This was a question recently posed by Professor Joshua Fairfield, a speaker at the John Gedid Lecture Series at Widener Law Commonwealth. Professor Fairfield, of Washington and Lee University School of Law, presented DELTA: The Law of Technological Change.
Professor Fairfield noted that the law has a complicated relationship with technology, since technology can make some laws seem obsolete, or even at odds with modern society.
“We still use the oldest rules to determine the newest cases,” Fairfield said. “What law is, is adapting human behavior to technology change.”
Fairfield used the term delta, or a mathematical concept for the rate of change, to describe that law is not just a system for the past, but one that grows and is flexible to help guide technological change for the future.
“The law is a system for guiding legal change,” said Fairfield. “Sometimes we think that law is supposed to slow down technology but not really, it is supposed to keep it on the rails,” he said.
He added that older case laws are well positioned to determine the outcome of recent cases involving technology, because the core legal issues translate. Professor Fairfield compared good law with building a solid Lego system.
“A good Lego structure will be solid, but you will be able to replace a piece if needed, since the new piece is interchangeable with the other piece,” he said. “A good legal structure is interactive. It repeats and improves over time.”
***This lecture series honors John Gedid, one of the founders of Widener Law Commonwealth, the school’s first Vice Dean and the founder of the Law and Government Institute. Prof. Gedid has served as a wonderful mentor to every faculty member the school has hired. The series showcases the work of nationally recognized young scholars much the same way Professor Gedid has fostered, encouraged and applauded the work of those who joined the school he helped to found.
