Selected Problems in
Jurisprudence:
New Governance and the Transformation of Law
3 Credits
Instructor: David M. Trubek
This seminar will
explore the rise of new forms of governance and their implications for the
future of law and legal practice. Governments and international agencies around
the world have begun to use new tools and processes to achieve public policies.
Generically labeled “new governance”, these may involve the use of broad
standards instead of fixed rules; rely on networks of policy makers, experts, stakeholders,
NGOs and the public for decision-making; encourage experimentation and
reviseability; employ measurement and monitoring in place of mandates and
sanctions; and privilege self-regulation. Ideally, this will create a form of networked
governance that would be reflexive rather than coercive, problem-solving rather
than controlling, coordinating rather than mandatory, bottom-up rather than
top-down. Some scholars decry these developments, considering them a threat to
the rule of law, while others see them as the beginning of a fundamental
transformation of the legal order and one that requires rethinking some basic
ideas about law. To explore these issues, the seminar will look at the new
governance phenomenon in the context of 20th Century legal theory
and current discussions of the changing role of government. It will lead up to
a Transatlantic Conference on “New
Governance and the Transformation of Law” to be held on November 20-21 as
the annual Symposium of the Wisconsin Law Review. This event will bring
together leading scholars from the
More information is available
here: Conference homepage
Students in the seminar will write 20 page papers on topics related to theme and are expected to attend conference sessions relevant to their paper. Papers are due at the end of the semester and would meet the upper level writing requirement.
