The Stanford Program in Law and Society (SPLS) at Stanford Law School is pleased to announce its Second Conference for Junior Researchers. Following the success of last year’s Inaugural Conference, this event seeks to continue the community-building process by providing a forum where aspiring scholars from around the globe can meet to present and discuss their current projects on law and society and create a fruitful ground for future cooperation. The conference is specially designed for junior researchers to present their work in progress and receive input from faculty and other participants, while promoting vibrant discussions and the exchange of ideas. The conference will also allow participants to develop their research skills through a special workshop.

The Second Conference for Junior Researchers invites papers from junior researchers (graduate students, post-graduate students, post-doctoral researchers as well as recent graduates from law schools and social science departments) that explore the relationship between law and social transformations. We live in a dynamic world, where social attitudes, realities, norms, practices, and needs are constantly evolving. Consequently, questions about the role law plays in creating those changes or following those transformations arise. Is law an efficient instrument to promote the development of societies, groups, institutions, and markets? Or should we be more cautious about the power of law to bring about social transformations? When does law lag behind changing societies, institutions, and markets? Or maybe law is just not the relevant framework for discussing these changes?

Research on the relationship between law and society has always been interested in how law connects with developments in society as well as circumstances where law is considered a cornerstone for implementing new norms. How does law function as a building block for constructing a change in norms? What are the conditions that allow law to keep pace with social transformations? How do changes in moral perceptions or social attitudes affect the way people regard the law? In other words, what is the relationship – if one exists – between developments outside the legal realm and the legal system itself?

The conference invites junior researchers to submit research papers in all fields that analyze, discuss, or reflect on the abovementioned themes. As this is an interdisciplinary conference, empirical law-related or law-relevant research projects from all social sciences are encouraged.