cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Under Attack: The Public's Right to Know and the War on Terror

Since the September 11 attacks, courts have been reluctant to uphold the public’s right to obtain government information through the Freedom of Information Act and the First Amendment right of access. Given the doctrinal and statutory confusion plaguing both FOIA and the First Amendment right of access since their inception, and the judiciary’s historic tendency to defer to the Executive in matters implicating national security, recent appellate decisions rejecting right to know claims may seem unsurprising. But a closer reading of these cases reveals that the judiciary’s failure to uphold the public’s right to government transparency has been based on a fundamental lack of appreciation for and hostility to the right’s very existence. These cases suggest that an enforceable right to know is unnecessary because the political process is adequate to force government disclosure. History amply demonstrates, however, the political process’s incapacity to compel government disclosure, particularly when the nation is in a time of crisis and the government activities at issue concern noncitizens.
If People Would Be Outraged by Their Rulings, Should Judges Care?

At first glance, it is puzzling to suggest that courts should care whether the public would be outraged by their decisions; judicial anticipation of public outrage and its effects seems incompatible with judicial independence. Nonetheless, judges might be affected by the prospect of outrage for both consequentialist and epistemic reasons. If a judicial ruling would undermine the cause it is meant to promote or impose serious social harms, judges have reason to hesitate on consequentialist grounds. The prospect of public outrage might also suggest that the Court’s ruling would be incorrect on the merits; if most people disagree with the Court’s decision, perhaps the Court is wrong. Those who adopt a method on consequentialist grounds are more likely to want to consider outrage than are those who adopt an interpretive method on nonconsequentialist grounds (including some originalists). The epistemic argument for attention to outrage is greatly weakened if people suffer from a systematic bias or if the public view is a product of an informational, moral, or legal cascade. There is also a strong argument for banning consideration of the effects of public outrage on ruleconsequentialist grounds. Judges might be poorly suited to make the relevant inquiries, and consideration of outrage might produce undue timidity. These points have general implications for those who favor “popular constitutionalism,” or judicial restraint, on democratic grounds. An understanding of the consequentialist and epistemic grounds for judicial attention to public outrage also offers lessons for the decisions of other public officials, including presidents, governors, and mayors, who might be inclined to make decisions that will produce public outrage.
The new vote buying: Empty voting and hidden (morphable) ownership

Corporate law generally makes voting power proportional to economic ownership. This serves several goals. Economic ownership gives shareholders an incentive to exercise voting power well. The coupling of votes and shares makes possible the market for corporate control. The power of economic owners to elect directors is also a core basis for the legitimacy of managerial authority. Both theory and evidence generally support the importance of linking votes to economic interest. Yet the derivatives revolution and other capital markets developments now allow both outside investors and insiders to readily decouple economic ownership of shares from voting rights. This decoupling, which we call the new vote buying, has emerged as a worldwide issue in the past several years. It is largely hidden from public view and mostly untouched by current regulation. Hedge funds have been especially creative in decoupling voting rights from economic ownership. Sometimes they hold more votes than economic ownership - a pattern we call empty voting. In an extreme situation, a vote holder can have a negative economic interest and, thus, an incentive to vote in ways that reduce the company's share price. Sometimes investors hold more economic ownership than votes, though often with morphable voting rights - the de facto ability to acquire the votes if needed. We call this situation hidden (morphable) ownership because the economic ownership and (de facto) voting ownership are often not disclosed. This Article analyzes the new vote buying and its potential benefits and costs. We set out the functional elements of the new vote buying and develop a taxonomy of decoupling strategies. We also propose a near-term disclosure-based response and outline a menu of longer-term regulatory choices. Our disclosure proposal would simplify and partially integrate five existing, inconsistent ownership disclosure regimes, and is worth considering independent of its value with respect to decoupling. In the longer term, other responses may be needed: we discuss strategies focused on voting rights, voting architecture, and supply and demand forces in the markets on which the new vote buying relies. ** This Article has two shorter companions. One is directed at an academic finance audience and the other is directed at legal practitioners and regulators. For the former, see Henry T.C. Hu & Bernard Black, Hedge Funds, Insiders, and Empty Voting: Decoupling of Economic and Voting Ownership in Public Companies, Journal of Corporate Finance, vol. 13, pp. 343-367 (2007), nearly final version at http://ssrn.com/abstract=874098. For the latter, see Henry T.C. Hu & Bernard Black, Empty Voting and Hidden (Morphable) Ownership: Taxonomy, Implications, and Reforms, Business Lawyer, vol. 61, pp. 1011-1070 (2006), also available at http://ssrn.com/abstract=887183 **
Bikinis and Efficient Trespass Law

Current trespass law at times emphasizes that a mere physical intrusion suffices, whereas at other times it focuses on the right to use, and instead seeks to determine whether an intrusion interferes with the present beneficial use of the landowner’s premises. Using economic efficiency analysis, this Article suggests that the right to exclude approach leads to fewer transaction costs and therefore is the economically efficient and thereby the preferable legal rule.
The Advance Directive Registry or Lockbox: A Model Proposal and Call to Legislative Action

In times of need, what portal or place could we go to easily retrieve a person’s advance directives when we have need to employ and use them? Well, a handful of states have come up with a solution. Nevada, Washington, and Vermont now have legislation in place that allows citizen’s of those states to digitally or electronically store their advance directives on the Internet, in a digital or electronic lockbox or portal of sorts. These states have addressed a critical need of their citizens: the need to have their advance directives accessible and readily available to health care providers so that their intent and wishes will be honored. This Article advocates that other states follow the lead of Nevada, Washington, and Vermont by adopting similar legislation and embracing digital or electronic technology by creating Internet “lockboxes” or registries, or portals where citizens can store their advance directives, and health care providers can access these advance directives in the most pressing and critical situations. Part One of this Article examines the rationale and need driving the creation of digital or electronic registries. Part Two of this Article lays out a model for the movement toward an advance directive for health care registry. Specifically, Part Two examines some of the pitfalls and shortcomings in existing legislation in Nevada, Washington, and Vermont. Additionally, Part Two sets forth model legislation that could be adopted by states wishing to legislatively create an advance directive for health care registry. Part Three explores who could administratively administer an advance directive for health care registry in the various states that decide to adopt the model legislation. Part Four addresses mechanisms and means to create the website or portal. Part Five explores the cost and expenses involved in building and maintaining the website or portal. Part Six explores demographic issues, namely who will use and benefit from an advance directive for health care registry.
Portfolio Choice with Illiquid Assets

We present a model of optimal allocation to liquid and illiquid assets, where illiquidity risk results from the restriction that an asset cannot be traded for intervals of uncertain duration. Illiquidity risk leads to increased and state-dependent risk aversion and reduces the allocation to both liquid and illiquid risky assets. Uncertainty about the length of the illiquidity interval, as opposed to a deterministic nontrading interval, is a primary determinant of the cost of illiquidity. We allow market liquidity to vary from "normal" periods, when all assets are fully liquid, to "illiquidity crises," when some assets can only be traded infrequently. The possibility of a liquidity crisis leads to limited arbitrage in normal times. Investors are willing to forgo 2% of their wealth to hedge against illiquidity crises occurring once every 10 years. This paper was accepted by Itay Goldstein, finance.
Dynamic mechanism design with hidden income and hidden actions

We develop general recursive methods to solve for optimal contracts in dynamic principal-agent environments with hidden states and hidden actions. Starting from a general mechanism with arbitrary communication, randomization, full history dependence, and without restrictions on preferences or technology, we show that the optimal contract can be implemented as a recursive direct mechanism. A curse of dimensionality which arises from the interaction of hidden income and hidden actions can be overcome by introducing utility bounds for behavior off the equilibrium path. Environments with multiple actions are implemented using multiple layers of such off-path utility bounds.
Predicting Entrepreneurship From Ideation and Divergent Thinking

In order to find out why certain entrepreneurs are successful we administered two measures of ideational skill to 47 successful entrepreneurs. The first asked about the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats (SWOT) to their own businesses; it assessed the participants’ ideational productivity (i.e. fluency) and originality. The second measure was a self-report of ideational tendencies in the natural environment. Statistical analyses indicated that the more successful entrepreneurs did indeed have particular ideational tendencies. This was especially apparent in the self-report measure of ideation. The two groups did not differ in terms of secondary criterion questions (e.g. profitable years within the last five, number of employees), nor in their SWOT scores. This last finding with the SWOT was unexpected but easy to understand, given the paper-and-pencil format of the test. The significant difference that were uncovered suggest that ideation is an important talent for entrepreneurs. Predictions about entrepreneurial success may, for example, be improved if an individual's ideational skills are assessed. Furthermore, it would be reasonable to encourage and support entrepreneurial potentials via programmes that target ideation.
Optimality of Securitized Debt with Endogenous and Flexible Information Acquisition

An issuer designs a contract and agents flexibly acquire information when deciding whether to accept it and provide liquidity. Unlike the existing literature, we do not impose any physical restriction on information structure to capture the idea of flexible information acquisition. Facing an informational cost measured by reduction of Shannon's entropy, agents collect the most relevant information that is determined by the "shape" of the contract. Thus in order to reduce the effect of adverse selection, the issuer designs the contract to avoid information acquisition, or induce her counterparty to acquire information least harmful to her interest. Without restricting attention to monotone securities, we show that pooling and tranching (i.e., issuing securitized debt) is uniquely optimal in providing liquidity, regardless of the stochastic interdependence of underlying assets and the allocation of bargaining power.
Econometric Assessment of ‘One Minute’ Paper as a Pedagogic Tool

This paper makes an econometric testing of one-minute paper used as a tool to manage and assess instruction in my statistics class. One of our findings is that the one minute paper when I have tested it by using an OLS estimate in a controlled Vs experimental design framework is found to statistically significant and effective in enhancing students’ knowledge. It is found to be equally effective when I have tested it by using a seemingly unrelated regression that allows the error terms to be correlated across separate but related regressions. This is irrespective of students’ ability levels as is measured by GPA in both cases.
Obergefell 's Conservatism: Reifying Familial Fronts

The Court’s reasoning in Obergefell v. Hodges is deeply problematic. In lieu of a straightforward and far more defensible decision based purely on the Equal Protection Clause, the Court’s reliance on the Due Process Clause required the Court to define marriage and explain its social importance. This meant the Court had to choose between competing images — social fronts — of marriage. If it had used an equal protection analysis, the Court would not have had to decide whether marriage is traditional or marriage is more plural. Instead, the Court would have espoused a thinner notion of marriage — that, whatever its essential nature, marriage must be available on equal grounds unless the state can convincingly argue otherwise. An equal protection analysis also would have obviated the need for Justice Kennedy’s paean to marriage. There are two lamentable consequences of the Court’s framing. It unnecessarily disrespects people who in good faith have a different view of the social front of marriage. And it reifies marriage as a key element in the social front of family, further marginalizing nonmarital families and making it harder, rhetorically and substantively, to strengthen these already fragile families.
Pharmacovigilence and the Plight of Chronic Pain Patients: In Pursuit of a Realistic and Responsible Ethic of Care

This paper critiques the increasingly prevalent approach in pain management that urges the universal adoption of medication adherence contracts and random urine drug screening as tools for managing the risk involved in prescribing and consuming opioid analgesics. We assess the use of such “universal precautions” through a two-tiered analysis consisting of dyadic and population-level perspectives, a combination of approaches that has rarely been deployed simultaneously in the bioethics literature on the undertreatment of pain. Specifically, in the first portion of the paper, we criticize the turn to opioid contracts in terms of the physician-patient relationship, and demonstrate that properly understood, applied, and documented, scrupulous adherence to informed consent offers all of the benefits and none of the burdens of opioid contracts. In the second portion, we balance the prior emphasis on the therapeutic dyad by leveraging techniques drawn primarily from population-level bioethics. We focus on disease stigma, explain why it is a pressing ethical issue on both descriptive and normative grounds, and show how the use of opioid contracts as part of a universal precautions approach is much more likely to intensify than to ameliorate stigma, contrary to the claims of its proponents.
Cheating for the Cause: The Effects of Performance-Based Pay on Socially Oriented Misreporting

We examine the effect of performance-based pay on misreporting intended to benefit a social mission. We show that performance-based pay decreases people’s propensity to misreport for a social mission in a not-for-profit setting (Experiment 1). We similarly show that in a for-profit setting, performance-based pay also decreases misreporting propensity for a social mission; however, it does not decrease misreporting propensity for a non-social mission (Experiment 2). Finally, using a framed field experiment with participants attending a conference hosted by a real charity, we show that performance-based pay reduces actual misreporting when misreporting leads to more donations for the charity (Experiment 3). These results are consistent with our theory which suggests that, relative to fixed pay, performance-based pay imposes additional costs on misreporting employees’ self-concepts of benevolence and honesty.
Mask-Wearing During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Background: Masks have been widely recommended as a precaution against COVID-19 transmission. Several studies have shown the efficacy of masks at curbing droplet dispersion in lab settings. Using individual response data from the Imperial College London — YouGov personal measures survey, this study investigates reported mask use and its association with the spread of COVID-19. Methods: We examine the association of reported mask-wearing in a population within a country with the growth rate of active COVID-19 cases. The analysis uses country-wide data from weekly surveys of individuals’ mask-wearing behavior in public places, as well as other concurrently implemented non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs), mobility changes, new cases of COVID-19 data and other control variables. Because mask-wearing showed substantial variation across countries and over time, we use a reduced form econometric model to relate population-wide changes in mask-wearing to the growth rate in COVID-19. Findings: The results indicate that reported mask-wearing could play an important role in mitigating the growth of COVID-19. Widespread mask-wearing within a country associates with an expected 7% (95% CI: 3.94% — 9.99%) decline in the growth rate of daily active cases of COVID-19 in the country. This daily decline equates to an expected 88.5% drop in the growth of daily active cases over a 30-day period when compared to zero percent mask-wearing, all else held equal. These estimates remain robust across multiple sensitivity analyses and counterfactuals. Taken together with mobility changes and NPIs, the combined association of individual and institutional measures on the decline in the daily growth of COVID-19 is 28.1% (95% CI: 24.2%-32%). Interpretation: Face mask usage as a preventative measure against the transmission of COVID-19 varies widely across countries. This observational study uses data from 24 countries and finds that reported face mask usage associates with a decline in new COVID-19 cases. Funding: No external funding. Declaration of Interests: The authors have no conflict of interest.
To believe or not to believe

Abstract This paper explains how the actions of skeptical traders can make manipulable earnings reports informative. Our model consists of a price-maximizing manager who chooses a cheap talk report, a profit-maximizing trader who may then seek costly information, and competitive market makers. Since the manager can influence the trader's information acquisition decision, the manager may choose to reveal even bad news to decrease the impact of order flows on prices. The paper provides foundations for treating positive and negative earnings surprises as good news and bad news respectively, even when external auditing cannot constrain opportunistic managers. Testable implications are derived.
You can't take it with you: Sunset provisions for equity compensation when managers retire, resign, or die

Abstract Company stock option plans have diverse “sunset” policies for modifying terms of options held by managers who exit the firm. In our S&P 500 sample, these forfeiture, vesting, and expiration provisions are less generous in companies characterized by fast growth, dependence on skilled human capital, and high strategic interaction with competitors. While these results apply for workers who retire at the end of their careers, almost no variation exists in the treatment of workers who resign with the possibility of working elsewhere. For CEOs over age 60, companies' sunset rules imply large discounts to option award values and estimates of total compensation.
The Space of Geometric Limits of One-generator Closed Subgroups of PSL2(R)

We give a complete description of the closure of the space of one-generator closed subgroups of PSL2(R) for the Chabauty topology, by computing explicitly the matrices associated with elements of Aut(D) = PSL2(R), and nding quantities parametrizing the limit cases. Along the way, we investigate under what conditions sequences of maps ’n : X ! Y transform convergent sequences of closed subsets of the domain X into convergent sequences of closed subsets of the range Y . In particular, this allows us to compute certain geometric limits of PSL2(R) only by looking at the Hausdor limit of some closed subsets of C.
USING RESERVE PRICES TO DETER COLLUSION IN PROCUREMENT COMPETITION

To enhance our understanding of collusion in procurement settings, this paper quantitatively evaluates how the buyer's choice of a reserve price influences the sustainability of two previously devised collusive schemes. If the buyer does not select its reserve price strategically, then collusion may be sustainable for a wide range of plausible discount factors. However, even mildly sophisticated reserve price selection can dramatically shrink the set of discount factors for which collusion is sustainable. These findings support existing arguments that buyers are vulnerable to collusion, but they also suggest that buyers possess tools that may profitably induce sellers to act competitively.
Short interest, institutional ownership, and stock returns

Stocks are short-sale constrained when there is a strong demand to sell short and a limited supply of shares to borrow. Using data on both short interest (a proxy for demand) and institutional ownership (a proxy for supply) we find that constrained stocks underperform during the period 1988–2002 by a significant 215 basis points per month on an equally weighted basis, although by only an insignificant 39 basis points per month on a valueweighted basis. For the overwhelming majority of stocks, short interest and institutional ownershiplevels make short selling constraints unlikely.
Underreaction, Overreaction, and Increasing Misreaction to Information in the Options Market

This paper investigates options market reaction to changes in the instantaneous variance of the underlying asset. There are three main findings. First, options market investors underreact to individual daily changes in instantaneous variance. Second, these same investors overreact to periods of mostly increasing or mostly decreasing daily changes in instantaneous variance. Third, they tend to underreact (overreact) to current daily changes in instantaneous variance that are preceded mostly by daily changes of the opposite (same) sign. The third finding can reconcile the first two and is also consistent with well-established cognitive biases.
The MacPherson-Henningsen Puzzle

In the landmark case of MacPherson v. Buick, an automobile company was held liable for negligence notwithstanding a lack of privity with the injured driver. Four decades later, in Henningsen v. Bloomfield Motors, the court held unconscionable the standard automobile company warranty which limited its responsibility to repair and replacement, even in a case involving physical injury. This suggests a puzzle: if it were so easy for firms to contract out of liability, did MacPherson accomplish anything?
On Automobile Repairs and the Provision of Loaner Vehicles by Dealers

In this note, we analyze two hitherto unstudied questions from the perspective of an automobile dealer that uses a particular temporal decision rule to provide loaner vehicles to customers who come to its facility with automobile repair requests. First, on the assumption that the basic criterion for the above mentioned decision rule is satisfied, we determine the expected repair times of automobiles for which our dealer provides customers with loaner vehicles. Second, we ascertain the average number of loaner vehicles that are out with customers.JEL Classification: L62, C44, D81
A legal theory of finance

Abstract This paper develops the building blocks for a legal theory of finance. LTF holds that financial markets are legally constructed and as such occupy an essentially hybrid place between state and market, public and private. At the same time, financial markets exhibit dynamics that frequently put them in direct tension with commitments enshrined in law or contracts. This is the case especially in times of financial crisis when the full enforcement of legal commitments would result in the self-destruction of the financial system. This law-finance paradox tends to be resolved by suspending the full force of law where the survival of the system is at stake; that is, at its apex. It is here that power becomes salient.
International Joint Ventures and The Value of Growth Options

According to real options theory, international joint ventures (IJVs) offer valuable growth options, yet there has been no direct evidence of whether, and under what conditions, firms actually capt...
Activist Distressed Debtholders: the New Barbarians at the Gate?

The term “corporate raiders” previously struck fear in the hearts of corporate boards and management teams. It generally refers to investors who target undervalued, cash-flush or mismanaged companies and initiate a hostile takeover of the company. Corporate raiders earned their name in part because of their focus on value extraction, which could entail dismantling a company and selling off its crown jewels. Today, the term often conjures up images of Michael Milken, Henry Kravis, or the movie character Gordon Gekko, but the alleged threat posed to companies by corporate raiders is less prevalent—at least with respect to the traditional use of equity to facilitate a hostile takeover. The growing use of debt rather than equity to cause a change of control at target companies raises new concerns for corporate boards and management teams and new policy considerations for commentators and legislators. Are activist debtholders who employ this investment strategy akin to the corporate raiders of the past? This Article explores these issues by, among other things, presenting in-depth case studies and critically evaluating the value implications of traditional takeover activity and regulation. It compares and contrasts the use of equity and debt in control contests and identifies similarities that suggest some regulation of strategic debt acquisitions is warranted. The Article proposes a proactive approach that better equips corporate boards and management teams to  Professor of Law, University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law. This Article was selected for presentation at the Center for Law, Economics and Finance at The George Washington University Law School‘s 2011 Junior Faculty Business and Financial Workshop and was presented at the 2009 Visiting Scholar in Residence Lecture, Widener Institute of Delaware Corporate and Business Law. This Article benefitted greatly from my discussions with Lisa Fairfax, Lawrence Hamermesh, Joan MacLeod Heminway, Juliet Moringiello, Donna Nagy, Judge Brendan L. Shannon, Randall Thomas, Fred Tung, Charles Whitehead, the participants in the presentations listed above, the 2010 Law & Society Annual Meeting, and 2010 Southeastern Association of Law Schools Annual Meeting. In addition, I appreciate the research assistance of Lauren Genvert and Alice Johnson. Nevertheless, all opinions, errors, and omissions in this Article are my own. Finally, I thank the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law for financial support. 156 WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY LAW REVIEW [VOL. 89:155 negotiate with activist debtholders while preserving investment opportunities for debtholders and the governance efficiencies that often flow from activism for the corporate target‟s other stakeholders.
Some unpleasant general equilibrium implications of executive incentive compensation contracts

Abstract We consider a simple real business cycle model in which shareholders hire self-interested executives to manage their firm. A generic family of compensation contracts similar to those employed in practice is studied. When compensation is convex in the firmʼs dividend, an increase in the firmʼs output results in a more than proportional increase in the managersʼ income. Incentive contracts of sufficient yet modest convexity are shown to result in an indeterminate general equilibrium, one in which business cycles are driven by self-fulfilling fluctuations in managersʼ expectations. The proposed family of contracts may yield first-best outcomes for specific parameter choices.
THE PRICE EFFECT OF ELIMINATING POTENTIAL COMPETITION: EVIDENCE FROM AN AIRLINE MERGER*

This paper analyzes the gain in pricing power that a firm achieves by merging with a potential competitor in its market. Using pricing data for the merger of USAir and Piedmont, empirical analysis finds that prices rose by 5.0 to 6.0 per cent on routes that one carrier served and the other was a potential entrant. This was more than half the increase on routes where the two carriers had been direct competitors. Other important factors included carrier size, market concentration, incumbent's identity and the potential entrant's presence at one or both endpoints.
Lawns and the New Watershed Law

American's long love affair with the evergreen, crew-cut, weed and pest free "Industrial" front lawn has resulted in untold costs on some of the nation's most cherished waterways, including Puget Sound, the Great Lakes, and the Chesapeake Bay. While this Article examines the legal regimes, primarily public law and neighborhood or community norms, that arguably have helped to "brown" the front lawn and make it environmentally unsustainable, it also argues that law can be a force to "green" it. By virtue of its effects on the watershed and marine ecosystems, the front lawn links water and land. This Article ultimately suggests that localities consider the front lawn’s effects on marine ecosystems and water management as a starting point for crafting land use law and policy. Arguably, therefore, land use law governing the front lawn has become part of the new watershed law.
Retroactivity and Legal Change: An Equilibrium Approach

This article assesses current retroactivity doctrine and proposes a new framework for retroactivity analysis. Current law has failed to reflect the complexity of defining retroactivity and to harmonize the conflicting concerns of efficiency and fairness that animate retroactivity doctrine. By drawing a sharp distinction between adjudication and legislation, the law has also overlooked the similarity of the issues raised by retroactivity in both contexts. The article proposes instead an equilibrium approach, influenced by the legal process school, to connect retroactivity to theories of legal change. Instead of focusing on the nature of the new legal rule, this approach emphasizes the context in which change occurs. The use of equilibrium theory improves doctrinal analysis of the temporal line-drawing associated with legal change and clarifies the relationship of retroactivity rules to lawmaking power.
Inference of bidders’ risk attitudes in ascending auctions with endogenous entry☆

Abstract Bidders’ risk attitudes have key implications for the choices of revenue-maximizing auction formats. In ascending auctions, bid distributions do not provide information about risk preference. We infer risk attitudes using distributions of transaction prices and participation decisions in ascending auctions with entry costs. Nonparametric tests are proposed for two distinct scenarios: first, the expected entry cost can be consistently estimated from the data; second, the data does not report entry costs but contains exogenous variation in potential competition and auction characteristics. We also show the identification of risk attitudes in ascending auctions with selective entry, where bidders receive entry-stage signals correlated with their values.
The Scope-Severity Paradox Why Doing More Harm Is Judged to Be Less Harmful

Punishment should be sensitive to the severity of the crime. Yet in three studies the authors found that increasing the number of people victimized by a crime actually decreases the perceived severity of that crime and leads people to recommend less punishment for crimes that victimize more people. The authors further demonstrate the process behind the scope-severity paradox—the victim identifiability effect—and test a strategy for overcoming this bias. Although Studies 1 and 2 document this phenomenon in the lab, in Study 3 the authors used archival data to demonstrate that the scope-severity paradox is a robust, real-world effect. They collected archival data of actual jury verdicts spanning a 10-year period and found that juries required defendants to pay higher punitive damages when their negligent behavior harmed fewer people.
Keeping the Underclass In Its Place: Zoning, the Poor, and Residential Segregation

It has become fashionable to argue that the preferences and choices of Americans living in metropolitan areas are changing.1 Contemporary middle and upper-class Americans, the argument goes, no longer want to live in suburban subdivisions, work in office parks, and shop in en closed malls. One-third of all homeowners now express a preference for living in compact urban settings or in older suburbs with an urban feel.2 The phrase "demographic inversion" has been used to suggest that the well-to-do are blending into the center-city while the poor are joining the middle and upper classes on the metropolitan outskirts.3 These descriptions of change in American metropolitan areas are at best only partially true. "Gentrification," the process through which older parts of the center-city are redeveloped for condominiums, restau rants, and stores appealing to the middle and upper classes, has surely had an impact on many cities.4 However, while some degree of gentri fication has taken place in most downtown areas, the great majority of middle and upper-class Americans continue to live on the outskirts of the center-cities and even more so in the surrounding suburbs. In larger metropolitan areas the fastest population growth has occurred in the second and third rings of suburbs, in new communities that not long
The Demise of Community Policing? The Impact of Post-9/11 Federal Surveillance Programs on Local Law Enforcement

Police reform over the past thirty years has been guided by the philosophy of “community policing,” or the theory that police departments overcome poor community relations by engaging in initiatives that build mutual trust. The advent of the War on Terror brought about the intermingling of federal policing initiatives with local law enforcement. The clashing goals of federal and local police entities undermine local police goals and reformation initiatives based on “community policing.” Using San Francisco as a case study, I argue that overbroad surveillance and information gathering by local police fundamentally undermines trusting relationships between police and the community. I also maintain that police legitimacy depends in part on procedural fairness. Therefore, to the extent the police engage in surveillance practices without clear standards, oversight, and accountability, they are perceived as being less legitimate in the eyes of the community. This, in turn, undermines the trust-building goals of community policing.
Revolutions in Local Democracy? Neighborhood Councils and Broadening Inclusion in the Local Political Process

Political marginalization of minorities and government corruption are two key factors that have led to the overwhelming decline and decay of America’s major cities. Local governments must combat the historical entrenchment of these two evils in order to reverse the trend toward demise. Neighborhood councils may be the best structural changes to local government because they provide more meaningful opportunities for political engagement of minority groups, while also serving as an antidote to systemic corruption in local government. This Essay analyzes the problems plaguing local government in urban cities and explores how neighborhood councils may be able to help address them.
Regulatory Stringency, Green Production Offsets, and Organizations' Financial Performance

Some scholars have argued that environmental regulatory pressures constrain organizations' financial opportunities, while others maintain that environmental regulations can spur product and technology innovations and encourage greater operational efficiencies. Advocates on both sides have evidence in support of their positions. However, considering both perspectives in tandem and recognizing that other factors may be associated with improved financial performance, we may find that neither position is valid, or that both are. Relying on data for manufacturing facilities in seven countries, this study shows that more stringent environmental policy regimes are related to diminished firm profits. Yet organizations that are motivated by a green production focus—defined as enhancing internal efficiencies and new product and technology development—are more likely to improve their environmental performance. They also demonstrate a greater probability of benefiting financially, thereby offsetting the cost of regulation or accruing a net gain.
Understanding the Great Changes in the World: Gaining Ground and Losing Ground since World War II

The composer Richard Strauss would warn his conducting students ‘never look at the brass — it will only encourage them’. I am afraid that the subject the organizers have looked to me to speak about — Understanding the Great Changes of the World — has given me dangerous encouragement: I have responded by analysing the great tectonic shifts in the global economy that I have witnessed and thought about since I began studying economics.
Fiscal Deficits, Bank Credit Risk, and Loan-Loss Provisions

Fiscal deficits represent an important variable for banks’ aggregate credit risk, revealing governments’ ability to curb banks’ losses in bad states, either with direct cash infusions or with macroeconomic stabilization policies. Deteriorating deficits are associated with increasing financial distress of the banking sector and higher levels of loan-loss provisions. The effect is more pronounced for banks with a strong aversion to underprovisioning and is robust to a battery of tests and to the identification of fiscal shocks using military-spending data. This association represents an additional source of negative comovement between provisions and economic conditions, with implications for financial stability.
Cooperative Justice: Understanding the Future of the International Criminal Court Through Its Involvement in Libya

In February 2011, the Libyan government began systematically and ruthlessly attacking its own citizens in an attempt to put down a political uprising. These attacks escalated into a full-fledged armed conflict between the government and rebel militias that engulfed the country for several months. With the old regime finally overthrown, and a new transitional government now in place, Libya looks to mend itself and to undo decades of oppression. Although the conflict is officially over, the world’s attention remains on Libya as the new government searches for ways to address the significant challenges left behind by the revolution. One such challenge is bringing members of the old regime to justice for crimes they committed both before and during the revolution. As a start to this process, the government has detained Saif Al-Islam Gaddafi, Muammar Gaddafi’s son and former de facto prime minister, with the hope of trying him for crimes against humanity. But because Libya shares jurisdiction over Saif with the International Criminal Court (ICC), it is unclear what that trial will look like or who will conduct it. This Comment seeks to help clarify how justice should be pursued in light of the ICC’s governing principles and Libya’s present circumstances. This Comment first describes the evolution of international criminal justice over the past century, which culminated in the creation of the ICC. It then explores the ICC’s fundamental principles and goals, and offers different ways to conceptualize them. Finally, this Comment observes some of the domestic issues that Libya faces and concludes that, given those issues, the ICC should work cooperatively with Libya to try Saif in his home country.
Autonocoin: A Proof-of-Belief Cryptocurrency

This paper proposes a self-governing cryptocurrency, dubbed Autonocoin. Cryptocurrency owners play formal tacit coordination games by making investments recorded on the blockchain. Such investments represent bets about the focal point resolution of normative issues, such as whether a proposed change to Autonocoin should occur. The game produces a result that resolves the issue. With a typical cryptocurrency, the client software establishes conventions that ultimately lead to the identification of the authoritative blockchain. Autonocoin completes a circle by making transactions on the blockchain that in turn define those conventions and the expected software behavior. The distributed consensus mechanism embodied by formal tacit coordination games, meanwhile, can make other types of decisions, including which of competing blockchains is authoritative and whether new Autonocoins should be rewarded to benefit those who have taken actions to benefit Autonocoin. This establishes a unique funding model for a cryptocurrency, and it addresses objections to cryptocurrencies issued predominantly to the initial founders, as well as to those that encourage wasteful mining activities.
Article Five of the UTC and the Future of Creditors' Rights in Trusts

Introduction 2552 I. Background 2553 A. Development of the UTC and Its Adoption by the States 2553 B. Criticisms of the UTC 2555 II. Operative Rules of Article Five 2557 A. Rights of Creditors of Non-settlor Beneficiaries 2557 1. Section 501 2557 2. Section 502 2559 3. Section 503 2560 4. Section 504 2562 5. Section 506 2565 B. Rights of Creditors of Settlors 2566 III. Criticizing the Critics 2570 A. Argument 1: The UTC Weakens the Creditor Protection Attributes of Spendthrift Trusts 2570 B. Argument 2: Exception Creditors Are Granted Rights that Are Too Broad, and the List of Exception Creditors Can Readily Be Expanded 2572 C. Argument 3: Eliminating the Distinction Between Support Trusts and Discretionary Trusts Compromises Protection from Creditors’ Claims 2575 D. Argument 4: The UTC Grants Enforceable Rights to Beneficiaries Not Held at Common Law 2579 E. Argument 5: The UTC Compromises the Effectiveness of Supplemental-Needs Trusts 2587 F. Argument 6: The UTC Increases the Exposure of Trust Assets in Divorce Proceedings 2591 G. Argument 7: Drafting a Trust in a UTC Jurisdiction Constitutes Malpractice 2593 H. Argument 8: The UTC is a “Regressive” Statute 2594 IV. Critical Analysis of the Code 2595 A. Abolishing the Distinction Between Support and Discretionary Trusts 2595 B. The Good Faith Standard of Section 814(a) 2598
The Generality of Rights

Looked at from the perspective of an American constitutionalist, individual rights is a familiar phrase. In its reference to the idea that individuals have rights against the government and against the majority, See, e.g., Ronald Dworkin, T AKING R IGHTS S ERIOUSLY 184–205 (1977). the phrase “individual rights” has a meaning that is now relatively well understood. In a different sense, however, the phrase “individual rights” might be taken to suggest that there is something necessarily or essentially individual, and thus particular, about the very idea of a right. Harking back to the Legal Realist positions that, first, a right is nothing more than a statement that a particular individual has an enforceable claim against another particular individual (or entity), See, e.g., Wesley Newcomb Hohfeld, F UNDAMENTAL L EGAL C ONCEPTIONS AS A PPLIED IN J UDICIAL R EASONING (Walter Wheeler Cook ed., 1964); Arthur Corbin, Legal Analysis and Terminology, 29 Y ALE L.J. 165 (1919); Roscoe Pound, Legal Rights, 26 I NT’L J. E THICS 92 (1916); Max Radin, A Restatement of Hohfeld, 51 H ARV . L. R EV . 1149 (1938). and, second, that a right is simply the ex post statement of the outcome of a particular lawsuit, See John Chipman Gray, T HE N ATURE AND S OURCES OF L AW (R. Gray ed., 2d ed. 1921); Oliver Wendell Holmes, T HE C OMMON L AW (1881); William Twining, K ARL L LEWELLYN AND THE R EALIST M OVEMENT 381 (1973); Oliver Wendell Holmes, The Path of the Law, 10 H ARV . L. R EV . 457 (1897). The theme is also prominent in the work of the Scandinavian Realists. See, e.g., Axel Hagerstrom, I NQUIRIES INTO THE N ATURE OF L AW AND M ORALS (1953); A. Villem Lundstedt, L EGAL T HINKING R EVISED (1956); Karl Olivecrona, L AW AS F ACT (2d ed. 1971); Alf Ross, D IRECTIVES AND N ORMS (1968); Alf Ross, O N L AW AND J USTICE (1958); Karl Olivecrona, Legal Language and Reality, in E SSAYS IN H ONOR OF R OSCOE P OUND 151 (F. Newman ed., 1962); Alf Ross, Tu-tu, 70 H ARV . L. R EV . 812 (1957). the idea has spread that rights are particular, individual, and contextual. Indeed, a recent article entitled Rights Against Rules: The Moral Structure of American Constitutional La w Matthew D. Adler, Rights Against Rules: The Moral Structure of American Constitutional Law, 97 M ICH . L. R EV . 1 (1998). announced in its title a conception of rights suggesting that rights are in their nature particular, and are thus to be contrasted with, and counterpoised against, necessarily general rules.
Social networks, self-denial, and median preferences: Conformity as an evolutionary strategy

Attitudes of conformity can be understood as a product of adaptation. Existing models of conformity invoke preference falsification with individuals hiding their true preferences. We posit an adaptive mechanism for conformity. Because non-conformity leads to costs as a dissenting individual is shut out of social networks and majority coalitions, individuals have an incentive to sublimate their original preferences to a meta-preference for conformity. However, this adaptation is not costless. Resisting original preferences imposes self-denial costs that may exceed the benefits of conforming. Further, a conforming individual foregoes the small probability that his first-best original preferences will be realized.
Convergence in accounting standards: Insights from academicians and practitioners

Abstract The efficiency and competitiveness of global capital markets depends on the ability of financial statement preparers to communicate effectively with investors through financial reports. Despite the global movement to adopt IFRS, US adoption of IFRS is still uncertain. To assess potential for convergence, this study compares perspectives of academicians and practitioners regarding convergence to a set of global accounting standards. The majority of respondents believe that effective convergence to a set of globally accepted accounting standards would be beneficial to preparers, users, auditors, analysts, and standard setters. Convergence in accounting standards can require extensive and possibly costly changes to the standard-setting infrastructure and enforcement process in the US and other countries, and will also require proper training for management, auditors, and investors.