Syllabus
The course is based on a mixture of lectured material and students’ active participation. A pair of classes is centered around a specific question that is of topical relevance in policy-making, jurisprudence, adjudication, or legislation. In the first class, instructor presents the question and the analytical framework that is useful for answering that question (the relevant theoretical concepts from Law and Economics, overview of the empirical research on the subject). In the next class, selected students present their own work on the question. Depending on the question, this work may consist of a structured literature review, a critical analysis of applicable court cases, collected data on the “law in action” or a policy analysis of the expected impacts of a given legislation. Examples of questions:
1. Gun ownership regulations: should they be tightened or loosened?2. Do debtors have an incentive to file for personal bankruptcy?3. Minority shareholder squeeze-outs: do they work and whom do they benefit?4. What is the adequate compensation for pain and suffering under the new civil code?5. Smoking ban in restaurants: how is it enforced and what effects did it have?6. The Czech class action legislation: the impact analysis.(The list of questions will be updated every year based on the topical issues).
Annotation
The objective of the course is a) Theoretical, to provide students with a deeper understanding of the economic aspects of the legal systems b) Applied, to develop the ability to apply the concepts and arguments from Law and Economics to specific legal problems.
Important information about the prerequisites: The course requires prior knowledge of economics at the level of an introductory microeconomics course (e.g., Mankiw, G.: Principles of Economics, chapters 1-19). For the Faculty of Law regular master students, this implies that they should have completed the course Theory of national economy I. Throughout the classes and exams, we will presume that the students have the requisite knowledge of this material.