Legal Studies

The course provides students with an understanding of ‘who does what’ in the Russian echelons of power, who makes law, how laws are made, how they are structured and how they are applied. Example seminar topics include: division of legal systems into legal families, key characteristics of Russian law: codification of the law and the key codes, sources of law, including the highest law of the land, the 1993 Constitution, notable international treaties and the role of court decisions, Russian legal culture, including judges’ reasoning, and Russia’s government structure and key institutions, including the role of the President, the concept of super-presidentialism and also, silovyki or power ministries. 

This course explores and fosters an understanding of the American criminal justice system, with an emphasis on federal criminal law and procedure. Though the course is taught with the basics in mind (using a combination of lecture and Socratic method), students are encouraged to explore well beyond the basics. Topics include overview of constitutional governance in America; classification of offenses; crime specific elements and intent requirements; criminal responsibility (accessories, aiding and abetting, conspiring); constitutionally protected rights; anatomy of a federal criminal case; selected federal offenses intersecting foreign interest in trade, commerce, and travel; and an overview of the death penalty in America.

This course examines debated issues in sport such as doping, violence, racial discrimination, the impact of technology, transgender athletes, limitation of certain fundamental rights, sports nationalism, e-ports, match-fixing, and legal and illegal bets.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale program. The course is intended for advanced level students only. Enrollment is by consent of the instructor. The aims of the course are: to make students familiar with feminist and queer theories and critiques of liberalism and liberal legal systems to the extent that they incorporate biases relating to gender and sexual orientation; to show how seemingly neutral legal norms are shaped by particular conceptualizations of gender, sexuality and sexual orientation; to introduce the debate concerning the partnership of feminism and multiculturalism and prompt a reflection on what constitutes gender (in)equality in a culturally diverse world; to familiarize students with the ways in which the law has contended with sexual difference, sexual orientation, gender-based stereotypes and the meaning of sexuality in European, transnational and international contexts. This course is designed to provide students with a critical understanding of the gendered structure of the law. Feminist and queer critiques of liberalism have challenged traditional ways of thinking about law and legal systems and have called into question some of the fundamental tenets of liberal democracy, such as equality, neutrality, justice, non-discrimination and universalism. These theories have highlighted how the law has created and reinforced gender roles, and how gender-related social and cultural constructs have shaped the balance of power and privilege in a liberal society. In this light, the course addresses a wide range of both theoretical and institutional problems, as well as thematic issues, pertaining to different areas of law, including citizenship, reproductive rights, marriage, sexuality, and violence. The course highlights how legal norms reflect gender-based stereotypes and how these impact the lives of people of different genders and sexual orientations. It also focuses on the increasing difficulties that multi-cultural societies experience in conceptualizing gender equality, examining contentious issues such as the regulation of religious marriage, and other gender-related “cultural clashes”. Module 2 tackles these issues in the context of Muslim societies, with a particular focus on Islamic feminism and Muslim women theologians, family law and women's political participation in predominantly Muslim countries.

This course uses concepts and tools in microeconomics. The purpose of the course is to clarify phenomena and problems that are inherent in the market economy by an examination of the laws and economic systems that support the internal and contractual structure of the market. In particular, the course focuses on Coase Theorem and its application to nuisance law, sales law, and tort law. This is a lecture course, but students are expected to work on "legal cases" in three groups (plaintiff, defendant, and judge or jury) in each class, and are expected to participate in the deliberations of the cases among the three groups.
 

This course examines ethical references within Spanish and European legal frameworks, specifically, contemporary ethical issues that have arisen in the field of cultural industries. It provides an introduction to the Spanish judicial system, the system of rights and freedoms as outlined in the Constitution, in the European Union and in international law. The course covers the freedom of expression and right to information, configuration of cultural industries, and deontology of information.

This course explores freedom of speech and hate speech and the laws and fine lines around both. Beginning through an American lens, it then compares these concepts with an international, European viewpoint. The course investigates American cases versus European cases.