Last week, Center staff were on the road on two continents weighing in on issues of economic justice.
Ted Mermin gave the opening keynote address at the inaugural European Regional Conference of the International Association of Consumer Law at the University of Cambridge, UK to an audience of consumer law scholars hailing from Cyprus to Norway and from Ireland to Jordan and beyond. Ted's talk, on The Digital Hare and the Regulatory Tortoise: Technological Inevitability, Federalism, and the Role of Consumer Law, explored the role of subnational and supranational governments in protecting consumers in the digital economy, and the potential impact of scholarly and regulatory assumptions regarding the inexorability of technological change.
Meanwhile, David Nahmias was in Cleveland, Ohio, leading a session on mandatory compelled disclosures and the First Amendment at the Convening on Local Consumer Financial Protection organized by Cities for Financial Empowerment. Consumer protection lawyers and advocates from city and county governments heard from David and attorneys from Philadelphia and Washtenaw County, Michigan (which includes Ann Arbor) about current developments in the law governing required disclosures -- and the Center's extensive experience with the issue.