We are delighted to announce the third issue of the LSE Law Working Paper Series for 2019.
In this issue, Niamh Dunne (WPS 14/2019) explores the proliferation of settlement mechanisms used by the European Commission within contemporary competition enforcement, and considers the impact of this evolving practice on the wider EU competition framework; Niamh Dunne (WPS 15/2019) offers an in-depth analysis of the concept of ‘indispensability’ - which underpins the treatment of refusal to deal claims under Article 102 TFEU - surveying the relevant jurisprudence and asking whether the weight of exceptions to indispensability may reach the point of overwhelming, or ‘dispensing with,’ the original rule; Nicola Lacey and David Soskice (WPS 16/2019) explore how American exceptionalism in crime and punishment as compared with the UK has been generated by local democratic autonomy over key relevant policy areas; they examine historical 'waves' of increasing then decreasing violent crime and incarceration, arguing that they reflect massive changes in technology regime: from the postwar stable Fordist system through the 1960s; through its collapse - especially felt in the large cities - through the 1970s and 1980s; to the transition to a knowledge economy from the early 1990s on; Edmund Schuster (WPS 17/2019) focusses on non-currency applications of blockchain technology – which has captured the imagination of media, legislators and academics as having the potential for transforming how assets are traded and legal relationships function – presenting a simple legal argument that seeks to demonstrate the impossibility of a meaningful blockchain-based economic system; Hugh Collins (WPS18/2019) discusses how theories of justice suitable for ordinary market transactions are not appropriate in the special context of employment relations, arguing that the legal protection of fundamental or human rights is needed to provide the robust guarantees that are required to protect people against abuses of power in relations of subordination; Martin Loughlin (WPS 19/2019) examines the development of the British constitution through six phases, in each of which a distinct meaning of the word 'constitution' has been shaped by the political forces of that time; Mattia Pinto (WPS 20/2019) analyses the implications of duties to mobilise criminal law developed in European Court of Human Rights case law for domestic criminal justice systems, using the case study of the UK Modern Slavery Act 2015 to show how an uncritical invocation of conviction and punishment in practice encourages harsher prison sentences, greater power to prosecute and convict, and extensive pre-emptive measures; Geoffrey Sigalet, Grégoire Webber, and Rosalind Dixon (WPS 21/2019) provide a review of the metaphor of dialogue across jurisdictions and introduce the arguments of the contributing authors of Constitutional Dialogue: Rights, Democracy, Institutions (Cambridge University Press, 2019), a volume bringing together many of the world's leading constitutional and political theorists to debate the nature and merits of constitutional dialogues between the judicial, legislative, and executive branches.