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Law & Political Economy

LPE project

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.

About The LPE Project Read the LPE Blog
Our Work

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.

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Engage

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!

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Events

A compendium of upcoming (and past) events put on by the LPE Project, LPE student groups, and other organizations in the LPE ecosystem.

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Recent Updates
The Unavoidable Consequences of Being Human
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The Unavoidable Consequences of Being Human

Next month, the Supreme Court will decide whether it is constitutional for cities to punish unsheltered people for sleeping outside, even when the city fails to provide any safe alternative. Sara Rankin explains what is at stake in this case, as well as how, in the wake of earlier rulings, cities have become more creative in their efforts to hide homelessness.

Territorial Labor and American Empire with Jed Kroncke
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Territorial Labor and American Empire with Jed Kroncke

Please join the LPE Project on Wednesday, April 3rd, at 12:10 ET for a lunch talk with Professor Jedidiah Kroncke, on “Territorial Labor and American Empire: A History of Democratic Avoidance and Constitutional Enervation.”  Much recent attention has been given to acknowledging the full historical scope of the American empire and its legal foundations. This…

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Weekly Roundup: March 15, 2024

Julieta Lobato on Milei's labor governance, Evan Bernick on the role of the Constitution in freedom struggles, and Jonathan Glater & Adriana Hardwicke on the fracturing of higher education. Plus, the next session in our Courts open course, a call for recently accepted LPE-relevant articles, pieces on the destruction of the Covid social safety net, the future of health care reform, and the politics of inequality, and, finally, Joe Biden is putting America back to work: job openings at the LPE Blog, the Vanderbilt Policy Accelerator, and the American Economic Liberties Project.

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The Fracturing of American Higher Education

Despite the outsized attention afforded to a handful of elite, private colleges, most students attend public institutions within 50 miles of their home. The recent curriculum wars in different states, as well as disparities in state-level funding, mean that where one lives will play an increasingly important role in both the accessibility and content of higher education.