This empirical research methods workshop is an introduction to the opportunities and challenges of empirical research and its place in legal scholarship. The panel features Prof. Robert MacCoun of UC Berkeley, Prof. Manuel Gomez of Florida International University College of Law, and SLS' Prof. John Donohue, who each have years of experience conducting research with qualitative and quantitative research methods and experimental design. Panelists will share their research experiences and attendees will have an opportunity to share questions from their own work. All SLS students are welcome, particularly those interested in a career in academia and legal scholarship generally.

This workshop is offered as part of the Inaugural Conference for Junior Researchers on Law and (In)formality sponsored by the Stanford Program in Law and Society, to be held on May 16-17.

Speakers

John J. Donohue III has been one of the leading empirical researchers in the legal academy over the past 25 years. Professor Donohue is an economist as well as a lawyer and is well known for using quantitative empirical analysis to determine the impact of law and public policy in a wide range of areas, including civil rights,crime and criminal justice, and school funding. Before rejoining SLS, Professor Donohue was a Professor of Law at Yale Law School. Earlier in his career, he was a law professor at Northwestern University as well as a research fellow with the American Bar Association. He is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the former editor of the American Law and Economics Review and president of the American Law and Economics Association.

Robert MacCoun is a professor of law and public policy at UC Berkeley, trained in psychology. From 1986 to 1993 he was a behavioral scientist at The RAND Corporation, and he has been a Visiting Professor at Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School and at SLS. Using a variety of experimental and quantitative research methods, Prof. MacCoun has published many studies on illicit drug use and drug dealing, harm reduction, jury decision making, alternative dispute resolution, social influence processes, and bias in the use and interpretation of research evidence. His analyses of military unit cohesion were very influential in the 1993 and 2010 policy debates about allowing gays and lesbians to serve in the US military.

Manuel A. Gómez is an associate professor of law at Florida International University College of Law, where he serves as Coordinator of International Legal Projects and leads the Global Legal Studies Initiative. Before joining FIU, Professor Gómez was a Lecturer in Law and a Teaching Fellow at SLS. Since 1995 he has also been a Faculty member at the Universidad Central de Venezuela Law School, and a visiting professor at various law schools around Latin America. In his research, Professor Gómez uses qualitative research methods to study various law and society related issues, including the impact of social networks on dispute processing, private order, international arbitration, complex litigation, legal education reform, and the globalization of the legal profession.

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