Essay: Developing Appropriate Standards for Achieving Diversity in Faculty Appointments

I am writing today to talk about diversity within law school faculties. And when I say “diversity,” I mean all sorts of diversities, not just the ones that most of those who address the issue tend to focus on. I have, for many years, been thinking about the different types of diversities that seem crucial to a law school, and the appropriate ways of achieving them. Part I lists the categories of diversity that I think are important to considering diversity within law school faculties. It then indicates a problem that inheres with this list. Part II suggests how different schools may view the appropriateness of achieving some of these diversities. And finally, in Part III, I will come to the main thesis of this piece and propose how schools can achieve the diversities they deem desirable

Does the Fault System Optimally Control Primary Accident Costs?

For the purposes of this article, I shall assume that the sole aim of any system of accident law is the minimization of the sum of (a) accident costs and (b) the cost of avoiding accident costs. I include in the latter the cost in pleasure forgone of undertaking a relatively less desirable but less accident-prone activity, or—what is really the same thing—the cost of engaging in an activity in a safer but more expensive or less pleasurable way. I make this assumption for analytical purposes only. I do not for a moment believe this to be the only aim of accident law. The aim that a system of accident law be just or fair could only through a rather unhappy twisting of words—and valuation of things which cannot be valued—be made to come within my cost formulation. Yet fairness is ultimately a goal which any system of accident law must meet. Everything cannot be discussed at once, however, and, although I believe that the fault system can be shown to be quite unfair both relatively and absolutely, I will leave that demonstration to another piece

Does the Fault System Optimally Control Primary Accident Costs?

Energy supply in Sweden year 2011 amounted to 577 TWh. The final energy consumption for industrial, residential and service was 379 TWh. Sweden has energy policy goals to reduce energy use in buildings. One of these goals is to reduce the energy use by 20 % in 2020 compared to the year 1995. An important step to achieve this goal is to target energy efficiency measures in existing buildings. There are also financial incentives to implement energy efficiency measures due to the fact that the cost of energy represents 30-40% of a buildings maintenance costs. In general, up to 20 % of the energy consumption can be reduced without major reconstruction. In this master thesis project presented here, an energy audit was performed and energy efficiency measures was proposed for an existing building located at Järfälla, Stockholm. The property belongs to SAAB - Defence and Security. They have an internal target to reduce energy use in their buildings with 50 % by 2015 compared to 2009. The work of this master thesis project was limited to a building locally termed hus A. This part of the property is the oldest and was built in 1968, but has expanded gradually to the year 1977. Hus A contains of offices, a production hall, laboratories and storage areas. The energy audit showed that the electricity use is far greater in hus A, compared to the an average office and administration building. This is mainly due to production processes. A breakdown of the highest electricity consumers are: Industrial processes – 61.9 kWh/m2/year Lighting – 35.7 kWh/m2/year Fans – 33.2 kWh/m2/year Refrigeration – 21.8 kWh/m2/year Compressed air – 18.9 kWh/m2/year Computer units – 7.8 kWh/m2/year Frequency converters – 4.4 kWh/m2/year Waste heat from industrial processes, primarily from the production hall leads to high cooling demand to maintain good thermal comfort. Limitations in operation control of the buildings HVAC (Heating, Cooling and Air-conditioning) systems causes high heating and cooling demand and hence the buildings thermal mass is not properly utilized. Energy saving measures was mainly focused on increasing the controlling capability of HVAC systems. By implementing the energy efficiency measures presented in this master thesis report, building thermal mass will be more efficiently utilized. In addition, end use of electricity, heat and cooling will be reduced. In total, seven energy-saving measures proposed.  One measure is implemented to prevent heating and cooling at the same time. A brief description of the energy efficiency measures and the expected result is found below. Adjust set point for TAFA301 Energy saving: 94.0 MWh/yearPayback time: 0 year Establish time schedule for compressed air systemEnergy saving: 110.8 MWh/yearPayback time: 2.5 months Demand controlled temperature set point to heating systemEnergy saving: 167.0 MWh/yearPayback time: 3.5 months Demand control of airflow in the production hallEnergy saving: 155,5 MWh/yearPayback time: 2 years and 10 months Establish time schedule for frequency invertersEnergy saving: 104.0 MWh/yearPayback time: 3 years and 2 months Radiator thermostats to the first part of the production hall Energy saving: 6.5 MWh/yearPayback time: 5 years and 2 months Demand control of airflow in conference roomsEnergy saving: 11.0 MWh/yearPayback time: 12 years and 2 month

A Broader View of the Cathedral: The Significance of the Liability Rule, Correcting a Misapprehension

Recent years have seen a resurgence of Torts viewed as a purely private legal arrangement: whether described in terms of compensatory justice—the right of an injured party to be made whole—or of redress for civil wrongs—the right of an injured person to get back at the one who injured him. These positions reject the approach of the system builders (to use Izhak Englard’s felicitous phrase), those who see torts as part of a legal–political–economic structure of a polity. This latter, “public,” view of torts has been dominant, at least since my first article, and Walter J. Blum and Harry Kalven’s answer to it, aptly titled Public Law Perspectives on a Private Law Problem. It is of the relationship between these approaches, and of the inevitability of the public-law (and hence, in part, economic) view of torts that I wish to write today

Neologisms Revisited

Oscar Gray, you are a great student of Jimmy\u27s [Fleming James] and since you and I are not the last, but among the last, of his students, it pleased me particularly that you remembered him. Thank you. I also want to thank all my other friends who took the time to come here today, and most especially this University, which has been so kind to me in the past but which outdid itself in setting up this Symposium. When Fowler Harper died, he left me his copy of Harper & James, The Law of Torts, which you, Oscar, have kept going so well. Since Fowler was dead, I could not have him sign it; I brought it to Jimmy, who signed it in a way that moved me enormously then, and has ever since. He wrote, To Guido, with that special affection that a teacher has for a student who has pushed the quest forward. To me, what is so joyous about this event is that I see an awful lot of students—some whom I never had in class—who have pushed the quest forward. So I speak today, with that special affection and delight that a teacher has in seeing the quest pushed forward, feelings that I know Jimmy would share

70th Commencement Address

Guido Calabresi, Dean of the Yale School of Law, told the graduates a few stories about choices. To remind them that the choices which reoccur do make a difference, if not always or often, to the world

The Costs of Class Actions: Allocation and Collective Redress in the U.S. Experience

Once a preserve of the American legal landscape, the class action device today transcends geographic boundaries. In the past decade, efforts have intensified to establish collective litigation instruments in diverse legal terrains outside the United States - including Europe - often with the common goal of allowing some form of collective legal redress while avoiding perceived disadvantages of class actions in the American experience. Today more than ever, from legislators to litigants to scholars, European reformers face the challenge - and the opportunity - of making fundamental choices about the scope and shape of the collective legal remedies they wish to make available. Choices about the shape of the class action device reflect foundational judgments about the proper allocation of costs, and there is much from the U.S. experience that can inform Europe's prospective reformers. This article describes the history and current status of class action rules in the U.S., and then compares class actions and another form of extra-compensatory damages - one type of punitive damages â as means of doing the same thing. Although neither punitive damages of this sort nor class actions generally have traditionally existed in civil law systems, they both - and especially this particular form of punitive damages - can, from an economic view, be made to vindicate the same kind of social cost accounting goals. By considering these legal devices together, we hope to shed light on crucial choices facing Europe as it grapples with how best to provide collective legal redress in light of the lessons of the U.S. experience with class actions.Class actions, Collective legal redress, Punitive damages, Extra-compensatory damages, Allocation of costs, Deterrence

High Density Lipoproteins Inhibit Oxidative Stress-Induced Prostate Cancer Cell Proliferation

Recent evidence suggests that oxidative stress can play a role in the pathogenesis and the progression of prostate cancer (PCa). Reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation is higher in PCa cells compared to normal prostate epithelial cells and this increase is proportional to the aggressiveness of the phenotype. Since high density lipoproteins (HDL) are known to exert antioxidant activities, their ability to reduce ROS levels and the consequent impact on cell proliferation was tested in normal and PCa cell lines. HDL significantly reduced basal and H2O2-induced oxidative stress in normal, androgen receptor (AR)-positive and AR-null PCa cell lines. AR, scavenger receptor BI and ATP binding cassette G1 transporter were not involved. In addition, HDL completely blunted H2O2-induced increase of cell proliferation, through their capacity to prevent the H2O2-induced shift of cell cycle distribution from G0/G1 towards G2/M phase. Synthetic HDL, made of the two main components of plasma-derived HDL (apoA-I and phosphatidylcholine) and which are under clinical development as anti-atherosclerotic agents, retained the ability of HDL to inhibit ROS production in PCa cells. Collectively, HDL antioxidant activity limits cell proliferation induced by ROS in AR-positive and AR-null PCa cell lines, thus supporting a possible role of HDL against PCa progression

Transaction Costs, Resource Allocation and Liability Rules: A Comment

In his article on The Problem of Social Cost Professor Coase argued that (assuming no transaction costs) the same allocation of resources will come about regardless of which of two joint cost causers is initially charged with the cost, in other words regardless of liability rules. Various writers-including me-accepted that conclusion for the short run, but had doubts about its validity in the long run situation. The argument was that even if transactions brought about the same short run allocation, liability rules would affect the relative wealth of the two joint cost causing activities, and in the long run this would affect the relative number of firms and hence the relative output of the activities