Suffolk University School of Law will host “Contract as Promise at 30: The Future of Contract Theory” on March 25, 2011. Papers will be published in the Suffolk University Law Review. Jeffrey Lipshaw writes:
In 1981, Professor Charles Fried published a book on contract theory entitled Contract as Promise. For almost thirty years, the book has been the seminal work on the moral or deontological justification for the state’s enforcement of private promises. No scholarly discussion of the field can be complete without addressing its claims, whether one agrees or not with its original and provocative stand.
On Friday, March 25, 2011, Suffolk University Law School in Boston will mark the thirtieth anniversary of the book’s publication with a day-long symposium, “Contract as Promise at 30: The Future of Contract Theory.” After reflections from Professor Fried, some of the academy’s foremost contract theorists will offer papers and commentary, with ample opportunity for questions and discussion. Participants presently scheduled include the Honorable Richard Posner, Randy Barnett, Barbara Fried, T.M. Scanlon, Jean Braucher, Richard Craswell, Avery Katz, Henry Smith, Lisa Bernstein, Seana Shiffrin, Daniel Markovits, Juliet Kostritsky, John C.P. Goldberg, Rachel Arnow-Richman, Curtis Bridgeman, Nathan Oman, Roy Kreitner, Gregory Klass, Carol Chomsky, and Robert Scott.
This is an opportune moment to step back, review the alternative approaches to contract theory that have developed since 1981, and to offer views about future doctrinal or inter-disciplinary developments, whether based in moral philosophy, welfare economics, sociology, or other disciplines.
