Georg von Wangenheim

The evolution of judge-made law☆

Abstract The Law must be applied in all cases which come within the letter or the spirit of any of its provisions Where no provision is applicable, the judge shall decide according to the existing Customary Law and, in default thereof, according to the rules which he would lay down if he had himself to act as legislator. Herein he must be guided by approved legal science and case-law 1

Lawmakers as norm entrepreneurs

In this paper we consider the role of lawmakers as norm entrepreneurs. Drawing from expressive law theories and social response theories, we shed light on the role of law in shaping social values and norms, and on the ability of the law to produce social norms where they did not exist before. Furthermore, we unveil a possible undesirable effect of legal intervention, where a legal innovation can cause social divide and possible conflicts.

On the Coevolution of Retribution and Trustworthiness: An (Indirect) Evolutionary and Experimental Analysis

Standard economic explanations of good conduct in trade rely almost exclusively on future-directed extrinsic motivations induced by material incentives. But intrinsic motives to behave trustworthily and to punish untrustworthiness do support trade. In our model, intrinsically motivated players are aware of their own type and observe the population share of other types. The material success of various types and their coevolution are analyzed, and it is checked whether the dynamics of the indirect evolutionary analysis are replicated in the laboratory.

Mutual interdependence versus repeated interaction: An experiment studying voluntary social exchange

Relations of mutual interdependence have been regarded as necessary for human cooperation to evolve. However, many studies in the social sciences indicate that repeated interaction suffices to establish cooperation. We examine this issue by means of a voluntary social exchange experiment where mutually interdependent players coexist with merely dependent ones. We systematically vary the degree of mutual interdependence and the length of the time horizon. According to our data, repetition of interactions is crucial for fostering cooperation, although people remain attentive to mutual interdependencies.

Trade secrets versus Cost Benefit Analysis

Abstract We argue that administrative agencies should base their decisions on Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA) for two reasons: first the well known ex ante effect that CBA make public decisions more rational and second the little discussed ex post effect that the agency’s CBA provides valuable information to judicial or political bodies controlling the agency. The ex post purpose of CBA implies (judicial review of administrative decisions) or requires (political review) the public availability of the CBA. A conflict between this public availability and the protection of trade secrets arises, if the costs or benefits of a decision depend on information which are trade secrets. As a solution to this conflict, we propose a nonpublic in camera court procedure which leaves little discretion to the agency.

Rent-Seeking and Litigation: The Hidden Virtues of Limited Fee Shifting

Abstract In the past couple of decades, scholars have predominantly employed rent-seeking models to analyze litigation problems. In this paper, we build on the existing literature to show how alternative fee-shifting arrangements (e.g., the American rule and English rule with limited fee-shifting) affect parties’ litigation expenditures and their decisions to litigate. Contrary to the prevailing wisdom, we discover that, when fee shifting is limited, the English rule presents some interrelated advantages over the American rule, including the reduction of litigation rates and the possible reduction of expected litigation expenditures. Our results unveil a hidden virtue of limited fee shifting, showing that an increase in such limit may lead to a desirable sorting of socially valuable litigation.

Evolutionary Theories in Law and Economics and Their Use for Comparative Legal Theory

Evolutionary Law and Economics explains how law evolves in possibly path dependent ways. The theory therefore seems apt to help comparative legal theory in understanding and evaluating legal variation across jurisdictions. This paper reviews evolutionary approaches in Law and Economics to study in a more precise way whether and how different strands of the approach may be useful for the comparative lawyer.Evolutionary Law and Economics explains how law evolves in possibly path dependent ways. The theory therefore seems apt to help comparative legal theory in understanding and evaluating legal variation across jurisdictions. This paper reviews evolutionary approaches in Law and Economics to study in a more precise way whether and how different strands of the approach may be useful for the comparative lawyer.

Coevolution of Cooperation, Preferences, and Cooperative Signals in Social Dilemmas

Economists have a long tradition in identifying the evolution of cooperation in large, unstructured societies as a puzzle. We suggest a new explanation for cooperation which avoids restrictions of most previous attempts. Our explanation deals with the role of internalized norms for cooperation in large unstructured populations. Even internalized norms, i.e. norms which alter the perceived utility from acting in a cooperative or in an uncooperative way, will not help to overcome a dilemma in an unstructured society, unless and this is the thrust of the current paper individuals are able to signal their property of being a norm bearer. Only when internalization of the norm may be communicated in a reliable way, the picture may change. We derive necessary and sufficient condition for cooperation to be part of an evolutionary stable equilibrium. These conditions relate signaling cost of norm-adopters and non-adopters, the strength of the social norm and parameter measuring the cost of cooperation.

Schwache Interessen in der Selbstregulierung im Umweltrecht

Dieser Aufsatz stellt Moglichkeiten dar, mithilfe juristischer und okonomischer Methoden zu untersuchen, wie im Umweltbereich schwache Interessen in der Selbstregulierung Berucksichtigung finden konnen. Governance im rechtlichen Bereich umfasst aus unserer Sicht jede gezielte Beeinflussung menschlichen Verhaltens durch jeglichen wenigstens teilweise durch Recht steuerbaren Mechanismus. Sie geht somit uber die einfache rechtliche Steuerung mittels sanktionsbewehrter Anordnungen (regulative Normierung) hinaus, indem sie versucht, unterschiedliche Akteure in ihren Handlungskontexten und -moglichkeiten im Zusammenhang von Politikgestaltung, Rechtsentstehung und Rechtsumsetzung zu erfassen. Damit wird der Erkenntnis der Implementationsforschung Rechnung getragen, dass regulative Normierung daran scheitert, Verhalten zu steuern, bei dem es auf Eigeninitiative ankommt. Vor diesem Hintergrund wurden alternative Formen rechtlicher Steuerung (kooperative Steuerung, staatliche Rahmensetzung und Selbstregulierung) diskutiert (Mayntz 1978), die die Eigenlogik der Objekte staatlicher Steuerung starker reflektieren: Verhaltenswissen ist relevant fur die Rechtsarbeit (Kock 2006). Darauf aufbauend lenkt die Governance-Perspektive den Blick auf Regelungsstrukturen, die das Verhaltnis zwischen dem offentlichen und dem privaten Sektor pragen (Trute 1999; Hoffmann-Riem 2005; Schuppert 2005, 2006). Da das Recht die Infrastruktur bietet fur die Interaktionen des zunehmend kooperationsgeneigten Staates mit para- oder nichtstaatlichen Akteuren sowie fur deren selbstorganisierte Aktivitaten, trifft sich die rechtswissenschaftliche Betonung der Infrastrukturverantwortung des Staates mit den Debatten der Sozialwissenschaften um Good Governance (Bachmann 2002; Schuppert 2006). Die governance-typische intensive Verzahnung von offentlichem und privatem Recht lasst sich insbesondere auch im Umweltrecht und in dem Phanomen der Selbstregulierung erkennen.

Central Stability or Unstable Decentralization? Why Enforcement is Unstable in Decentralized Governments

In his wide range of research on, and teaching of, the economic analysis of law, Hans-Bernd Schafer has also come across questions of constitutional law, in particular with respect to the European Union (e.g. Schmid-Lubbert and Schafer, 2003; Schafer and Van den Bergh, 1998, 2000). Perhaps the most important topic in this field is subsidiarity and federalism, centralization and decentralization. As other jurisdictions with a federal structure, the European Union faces the problem of having to weigh democratic legitimization against economic efficiency (Inman and Rubinfeld, 1998, 2000), local differentiation of public goods against internalization of inter-jurisdictional external effects (Oates, 1972) and mutual insurance against local responsibility (Bucovetsky, 1997; Perrson and Tabellini, 1996a). While most authors concentrate on geographical federalism1, Frey and Eichenberger (1996) extended the geographical subsidiarity principle to the functional dimension: there seems to be little reason, why one low-level jurisdiction should decide on a multiplicity of subjects. Rather, prima-facie arguments would support the approach followed effectively in so many countries to split competences not only along the lines of federal subordination but also along functional distinctions.