Encouraging Diversity in Law School Deanships

Introduction to a symposium

From Governess to Governance: Advancing Gender Equity in Corporate Leadership

Even as corporate influence on every aspect of life continues to grow, women (overall, and especially women of color) remain woefully underrepresented in corporate governance roles, particularly on boards of directors. This lack of gender diversity in the corporate boardroom is prevalent not only in more established companies but also persists—often at even higher levels— in new ventures as well. This Essay details the persistent lack of progress over more than a half century in diversifying leadership in corporate governance. This progress is especially concerning given that the benefits of diversity for sound decisionmaking and overall corporate welfare have been established empirically, putting into question whether those boards that fall short on gender equity are meeting their fiduciary duties of good governance. The Essay confronts and debunks the common reasons given for slow progress and outlines specific steps that corporate boards and others seeking to improve gender equity in corporate governance can deploy to make faster and more consistent progress. Part of a symposium on Gender Diversity, Diversity Fatigue, and Shifting the Focus

First Keynote Address

Kellye Y. Testy, Toni Rembe Dean and Professor of Law, University of Washington School of Law and President (2016), AAL

Foreword: Compensated Surrogacy in the Age of \u3ci\u3eWindsor\u3c/i\u3e

The authors in this timely symposium tackle the many and varied issues related to compensated surrogacy with sophisticated, diverse, and careful analysis. Moreover, they do so in the context of fast-paced legal and sociological change on issues of marriage and parenting, some of which was crystalized in the recent United States v. Windsor decision that spurred growing recognition of gay marriage and families across the nation

Foreword: The Financial Services Industry: A New World (Dis)Order? Symposium

Symposium: The Financial Services Industry: A New World (Dis)Order

Intention In Tension \u3cem\u3eContracts, Cases and Doctrine\u3c/em\u3e by Randy E. Barnett

In discussing the choice of Barnett\u27s casebook, this Review focuses on two central pedagogical goals, and describe how Barnett\u27s casebook has either helped or hindered the reviewer\u27s ability to accomplish those goals. Those goals are to actively assist students in (1) learning basic (accepted) contract doctrines and methods of analyzing contract issues; and (2) developing a critical stance toward law in general, and contract law in particular

Whose Deal Is It? Teaching about Structural Inequality by Teaching Contracts Transactionally

Although Scott Burnham and others have urged the use of more contracts to teach Contracts for some time,\u279 it is safe to say that the majority of Contracts courses in the United States do not put actual contracts front and center. While particular phrases or provisions surely are referenced in the steady diet of appellate decisions that comprise the first-year course, those decisions very rarely include the actual contract at issue for study. Moreover, in the increased compression of the first year course, few professors believe they can justify the time for transactional exercises or simulations in the rush to cover the basic doctrines. A transactional approach to teaching Contracts is thus a simple but important idea that is still too much a rarity in the academy. And so in praise of simple but important ideas, I want to make an additional one. In addition to all of the benefits that others in this issue have identified about using contracts to teach Contracts, teaching contracts transactionally also provides the opportunity to raise important issues of social location. That is, teaching Contracts transactionally highlights the importance of the context of the transaction, and thus opens the door to considerations of structural inequalities (including race, gender, class, sexuality (and their intersections)) implicated in that transaction. Rather than teaching about deals in the abstract, teaching Contracts transactionally enables more trained attention upon the issue of whose deal it is, and why that aspect of the context of the transaction must be addressed before much else can be profitably discussed. Contracts, after all, are bargains between particular persons or entities, not freefloating bargains. Those identities matter in terms of the bargaining power of the parties and the kind of contract that they need to embody their deal. Accordingly, focus upon contractual transactions presents a prime opportunity to surface issues that influence bargaining power and client needs. What kinds of issues do that? Any issue that determines who has power in this society and who does not: race, gender, class, sexual orientation, and their many complex intersections are foremost among them. Thus, in the process of learning much about contract drafting and negotiation, students also can learn much about these important social inequalities as well if simulations are structured to present these issues. It is not hard to do; remember, this paper is in praise of simple ideas. It is also important to do so, and below I discuss both the why and the how of focusing upon whose deal is it