An Introduction to Empirical Legal Research introduces empirical methodology in a legal context, explaining how empirical analysis can inform legal arguments; how lawyers can set about framing empirical questions, conducting empirical research, analysing data, and presenting or evaluating the results.

Free speech and academic freedom have long been hot topics on college campuses. Free Speech: A Campus Toolkit equips students with the tools they need to make informed judgments about campus controversies for themselves. Rather than telling them what to think about the question of free speech, prominent scholars and experts Rebecca L. Brown, Lee Epstein, Adam Liptak, and Andrew D. Martin weave theoretical and historical analysis with contemporary examples to help students understand what free speech actually is and the profound implications for democracy. This book is a valuable tool in any classroom to prompt discussion and encourage critical thinking and engagement.

This is an empirical piece prepared for a conference entitled Testing the Constitution, held at the University of Chicago Law School. Brown and Martin collaborated to design a survey experiment aimed at testing some of the factual claims made by the Supreme Court in Citizens United v. FEC. The paper shows that there is a demonstrable harm to the electorate's faith in democracy, and argues that these findings supply a government interest, separate from prevention of corruption, in regulating campaign spending.

The foundation upon which accounts of policy-motivated behavior of Supreme Court justices are built consists of assumptions about the policy preferences of the justices. To date, most scholars have assumed that the policy positions of Supreme Court justices remain consistent throughout the course of their careers and most measures of judicial ideology-such as Segal and Cover scores-are time invariant. On its face, this assumption is reasonable; Supreme Court justices serve with life tenure and are typically appointed after serving in other political or judicial roles. However, it is also possible that the worldviews, and thus the policy positions, of justices evolve through the course of their careers. In this article we use a Bayesian dynamic ideal point model to investigate preference change on the US Supreme Court. The model allows for justices' ideal points to change over time in a smooth fashion. We focus our attention on the 16 justices who served for 10 or more terms and completed their service between the 1937 and 2003 terms. The results are striking-14 of these 16 justices exhibit significant preference change. This has profound implications for the use of time-invariant preference measures in applied work.

What if our assumptions about the future are wrong? As we move past overshoot in the use of natural resources, humanity is faced with two questions? The first being, do we continue down the 'business as usual' road, or do we 'rethink' our current paradigm and change our trajectory? One way will lead to certain collapse. The other will give us a better chance of mitigating catastrophic disruptions, lead us to greater connection and the ability to rebuild communities and ecosystems, and deliver real prosperity to all. Rethink...Your world, Your future, explains: How our biases and failures in cognitive thinking have been limiting humanity from true progress. How modern society has been manipulated into compliance and participating in an unsustainable system of consumption and production. How our modern industrialised society is largely responsible for our ecological and social disconnect. How government, economic and corporate propaganda is hiding the truth and setting us up for major crisis. How cheap energy has shaped modern civilisation and how the end of cheap energy is (and will continue to have) profound implications for modern society. Why food production and consumption is key to helping solve many of the world's problems. Why new models of food production and distribution that help provide diversity, abundance and health benefits are needed. What we must do to transition to a new prosperous more resilient world. The big picture trends and shifts that will shape modern industrialised economies over the coming decades. The three revolutions that will change how we live, enabling us to live richer more meaningful lives. Rethink...Your world, Your future, Offers people and communities hope and practical strategies and solutions which can help facilitate change and build a more abundant and resilient future...

A collection of annual Thanksgiving letters sent by Chancellor William Danforth, touching on the year's events at Washington University and ideas about the world at large.

This book is the only comprehensive treatment of judicial decision-making that combines social science with a sophisticated understanding of law and legal institutions. It is designed for everyone from undergraduates to law students and graduate students. Topics include whether the identity of the judge matters in deciding a case, how different types of lawyers and litigants shape the work of judges, how judges follow or defy the decisions of higher courts, how judges bargain with one another on multi-member courts, how judges get and keep their jobs, and how the judicial branch interacts with the other branches of government and the general public. The book explains how these individual and institutional features affect who wins and loses cases, and how the law itself is changed. It is built around well-known and accessible disputes such as gay marriage, women's rights, Obamacare, and the death penalty; and it offers students a new way to think about familiar legal issues and demonstrates how legal and social-science perspectives can produce a better understanding of courts and judges.