The Law and Political Economy (LPE) Project brings together a network of scholars, practitioners, and students working to develop innovative intellectual, pedagogical, and political interventions to advance the study of political economy and law. Our work is rooted in the insight that politics and the economy cannot be separated and that both are constructed in essential respects by law. We believe that developments over the last several decades in legal scholarship and policy helped to facilitate rising inequality and precarity, political alienation, the entrenchment of racial hierarchies and intersectional exploitation, and ecological and social catastrophe. We aim to help reverse these trends by supporting scholarly work that maps where we have gone wrong, and that develops ideas and proposals to democratize our political economy and build a more just, equal, and sustainable future.
LPE project
Learn
A variety of resources designed to help faculty and students learn more about LPE, including syllabi from LPE and LPE-related courses, primers on topics such as neoliberalism and legal realism, as well as videos from a number of events we have held over the last year.
Go to LearnEngage
Information about the amazing work being done by LPE student groups, as well as guidance on starting a student group on your own campus! A bureau of affiliated professors and practitioners designed to help faculty and students to bring LPE scholars to their campuses!
Go to EngageEvents
A compendium of upcoming (and past) events put on by the LPE Project, LPE student groups, and other organizations in the LPE ecosystem.
Go to Events
CFP – Making and Breaking Worlds: Old and New Struggles in...
Neoliberalism – understood both as a political philosophy and as an actually-existing model of governing capitalism – appears to be in terminal decline. The renewed acceptability of industrial policy, the successes of Chinese state capitalism, and the decline of neo/liberal constitutionalism and legalism have all been cited as evidence of such decline. In the midst…
15 Movies to Watch for an LPE Summer
The old school year is dying, and the new one struggles to be born: now is the time of movies.
The Dilemma of Picking Winners
Industrial policy will often require picking winners: if there were already many domestic firms capable of producing the desired output, there would be no compelling reason for subsidy or special treatment. Yet in doing so, the government risks locking in dominant firms and foreclosing the competition it ultimately needs. How might policymakers avoid this trap?
Weekly Roundup: June 26
Amy Kapczynski on LPE and social science, Sam Moyn on the class reductionist response to Gerontocracy, and Rakeen Mabud on why the affordability frame needs a power analysis. Plus, a bevy of new essays, papers, and events, covering the history of the consumer price index, left critiques of the constitution, the international right to strike, worker control over AI governance, administrative law pluralism, the economic function of rent stabilization, and more!