Harvard Law Students Criticize Recording Policy

Harvard Law School

New Harvard Law Journal Focuses on Equality

Harvard Law professors are publishing a new journal committed to investigating equality in American society.

The American Journal of Law and Equality, founded by Randall L. Kennedy, Martha L. Minow, and Cass R. Sunstein, will publish annually and specifically examines the inequities of America, The Harvard Crimson reports.

“People knew about various inequities in American life, but it certainly put the spotlight in an especially poignant way on various inequities in our society,” Kennedy tells the Crimson. “You had the pandemic, you had the continuing and highly publicized episodes of police malfeasance, often racist police malfeasance, the reaction to that in the eruption of protests all over the country. And all of this is going on in the shadow of the impending election.”

FIRST ISSUE

The first issue of the journal will be released this summer with essays responding to The Tyranny of Merit: What’s Become of the Common Good?, a book by Harvard Government professor Michael J. Sandel.

“The editors have enlisted an all-star cast of 14 scholars of differing perspectives to respond to the book,” Sandel wrote. “I look forward to responding to their essays, and learning from them.”

The journal’s founders say that they’re open to contributions from those outside of law as well.

“Law professors are certainly very welcome, but so are political scientists, so are sociologists, so are anthropologists, so are philosophers, so are people who are outside of academia,” Kennedy tells the Crimson. “Our pages are open to thoughtful commentary, whatever the source of that commentary.”

Sandel, the author of the book, says the journal couldn’t have come at a more needed time.

“At a time when issues of equality and inequality demand new thinking, launching this journal is an inspired idea,” Sandel tells the Crimson. “The three founding editors are ideally equipped to bring multiple voices into dialogue — from the legal academy and beyond.”

Sources: The Harvard Crimson, macmillan Publishers

Questions about this article? Email us or leave a comment below.