Legal Commentary

What?s Wrong With the AALS?

By Orin Kerr

Brian Leiter has had a series of interesting posts on the Association of American Law Schools (AALS), focusing on why the AALS charges such high fees for its academic conferences:

1. AALS Annual Meeting Registration Fee Is Not (ahem) ?Popular?
2. So would reducing the high AALS Annual Meeting registration fees affect attendance?
3. More on the AALS Annual Meeting Registration Rip-Off

All are worth reading. In addition, Larry Ribstein offers some apt comments here, and Jeff Sovern does so here.

I wanted to add to the discussion with a plea directed to the new AALS section heads. Your primary responsibility as the new AALS section head is to (a) put it on your resume and (b) plan the panel discussion hosted for your section for the 2011 AALS meeting. My plea is that you are done with (a), please think carefully about how you can ensure that (b) will be of genuine scholarly interest to many of your fellow section members.

In particular, please don?t put on a panel featuring just your friends. Please don?t choose a panel based on a pet topic that you love but few people seem to follow. And please don?t pick panel members who all agree with each other, or who look at the problem in a similar way.

Instead, chose a specific topic of significant scholarly interest and debate in your field. Then ask the leading and active scholars in your field ? the people who everyone wants to hear from ? to discuss and debate that topic. Make sure there are participants from all of the major sides of the debate represented (yes, that means inviting people who you think are wrong). In other words, make sure there is a real debate on a very live topic featuring scholars who are heavy hitters and will draw a crowd. Then write up a specific description of the debate and the different sides that will be expressed during the panel for posting in the program and on the AALS website.

I ask that you do this because doing so will help turn the AALS into a serious and important conference. As it is, relatively few people go to the AALS with much of a scholarly agenda: There?s a lot of schmoozing, but not much in the way of serious academic discussion. However, every panel that becomes a real scholarly event will draw a crowd and energize the conference. On behalf of the rest of the lawprofs out there, please make sure that the AALS event you help organize will be an exciting one.

Full post as published by The Volokh Conspiracy on January 19, 2010 (boomark / email).