Law & Technology Theory
posted by Frank Pasquale
I just wanted to plug a new forum that Gaia Bernstein, Jim Chen, and I recently launched–Law & Technology Theory. The big question we’re addressing is whether our experience of past regulation of technologies teaches generalizable lessons for future policy. Gaia has nicely summarized some of the key issues we’ll be considering:
Whether [a theory of law & technology] should have broad principles that apply to all technologies or whether it should offer narrower principles relevant to different categories of technologies?
[Can we] formulate a theory that differentiates on the basis of the social values or institutions a new technology destabilizes?
Our “virtual symposium” will host an international group of scholars with a wide range of theoretical commitments. We’ll be publishing the proceedings in the Minnesota Journal of Law, Science, and Technology this Spring. We hope you’ll consider reading and commenting as the discussion progresses. (Some of us will also be at the IASTS conference in Baltimore this February.)
By the way, on a completely untheoretical note, I have to say that the travel time involved in this symposium is great–zero! By developing a forum somewhere between a blog and a conference, we’re trying to promote a new kind of academic exchange. We hope it ends up being a bit more inclusive than the average conference circuit, which can be inhospitable to those who have a tough time traveling.
Art Credit: Elsie Russell, Prometheus (1994).
December 4, 2006 at 2:05 pm
Posted in: Intellectual Property, Law and Humanities, Legal Theory, Sociology of Law, Technology
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Responses (1)
Patrick S. O'Donnell - December 4, 2006 at 4:53 pm
Wonderful idea: I think ‘law and technology’ is ‘under-theorized’ (I suspect you’ll [should?] come up with *both* broad and narrow principles). I’m looking forward to the fruits of your labor….
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