Friday, April 19, 2013

Bernstein on Merchant Law, the UCC, and the Modern Economy

Lisa Esther Bernstein, University of Chicago Law School, has posted Merchant Law in a Modern Economy.  Here is the abstract:
Drawing on empirical evidence from the Middle Ages to the present and theoretical arguments developed by neo-formalist scholars over the past decade, this Essay explores the uneasy fit between the jurisprudence of the Uniform Commercial Code and its Machinery for adjusting to change, and the needs of a modern outsourced economy. It concludes that when the effects of the Code on multi-agent firms dealing with other multi-agent firms are taken into account, it becomes clear that to support trade in the modern economy mere amendments to Article 2 will not suffice; commercial law must be rethought from the ground up.