The last year, and the COVID-19 pandemic in particular, has laid bare the inequalities and political instability of our contemporary political economy. There is a growing sense of urgency about the need to challenge the underlying assumptions and ideas that have shaped law, economic policy, political economy, and the economic worldview in American society over the last several decades. The prevailing “neoliberal consensus”—that markets are self-correcting and efficient, that government action is futile at best, and that society should be analyzed primarily in terms of individual preference-maximization—has led to growing inequality and precarity. It has also undermined the public infrastructures that we need to enable democracy and collective flourishing, and to address crises like COVID-19. But we are starting to see a new paradigm emerge to challenge the old, to challenge concentrated economic and political power, and revive anti-monopoly traditions and public power over markets. Law and political economy frameworks have emerged to challenge the neoliberal paradigm, and to translate new empirical and theoretical work on the limits of markets and neoliberal capitalism into policy change.
Following on the success of last summer’s Anti-Monopoly and Regulated Industries (AMRI) Summer Academy, this summer’s updated program will once again provide participants with a crash course in political economy, anti-monopoly, public utility, and regulated industries, drawing on cutting-edge scholarship in law, economics, and social science. Participants will come away with an understanding of the unique challenges of 21st century capitalism and a broader sense of the legal and institutional tools that can be leveraged to tackle the kinds of concentrated corporate power that are manifest today, from Big Tech to new monopoly power in sectors like health care, pharma, banking, and more.
Please email AMRI Project Lead Jay Varellas at [email protected] if you have any questions.
AMRI 2021 Summer Academy Schedule
June 1: “Contemporary Problems in Anti-Monopoly and Regulated Industries I: Framing the Problem”
Faculty: Amy Kapczynski, Professor of Law, Yale Law School, Faculty Co-Director, Law & Political Economy Project; Suresh Naidu, Professor of International & Public Affairs and Economics, Columbia University; and Sandeep Vaheesan, Legal Director, Open Markets Institute
June 8: “Contemporary Problems in Anti-Monopoly and Regulated Industries II: How We Got Here”
Faculty: Amy Kapczynski, Professor of Law, Yale Law School, Faculty Co-Director, Law & Political Economy Project; Corinne Blalock, Executive Director, Law & Political Economy Project; and Jay Varellas, Academic Fellow, Law and Political Economy Project
Faculty: William Novak, Charles F. and Edith J. Clyne Professor of Law, University of Michigan Law School
June 22: “Unpacking the Anti-Monopoly Toolkit II: Antitrust and Competition”
Faculty: Lina Khan, Assistant Professor, Columbia Law School; Sanjukta Paul, Assistant Professor of Law, Wayne State University Law School, Frank Pasquale, Professor of Law, Brooklyn Law School, and John Newman, Associate Professor of Law, University of Miami School of Law
June 29: “Applications I: Banking and Finance”
Faculty: Mehrsa Baradaran, Professor of Law, University of California, Irvine School of Law, Saule Omarova, Beth and Marc Goldberg Professor of Law, Cornell Law School, and Morgan Ricks, Professor of Law, Vanderbilt University Law School
July 6: “Applications II: Technology”
Faculty: Frank Pasquale, Professor of Law, Brooklyn Law School
July 13: “Applications III: Labor and Anti-Monopoly”
Faculty: Kate Andrias, Professor of Law, Columbia Law School, and Sandeep Vaheesan, Legal Director, Open Markets Institute
July 20: “Applications IV: Health Care and Pharmaceuticals”
Faculty: Allison K. Hoffman, Professor of Law, University of Pennsylvania Law School, and Amy Kapczynski, Professor of Law, Yale Law School, Faculty Co-Director, Law and Political Economy Project
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