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Essay

The Machiavellis of the Market: Entrepreneurs Against Democracy

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With Elon Musk plowing his wealth into a pro-Trump super PAC and Jeff Bezos blocking the Washington Post’s endorsement of Harris, it’s easy to overlook the more direct anti-democratic power of the entrepreneurial elite. Their economic power — the ability to shape the future of our society in utterly unaccountable ways — requires no insidious. . .
Essay

Have You Heard the Good News About Consumer Protection?

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Recent years have witnessed a sea change in consumer protection, ushered in by a new generation of enforcers who reject many of the basic premises from the neoliberal era. They aim not merely to ensure that consumers have the information necessary to discipline firms through choice, but to prevent businesses from using their power to shape markets in. . .
Weekly Roundup

Weekly Roundup: Oct. 25

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Zohra Ahmed on the role that criminal fines and fees play in financing the state, Miguel Ruiz on the role of law and social movements in the fight against Spain’s chronic housing crisis, and Matthew Glover and Joshua Ingram on fascism from an Afrikan perspective. Plus, a call for (your!) recently accepted LPE scholarship, an internship with the. . .
Essay

On Fascism: An Afrikan Perspective

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While current analyses of fascism tend to focus on interwar Europe, for George Jackson and other political prisoners, fascism represented the general tendency of the capitalist class to destroy revolutionary consciousness wherever it threatened the established economic order. On this view, rather than being a twentieth-century ideology, fascism was already. . .
Symposium

Enough! The Spanish Fight to Limit Housing Speculation

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Throughout Spain, social movements are fighting against a chronic housing crisis caused by an influx of tourists and international capital. In this struggle, law is often a reflection of the existing neoliberal power structure, but with the support of sustained popular mobilizations, it has also served as a tool for emancipation.
Symposium

The Role of Coercion in the Neoliberal Economy

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As neoliberal attacks on progressive taxation emptied public coffers, states and municipalities increasingly turned to fines and fees to generate revenue. More fundamentally, criminal punishment became a necessary correlate to a state that must enforce property rights against an ever-growing multitude.
Weekly Roundup

Weekly Roundup: Oct. 18

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The LPE Blog goes global: the editors share some of our favorite recent global LPE and LPE-adjacent scholarship, Meena Jagannath and Felipe Mesel kick off a series on movement lawyering in times of rising authoritarianism, and Lamine Benghazi analyzes Tunisia’s failed democratic transition. Plus, a fellowship in carceral studies, a symposium on. . .
Weekly Roundup

Weekly Roundup: Oct. 11

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Greg Baltz on Abolish Rent, Chaumtoli Huq on the student uprising in Bangladesh, and Etienne Toussaint on Afrofuturist legal critique. Plus, an upcoming event on Sandeep Vaheesan’s Democracy in Power, an interview with Brian Highsmith on company towns old and new, a bombshell in Colorado’s Kroger-Albertsons merger trial, a. . .
Essay

Octavia Butler and Afrofuturist Legal Critique

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Butler’s speculative fiction uses the freedom dreams of Black Americans to show how the structure of a political economy not only reflects but also shapes legal concepts. By challenging the perceived permanence of existing power structures, Afrofuturism creates space for envisioning new, emancipatory futures.
Essay

All Power To The Tenants

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Tracy Rosenthal and Leonardo Vilchis’ new book, Abolish Rent: How Tenants Can End the Housing Crisis, is both a polemic and a guide. Drawing on their experiences organizing with the Los Angeles Tenants Union, Rosenthal and Vilchis envision a world where tenants control housing – a liberatory horizon that legal scholars, lawyers, and law. . .
Weekly Roundup

Weekly Roundup: Oct. 4

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Jeena Shah on BDS and neoimperial sanctions, Marshall Steinbaum on the legacy of Lake Powell, and another trip down into the LPE Vault. Plus, several cool job opportunities at the Vanderbilt Policy Accelerator, Asli Bali and Aziz Rana on the history of leftwing internationalism, Gabriel Winant on class analysis, Simon Torracinta on Swedish Social Democracy, and. . .

LPE Masthead

Managing Editor James Brandt Editoral Board Amna Akbar Corinne Blalock Veena Dubal Luke Herrine Amy Kapczynski Caroline Parker Aziz Rana Kate Redburn Karen Tani Noah Zatz Student Editors Liz Brown Chloe Miller Sohum Pal Elliot Setzer Eve Zelickson
Student Editor Emeriti Sam Aber Ashraf Ahmed Will Bloom Adam H. Bradlow Matthew Buck Brett Davidson Isabel Echarte Tariq El-Gabalawy Berto Elysee Molly Gordon Jeff Gordon Ruthie Lazenby Talya Lockman-Fine Andrew Miller Roxana Moussavian Lydia Nicholson