Research Handbook on Law and Time
Published on 28. March 2025
Book
Hardback
382 pages
978-1-0353-1675-5 (ISBN)
Description
This Research Handbook explores the interactions between law and time, demonstrating how both are pivotal in the organization of human activities, including legal proceedings and societal functions.
The book expands upon the structural relationship between law and time, examining how societies and legal systems coordinate around timing conventions and how the use of time constraints can alter litigation and deter socially destructive behavior. Expert contributors evaluate transition and timing rules, analyzing the 'dilemma of waiting', delayed implementation, the use of temporary laws in emergency situations, and third-party losses arising from delays. They also investigate practical issues such as mandatory retirement, how statutes of limitations work, and the impact of legal developments over time.
Illustrating the importance of time in legal processes and decision-making, the Research Handbook on Law and Time is an essential resource for students and scholars of constitutional and administrative law, legal philosophy, and legal theory. It is also beneficial to policymakers, judges, and practitioners in economics and political science.
The book expands upon the structural relationship between law and time, examining how societies and legal systems coordinate around timing conventions and how the use of time constraints can alter litigation and deter socially destructive behavior. Expert contributors evaluate transition and timing rules, analyzing the 'dilemma of waiting', delayed implementation, the use of temporary laws in emergency situations, and third-party losses arising from delays. They also investigate practical issues such as mandatory retirement, how statutes of limitations work, and the impact of legal developments over time.
Illustrating the importance of time in legal processes and decision-making, the Research Handbook on Law and Time is an essential resource for students and scholars of constitutional and administrative law, legal philosophy, and legal theory. It is also beneficial to policymakers, judges, and practitioners in economics and political science.
Reviews / Votes
'This Research Handbook is a fascinating treatment of a broad range of topics in law and legal institutions, using time as its organizing theme. Each chapter adds a novel and intriguing twist in this thread, with diverse applications that will engage readers across many fields of law and policy.' -- George Triantis, Stanford University, USA 'A magnificent book, teeming with insights. The essays are absolute gems. This is a defining treatment of some fundamental questions.' -- Cass R. Sunstein, Harvard Law School, USA 'Poets have called time a river, a thief, even a jet plane that moves too fast. Lawyers constantly confront this golden thread connecting the past, present and future. The Research Handbook on Law and Time/ offers a groundbreaking exploration of the intricate ties between legal systems and temporal conventions. Through 18 diverse chapters, experts reveal how time influences everything from court proceedings to statutes of limitations and beyond. With insightful analyses on topics like temporary legislation and path dependency, this volume is a compelling examination of how law both structures and is shaped by the passage of time.' -- Ian Ayres, Yale Law School, USAMore details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Cheltenham
United Kingdom
Target group
Professional and scholarly
College/higher education
Dimensions
Height: 244 mm
Width: 169 mm
ISBN-13
978-1-0353-1675-5 (9781035316755)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Edited by Frank Fagan, Associate Professor, South Texas College of Law and Saul Levmore, William B. Graham Distinguished Service Professor of Law, University of Chicago Law School, USA
Content
Contents
Introduction to the Research Handbook on Law and Time 1
Frank Fagan and Saul Levmore
PART I ORGANIZING AND INTERPRETING TIME
1 Coordination, conflict, and the laws of time 9
Daniel J. Hemel and Matthew Hamilton
2 Moral and evidentiary statutes of limitations 38
Frank Fagan
3 Temporary justices 49
Jacob Gersen and Jeannie Suk Gersen
4 The dynamic dilemma: dynamics and disuniformity in statutory interpretation 73
Jonah B. Gelbach
5 Time and contract interpretation: lessons from machine learning 109
Yonathan A. Arbel
PART II INFORMATION, PATH DEPENDENCE, AND THE DILEMMA OF WAITING
6 Timing the regulatory tightrope 131
Adriana Z. Robertson
7 One (more) virtue of temporary law 146
Tom Ginsburg, Jonathan S. Masur and Richard H. McAdams
8 Litigation scar tissue and construction costs 165
Diego A. Zambrano
9 Leveraging information forcing in good faith 192
Hillary A. Sale
PART III EQUITY AND COMPROMISE
10 Time distortions in the income tax system: the 2024 proposals to chip away at the realization privilege 215
Julie A. Roin
11 Time is, time was: evaluating the use of the life cycle model as a fiscal policy tool 232
Daniel Shaviro
12 Timing rules and legislative compromise 253
Daniel A. Farber
13 Temporary COVID laws 275
Ittai Bar-Siman-Tov, Daniel Shtauber, Gaya Harari-Heit and Gonen Ilan
PART IV MODEST CHANGE AND THE COST OF TIME
14 Intellectual property and time: a behavioral example 297
Daniela Sele and Stefan Bechtold
15 The attenuation of legal change 313
Luigi Alberto Franzoni
16 Modest instability over time: from law to religions and universities 322
Saul Levmore
17 Reconsidering litigation delay 327
Abdi Aidid and Anthony Niblett
18 Lost time: paying for delays associated with labor strikes and traffic jams 347
Saul Levmore
Index 363
Introduction to the Research Handbook on Law and Time 1
Frank Fagan and Saul Levmore
PART I ORGANIZING AND INTERPRETING TIME
1 Coordination, conflict, and the laws of time 9
Daniel J. Hemel and Matthew Hamilton
2 Moral and evidentiary statutes of limitations 38
Frank Fagan
3 Temporary justices 49
Jacob Gersen and Jeannie Suk Gersen
4 The dynamic dilemma: dynamics and disuniformity in statutory interpretation 73
Jonah B. Gelbach
5 Time and contract interpretation: lessons from machine learning 109
Yonathan A. Arbel
PART II INFORMATION, PATH DEPENDENCE, AND THE DILEMMA OF WAITING
6 Timing the regulatory tightrope 131
Adriana Z. Robertson
7 One (more) virtue of temporary law 146
Tom Ginsburg, Jonathan S. Masur and Richard H. McAdams
8 Litigation scar tissue and construction costs 165
Diego A. Zambrano
9 Leveraging information forcing in good faith 192
Hillary A. Sale
PART III EQUITY AND COMPROMISE
10 Time distortions in the income tax system: the 2024 proposals to chip away at the realization privilege 215
Julie A. Roin
11 Time is, time was: evaluating the use of the life cycle model as a fiscal policy tool 232
Daniel Shaviro
12 Timing rules and legislative compromise 253
Daniel A. Farber
13 Temporary COVID laws 275
Ittai Bar-Siman-Tov, Daniel Shtauber, Gaya Harari-Heit and Gonen Ilan
PART IV MODEST CHANGE AND THE COST OF TIME
14 Intellectual property and time: a behavioral example 297
Daniela Sele and Stefan Bechtold
15 The attenuation of legal change 313
Luigi Alberto Franzoni
16 Modest instability over time: from law to religions and universities 322
Saul Levmore
17 Reconsidering litigation delay 327
Abdi Aidid and Anthony Niblett
18 Lost time: paying for delays associated with labor strikes and traffic jams 347
Saul Levmore
Index 363