Program on Law & Economics

Director: Avishalom Tor

The Notre Dame Program on Law and Economics (NDLE or “the Program”) promotes research and scholarship in law and economics, law and the social sciences, and law and business at Notre Dame Law School and beyond. At the law school, the Program offers a range of law and economics courses, including a year-round workshop, as well as a variety of events, such as guest lectures, symposia, and conferences. In addition, NDLE awards competitive stipends to excellent Student Fellows who wish to deepen their understanding of the economic analysis of law, and brings in Visiting Scholars to engage in joint research or intellectual exchange with the Program’s Faculty Fellows and Student Fellows.

The Program is also active globally, through the Notre Dame Research Program on Law and Market Behavior (ND LAMB), which runs and cosponsors multiple international conferences, symposia, and workshops every year, and facilitates research collaborations between Law School faculty and scholars from law schools and universities around the world by drawing on the University’s Global Network and beyond. More information on ND LAMB and its ongoing activities is available here.

NDLE was established in 2010, introducing the Notre Dame Law and Economics Workshop and an annual symposium. Over the years following the Program’s founding, it has expanded its offerings to include a variety of law and economics courses. We now recommend that students who wish to engage more deeply and systematically with the economic approach to law take the full arc of basic law and economics courses, besides any specialized courses in their doctrinal fields of interest.

Specifically, the recommended law and economics arc begins with “Introduction to Law and Economics” (usually also offered as a 1L elective), which provides students with an introduction the economic analysis of law, examining how economic reasoning can and should be used to understand and evaluate legal rules and institutions across various legal fields including private law, criminal law, family law, labor law, and more.

This should be followed by the “Law and Economics Seminar,” the cornerstone of the law and economics program (which students are allowed to register for twice in the course of their 2L and 3L years). This workshop, which now runs in both fall and spring semesters, offers student direct engagement with cutting-edge law and economics scholarship. Every semester, the workshop brings in about a dozen speakers—from leading law schools and universities in the U.S. and abroad, as well as from among our own faculty at the Law School and other departments at the University—to present their ongoing research and engage in a critical discussion of their work with enrolled students and Law School faculty. The seminar is also open to all interested faculty and students at Notre Dame.

Finally, the recommended law and economics arc now concludes with the capstone seminar “Foundational Concepts in Law and Economics.” This seminar is specifically geared towards helping students write excellent seminar papers, in any legal field, using the conceptual toolkit offered by the economic approach to law. (Seminar papers also satisfy the Substantial Research Paper requirement as described in the Hoynes Code.)

Beyond its course offerings, NDLE also fosters interdisciplinary research and relationships in other ways. The Program encourages the intellectual and scholarly development of its members, promotes the creation and dissemination of research and working papers, and enables collaboration with colleagues across disciplines. NDLE also supports its members’ presentation of work at various conferences and workshops, their publication of scholarship in academic presses, and peer-reviewed journals, and law reviews.

All in all, through its multifaceted activities at the Law School, Notre Dame Global Network, as well as other domestic and global research and scholarly engagements, the Program promotes rigorous and wide-ranging research and provides meaningful insights into many of today's most significant legal and policy questions.

People

Faculty Fellows       Visiting Scholars      Postdoctoral Fellows      Student Fellows

Events

News

Professor Avishalom Tor co-authors new article, "N-Equality: Inequality Increases With the Number of Allocation Recipients", October 7, 2025

Professor Sadie Blanchard joins Taboo Trades podcast, October 2, 2025

Professor Avishalom Tor presents at Fourth International Behavioural Public Policy Conference, September 29, 2025

Notre Dame Law Professor Patrick Corrigan has published a new article, The Corporate Governance Trilemma, in the Journal of Legal Analysis, September 17, 2025

Program on Law and Economics Welcomes New Fellows for Academic Year, September 4, 2025

Notre Dame Law Professor Avishalom Tor Coauthors New Study on How Group Size Shapes Fairness in Decision-Making, July 26, 2025

Call for Papers for the 13th Law and Economics Conference in Lucerne, May 29, 2025

ND Law Professor Patrick Corrigan was quoted by FundFire about the legal battle surrounding SmileDirectClub, February 12, 2025

Notre Dame Law School hosts Symposium on the future of the Federal Trade Commission, December 19, 2024

Notre Dame Law Professor Avishalom Tor awarded Honorary Doctorate by University of Lucerne for pioneering behavioral-legal research, November 11, 2024

Nicole Stelle Garnett gave the keynote address at the American Enterprise Institute's event, Church and State: Reimagining Faith Communities' Role in L-12 Education, October 15, 2024

ND Law’s Program on Law and Economics establishes new competition to select Law and Economics Student Fellows, names five students as inaugural Fellows, September 23, 2024

Anton Burri-Wenzel joins Notre Dame Law School as first postdoctoral fellow for the Program on Law & Economics, September 20, 2024

Professor Avishalom Tor presents at Conference of European Association of Law and Economics and participates in workshop at the London School of Economics, September 17, 2024

Professor Nicole Stelle Garnett elected to American Law Institute, August 1, 2024

LAMB Faculty Fellow Patrick Corrigan receives tenure, July 8, 2024

Professor Sadie Blanchard presents "ESG Reputation Adjudication Bonds" at two conferences, June 28, 2024

The Future of Behavioral Public Policy II Conference held in London, May 31, 2024

Professor Avishalom Tor publishes a new article, edited volume, and chapter May 16, 2024

Implementing K-12 education savings accounts by Nicole Stelle Garnett and Michael Q. McShane, June 22, 2023