Empirical Legal Studies

SELS Global: CELS Brazil 2024 -- Call for Papers

CELS Global Conference, Brazil 2024

São Paulo - June 5-7, 2024

Call for Papers

The 2024 Conference on Empirical Legal Studies (CELS) [Brazil] is now accepting submissions. CELS will consider empirical papers spanning all areas of empirical legal studies. Authors are encouraged to submit works-in-progress; however, submissions should be completed drafts that include principal results. Submitted papers must be unpublished (and expected to be unpublished at the time of the conference).

The Early Paper Submission Deadline is Thursday, December 28, 2023 (11:59 PM UTC-3:00), with decisions on January 3, 2024. The Regular Paper Submission will be opened from 29 December, 2023 until 31 January, 2024 (11:59 PM UTC-3:00), with decisions on February 23, 2024. There is no charge for submissions. Papers not chosen in the early review will be automatically directed for further evaluation in the Regular Submission round.

Papers are selected through a peer review process. If accepted, authors will have an opportunity to submit a revised draft prior to the conference for presentation and discussion. Discussion at the conference includes assigned commentators and audience questions. Accepted papers will be made available to all conference participants.

To submit a paper, please click here. Questions for conference organizers should be directed to: [email protected].

About: The Centro de Estudos da Ordem Econômica (CEOE) and the Society for Empirical Legal Studies (SELS) are pleased to host the Conference on Empirical Legal Studies (CELS) Global Brazil on June 5-7, 2024, in person at the CEOE building (Federal University of São Paulo, Quitaúna Campus, São Paulo). CELS is an interdisciplinary gathering that draws researchers from across the United States and the world, bringing together scholars in law, economics, political science, psychology, and other fields who are interested in the empirical analysis of law and legal institutions.

ADDENDUM: Please note that SELS Global Brazil - CELS Brazil 2024 is part of the growing SELS international conference program and not a replacement for the annual CELS conference series. The 18th annual CELS conference will be held at Emory University School of Law in the fall of 2024. More information on the 2024 Emory CELS will be sent in the new year.

Patents, the Mayo Decision (2012) & Innovation

Our patent system seeks to promote innovation. When it comes to levering incentives in the service of innovation, property rights flowing from patent grants do much of the expected work.

The Supreme Court's 2012 Mayo v. Prometheus decision disrupted the existing status quo and articulated a new legal test for patent-eligible subject matter. Assessing Mayo's impact in general and on molecular diagnostics innovation in particular confronts considerable data and research design challenges.

Arti Rai (Duke) et al. take up this challenge in a recent paper, Molecular Diagnostics Patenting after Mayo v. Prometheus: An Empirical Analysis. As the authors make clear, "in an ideal world, we would be able to examine rigorously differences in molecular diagnostics innovation before and after Mayo. Unfortunately, the rigorous measurement of innovation raises well-known challenges.” Despite these (and other) challenges, the paper uses data on molecular diagnostic patenting from 2009 through 2019. The paper's DID specifications exploit comparisons with non-bioinformatics and non-molecular diagnostic biochemistry inventions. The paper reports mixed results summarized in the excerpted abstract that follows.

"This Article contributes to the presently thin evidence base on the impact of Mayo by using data on patent applications, examinations, and grants from 2010-2019 to comprehensively trace the effects of the test and subsequent related developments. Using descriptive data as well as a difference-in-difference (DID) design, we evaluate the extent to which the decision was followed by one of three expected outcomes: a decline in patent quantity and quality (“retrenchment”); increase in patent prosecution “toughness”; and applicant “adaptation.” We find substantial support for our toughness and adaptation hypotheses, but not our retrenchment hypothesis: molecular diagnostic patenting did not decline in aggregate, though there is some evidence of a relative decline among small, U.S. based firms as well as a potential decline in the share of patents covering new (non-continuation) inventions. These results suggest that molecular diagnostic patents are harder to get but they are still being applied for and granted, with their narrowed scope making them less likely to block follow on innovation.”

The Bruen Decision After One Year: An Empirical Look

In its 2022 Bruen decision, the Court ruled (6-3) that a New York law requiring that applicants “show cause” in their conceal carry firearm license applications unconstitutionally infringed on Second Amendment protections.

Since the Bruen decision, a stream of additional lawsuits challenging various other state and federal firearm regulations has been decided. Assessing these post- Bruen court decisions may hold some clues about the Bruen decision’s impact on the Second Amendment landscape.

To this end, in One Year Post-Bruen: An Empirical Assessment, Eric Ruben (SMU) et al., analyze more than 450 claims, flowing from 326 cases, decided after Bruen. The authors note that the pace (and volume) of litigation dramatically increased after Bruen as well as the lawsuits’ efficacy. The authors also observe that Bruen’s analytic framework “has not meaningfully constrained judges.” The paper’s abstract follows.

"In the year after New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, a steady stream of highly publicized opinions struck down a wide range of previously upheld gun restrictions. Courts declared unconstitutional policies ranging from assault weapon bans to domestic abuser prohibitions to various limits on publicly carrying handguns. Those opinions can frequently be paired with others reaching the opposite conclusion. The extent to which Bruen shook up the Second Amendment landscape and has caused widespread confusion in the courts is starting to come into focus.

This Article measures Bruen’s after effects by statistically analyzing a year’s worth of Second Amendment opinions. We coded more than 450 challenges for dozens of variables including both case and judge characteristics, resulting in a comprehensive post-Bruen Second Amendment dataset. The findings of our analysis provide an objective basis for assessing the upheaval wrought by Bruen and highlight both unanswered questions and immense challenges for Second Amendment doctrine in the coming years."