speakers Selected from Call for Papers: Because students and educators necessarily bring their beliefs and convictions with them through the schoolhouse gate, clashes inevitably occur between deeply held religious values and the values of others in the school community. Those clashes can arise when schools attempt to enforce hate speech policies against offensive or hurtful religious speech, restrict the distribution of religious literature, or respond to students’ religious expression in broadly framed assignments or activities. They arise in a host of contexts that pit students and their families against school officials, and school officials against one another. They pull into sharp conflict competing constitutional freedoms and competing national values. Panelists will examine the complex theoretical tensions these conflicts present and the implications of the courts’ continually evolving approaches to those tensions. 10:30 a.m.- 12:15 p.m. Speakers Selected from Call for Papers: Speakers will be those who are presenting papers for the first time at an AALS conference, or for the first time in an area of human rights. Speakers will be selected on a competitive basis and the names of those papers chosen for presentation will be listed in the supplemental program, updated on the AALS Annual Meeting web site and in the section newsletter. 10:30 a.m.- 12:15 p.m. Speakers Selected from Call for Papers: This program will demonstrate how professors of employment and labor law are engaged in activities that share their scholarly work with the general public in two primary ways: Public Education - Sharing our scholarly work through writings for a broader public audience (e.g., op-eds and guest columns), speaking appearances and adult education programs, and the news media. Intellectual Activism - Applying our scholarly work to direct interaction and advocacy with the public for the purpose of effectuating social change and law reform. The presentations and accompanying papers will be descriptive, reflective, and instructive. Our presenters, who were selected via an open Call for Papers, will tell us what they have been doing, reflect upon the impact of those efforts, and offer insights to colleagues who are engaging, or wish to engage, in similar activities. Their essays will be published in an upcoming issue of the Suffolk University Law Review. 10:30 a.m.- 12:15 p.m. Speakers Selected from Call for Papers: Few issues are as complex and controversial as those concerning the domestic role of the military. This has long been true, but recent developments ranging from the war on terrorism to Hurricane Katrina demonstrate that the topic has become unusually pressing in recent years. Our panelists will be surveying and debating a number of issues under this general heading, including the latest developments concerning NSA surveillance, the line between homeland security and homeland defense in the context of an armed conflict against a terrorist organization, and the President’s power to control the National Guard. We will begin with a presentation by the winner of our call for papers, followed by a moderated dialogue amongst all panelists and concluding with an opportunity for the audience to join the conversation. 10:30 a.m.- 12:15 p.m. Speakers Selected from Call for Papers: The presenters for this year’s program were selected in response to a call for papers. In the spirit of our section, the selection process ensured open access and resulted in an exciting panel of speakers sharing new scholarship and adding fresh perspectives to the overall theme of this year’s conference, “Reassessing Our Roles in Light of Change.” 4:00 - 5:45 p.m. Speakers selected from Call for Papers/Commentaries: The main task of the panel will be to survey the changing challenges posed by war during the 20th Century, as a result of the dramatic changes in the characteristics of armed conflicts, and to assess the law’s responses. The focus of the panel will be on how the law’s objectives and diverse protected communities (i.e., belligerents, sick and wounded, prisoners of war and civil ians) have fared in view of the changes in the conduct of warfare and the law. The century’s dramatic developments, affecting both jus ad bellum and jus in bello, have included several noted conceptual and operational transitions: From “Just War” to the “Outlawing” of War; From International Armed Conflicts” to “Intra-national and Transnational Conflicts”; From the Containment of Armed Conflicts (through the Principle of Distinction, Neutrality, etc.) to a resort to “Total War” (through strategic bombing, terrorism, etc.); From conventional weapons to weapons of mass destruction; From quasi-public (ICRC, etc.) and national policing of Humanitarian Law to international policing. The panel, relying on both chronological and thematic approaches, will seek to assess the impact of these developments on Humanitarian Law’s functions in several conflict arenas, including Afghanistan, Chechnya, Iraq, Kashmir, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Sudan and former Yugoslavia. Saturday, January 5, 2008 8:30 - 10:15 a.m. The panel will explore the moral or policy foundations of family law, discussing the ideas or values that either are, or should be, foundational, either for family law as a whole, or for some significant sub-area within family law. 10:30 a.m.- 12:15 p.m. Speakers Selected from Call for Papers: Subprime mortgage lending in the United States has grown rapidly in recent years, rising from $40 billion in 1993 to $150 billion in 2000 and $625 billion in 2005. By the end of 2006, subprime loans accounted for 14% of all outstanding mortgages. Subprime lending helped to promote a housing boom during 2001-05 and increased the U.S. homeownership rate to an all-time record of nearly 70%. However, subprime lending has also created significant concerns and problems. Critics allege that subprime lenders have unfairly targeted minority and elderly borrowers for high-cost subprime loans. Many subprime mortgages are adjustable-rate loans whose interest rates increase rapidly after only two or three years and also carry prepayment penalties that make refinancing very costly. Critics have accused subprime lenders of engaging in “predatory” practices, such as lending without regard to the borrower’s ability to repay, fee-packing, equity-stripping and loan-flipping. Delinquency and foreclosure rates on subprime loans have risen sharply since 2005, and several large subprime lenders have declared bankruptcy. Members of Congress have proposed remedial legislation and have criticized regulators for not responding adequately to problems in the subprime market. Speakers for this program will address various topics dealing with the development, operation and regulation of subprime lending, as well as the impact of subprime lending on the U.S. housing market and the broader economy. 10:30 a.m.- 12:15 p.m. LL.M. students come to our programs armed with accomplishments and primed for intellectual growth. These talented and committed individuals leave a profound impact on the schools where they study, and acquire powerful tools (both theoretical and practical) to make a positive difference on the world around them. Beyond the walls of the academy, how do we view and assess the critical global impact carried forward by our LL.M. graduates, and how has that assessment changed through the history of our programs? What are our roles in coaching and training these students? What are our schools doing to track the perspectives of our graduates and to recognize the contributions of these talented professionals? What signals are our programs heralding throughout the global community? Our panel explores this impact and our role in supporting these global contributions. We explore this topic from various perspectives - that of graduate, law teacher, administrative director, and funding organization. Our panelists will share their experiences and impressions, and guide us in identifying paths for future exploration. Sunday, January 6, 2008 9:00 a.m.-12:00 p.m. Speakers Selected from Call for Papers: |
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