Wayne Law symposium to discuss blockchain and the law Feb. 22

The Wayne Law Review will bring together experts from across the country on Friday, Feb. 22 for its annual symposium, this year discussing “The Emerging Blockchain and the Law.”

The event will be from 8:15 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Wayne State University Law School, 471 W. Palmer St., in the Spencer M. Partrich Auditorium. The program is free and open to the public, but registration is requested at rsvp.wayne. edu/lawreview19. The symposium is made possible by generous funding from the Cohn Family Endowed Fund.

The adoption of blockchain technology, like that of the internet and other digital technologies that preceded it, is creating a host of new legal problems. This symposium will explore the following three issues:

• Issues that arise when contracts are enforced automatically by blockchain technology rather than by a contracting party’s invocation of the coercive power of courts

• Use of blockchain technology by local governments

• Use by business organizations in applications such as controlling the supply chain and decentralizing management of the corporation itself

Sarah Jane Hughes, university scholar and fellow in commercial law at Indiana University Bloomington Maurer School of Law, will deliver the keynote address over lunch at 12:30 p.m.

Hughes has worked on updates to payments law since the 1980s, and most recently served as the reporter for both the Uniform Regulation of Virtual-Currency Businesses Act (2017) and the Uniform Supplemental Commercial Law for the Uniform Regulation of Virtual-Currency Businesses Act (2018). Hughes began writing about emerging electronic payments in 1996, following the introduction of the first “virtual currencies.” She had a 14-year career at the Federal Trade Commission prior to joining the Maurer School faculty in 1988. Hughes earned her bachelor’s from Mount Holyoke College and law degree from the University of Washington.

A complete schedule and detailed information about the panels and speakers is available at law.wayne.edu/lawreview19.