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
Seeing the University More Clearly
Crisis can be clarifying. Recent events on campuses across the country have forced many of us to look more closely at how our own universities work, including at the decades-long drift toward more powerful university presidents. Reversing this drift, and developing a more democratic model of internal governance, may be a prerequisite not only for rebuilding intellectual community but also for avoiding future campus conflagrations.
Financial War and Economic Peace in Israel-Palestine
The United States has long used economic coercion in hopes of achieving "economic peace" in Israel/Palestine. Yet its vision of this peace has notably shifted over time. While earlier sanctions punished those who disrupted the Israeli-Palestinian "peace process" or undermined neoliberal dreams of global commercial integration, Biden's recent sanctions against West Bank settlers aim primarily to secure a peace deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia, relegating Palestinians to observer status.
Weekly Roundup: May 3, 2024
Darryl Li on the political economy of artillery shells, and Student reflections from the encampments at Columbia, CUNY, NYU and Yale. Plus, a CfP on dollar hegemony, a collection of critical legal work on Gaza, two open letters from law faculty, and new pieces by Adam Tooze on the political economy of Columbia University, David Stein & Ira Regmi on the civil rights struggle for full employment, Aziz Rana on why the constitution won't save us from Trump, and several YLS students on efforts by universities to smother pro-Palestinian activism.
From the Encampments: Student Reflections on Protests for Palestine
Law students at Columbia, CUNY, NYU, and Yale explain the demands behind the ongoing anti-war protests and offer their reflections from the encampments.