There is a built-in tension between the perception of copyright law as promoting a delicate balance between the interests of creators, distributions, and users of information goods and contract law’s laissez-faire philosophy. Legal systems need to decide how to approach this tension and...

The progressive automation of the contracting process has led to a revival of theories that question the validity of contracts formed with the assistance of computers. Purportedly, once statements are not only transmitted but also generated by computers, the latter ‘deserve' legal personhood...

Parties frequently obtain patents for one purpose, only to use those patents for another. This Article calls such divergences between parties' initial motivations to obtain patents and those patents' predominant uses later on “patent schisms.”Because traditional patent law theories typically...

The idea of fiduciary government is venerable. However, it has also been developed in new and sometimes provocative ways by contemporary theorists. Partly as a result, the idea is facing fresh criticism. Critics allege that government (in general, or in respect of particular governmental...

The principles of contract law have shown continued resilience in light of constant technological developments, including the mainstream adoption of the Internet. This resilience may be attributable to the broad manner of their formulation. While the Internet hardly creates academic excitement...

This chapter considers the landmark status of the House of Lords in Thorner v Major [2009] UKHL 18, understanding it as an example of story-telling in the law. The chapter explores the issues surrounding the equitable doctrine of proprietary estoppel, as it applies in particular in the context...

The past few decades have witnessed the growth of an exciting debate in the legal academy about the tensions between economic pressures to commodify and philosophical commitments to the market inalienability of certain items. Sex, organs, babies and college athletics are among the many topics...

The ad hoc institutional configurations that facilitated the resolution of sovereign insolvency for over thirty years are fragmenting. In the absence of an acceptable alternative, the recent pari passu decision reveals the dangers of common law courts pressured to enforce contracts and paper...