Events

Upcoming Events

Past Events

Complex Litigation:

Mass Actions: Bankruptcies, MDLs, Class Actions & Harrington v. Purdue - On January 31, 2025, the Center on Civil Justice hosted a full-day conference discussing the future of American mass actions in the wake of the United States Supreme Court's bankruptcy decision in Harrington v. Purdue. Panelists debated the extent of the impact of the Purdue case and the respective merits and disadvantages of the bankruptcy vs MDL system. They brought first-hand experiences as individuals personally involved in litigating the Purdue MDL and bankruptcy cases. They raised novel differences in how MDL and bankruptcy claims get valued, especially noting that large pools of low-value mass tort claimants have outsized influence in bankruptcies, where each claimant has a single vote, whether the claimant is an individual or a State. The event concluded with Professor Arthur Miller, present for the founding of American mass actions, reflecting on how they have evolved.
MDLs & Class Actions: A Discussion with Chris Seeger and Elizabeth Burch (October 20, 2020)
Brian T. Fitzpatrick Book Talk: The Conservative Case for Class Actions (November 11, 2019)
The Opioid Epidemic (September 26, 2019)
MDL @ 50 (October 12-13, 2018)
Class Action Effect (May 19, 2017)
Rule 23 @ 50 (December 2-3, 2016)
Consumer Class Actions (November 7, 2014)

Access to Justice:

Stephen B. Bright and James Kwak Book Talk: Fear of Too much Justice (October 10, 2023)
Sateesh Nori Book Talk: Sheltered: Twenty Years in Housing Court (September 18, 2023)
Shifting Tide in State Court Civil Litigation (September 16, 2022) - State court dockets have increasingly become home to assembly-line plaintiffs filing debt collection, eviction, or foreclosure actions against unrepresented defendants. At this conference, we convened the leading scholars who have been calling for attention to this developing issue, together with judges and practitioners who are working on solutions. Among our presenters were Professor Colleen Shanahan, who has written extensively about developments in state courts, as well as Prof. Daniel Wilf-Townsend, who authored the insightful "Assembly Line Plaintiffs" in the Harvard Law Review. The conference also included a discussion of current efforts by various state courts in aid of those who find themselves in state court without legal representation. A highlight of the conference was a lunchtime keynote by Hon. Bridget McCormack, then-Chief Justice of the Michigan Supreme Court.
COVID & the Courts (January 11, 2021)

Third-Party Funding:

Third-Party Litigation Funding through a Transatlantic Lens (November 21, 2024)
Recent Legislative Responses to Litigation Finance (October 28, 2024) - The Center on Civil Justice's 2024 Fall conference featured presentations on active legislation and was widely attended both in-person and on Zoom. The first panel consisted of a lively debate on the need for disclosure of commercial legal funding agreements and was featured in American Lawyer. The second panel discussed consumer legal funding. New York Assemblymember William Magnarelli presented his legislation on the subject, and experts on both sides of the debate discussed it. The final panel was a comparative discussion of European efforts to regulate the industry, featuring Kai Zenner, who helped draft the European Parliament resolution that opened the dialogue. Recordings of the event are available here.
Emerging Trends in Third Party Funding - On February 3, 2023, members of the Center's Dispute Financing Library Advisory Board organized a full-day conference on cutting-edge issues in third-party funding. Among the highlights was a spirited conversation on law firm ownership, featuring a vigorous debate between members of the New York State Bar Association and practitioners. A separate panel provided a practical, behind-the-scenes peek into the process of drafting a contract to fund litigation. The full conference was recorded and is available here.
Dispute Financing: COVID-19 & Other Recent Developments (June 4, 2020)
The Future of Dispute Finance: Pricing, Profits, and Policy (October 18, 2019)
Litigation Funding (November 20, 2015)

Artificial Intelligence:

The Future of AI & the Law: Risks, Opportunities and Challenges (September 13, 2023)
Artificial Intelligence: Educating the Legal Profession (November 22, 2019)
Artificial Intelligence in a Democratic Society (November 30-December 1, 2018)

Antitrust:

Antitrust & Competition Law Society Fireside Chat with Judge Cote (November 13, 2024)
Unlocking Antitrust: Updates in Merger Enforcement (November 1, 2023)
Antitrust Panel Series in association with Cravath, Swaine & Moore (March 10, March 24, April 7, and April 21, 2021)

Other:

Nationwide Injunctions (October 23, 2023)
Stephen Vladeck Book Talk: The Shadow Docket (October 23, 2023)
Recent Developments in Arbitration (November 12, 2022) - CCJ Board of Advisers member Hon. Lee Rosenthal, Chief Judge of the Southern District of Texas conceived of this conference on the changing landscape in arbitration. The Center worked with George Bermann of the Center for International Commercial & Investment Arbitration at Columbia Law School and Franco Ferrari and Linda Silberman of the Center for Transnational Litigation, Arbitration, and Commercial Law at NYU School of Law to organize the event. The conference featured five panels discussing various pressing issues in arbitration, including the lead-off panel on gateway issues moderated by Judge Rosenthal; a panel discussing due process in arbitration; a panel discussing developments in international arbitration; panel on the cutting-edge aspects of consumer and employment mass arbitration, featuring a presentation by Maria Glover, author of the leading paper on the subject; and a panel on third-party arbitration funding.
Honoring Hon. Jack B. Weinstein (July 14, 2021)
Firearms Litigation: Liability, Regulation, and the Constitution (December 1, 2020)
Lost in the Fine Print
Is the Jury Trial Dying (April 9, 2014)