Acclaimed Article by Professor Alex Stein the Focus of Program at Columbia Law School

Professor Alex Stein’s acclaimed article, “The Domain of Torts,” which appeared in the Columbia Law Review this year, will be the focus of a presentation and commentary at Columbia Law School on Sept. 27.

Joining Stein at Wednesday’s program to provide commentary will be Professors Bert Huang of Columbia Law School and Robert Rabin of Stanford Law School. Ariel Porat, Visiting Professor at Columbia Law School and Professor of Law at Tel Aviv University, will serve as moderator.

Stein’s article advances a novel positive theory of the law of torts that grows out of a careful reading of the caselaw. The core insight is that the benefit from the harm-causing activity determines the form and substance of tort liability. This finding is both surprising and innovative, since the operation of the doctrines that determine individuals’ liability for accidents—negligence, causation and damage—is universally believed to be driven by harms, not benefits.

Stein is a widely published expert on torts, medical malpractice, evidence, and general legal theory. He joined the Brooklyn Law School faculty last July from the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law—a key hire that caught the attention of legal academia.

He has been recognized as one of the most highly cited scholars in the field of Evidence. His writings combine law with economic theories and moral philosophy. He has written three books—Foundations of Evidence Law; Tort Liability Under Uncertainty; and An Analytical Approach to Evidence: Text, Cases and Problems—and numerous articles, many of them published by leading law reviews and journals. He received his law degree from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and his Ph.D. from the University of London.

Program Details:
http://www.law.columbia.edu/events/domain-torts