Program for the 2023 Bergen Exchanges
The Bergen Exchanges on Law & Social Transformation takes place in Bergen in August every year. It is a meeting place for scholars and practitioners from across the globe who seek to understand how law serves as an instrument of change, and how it shapes and is shaped by power relations. During a week of public discussions, we examine strategic uses of rights and law and how legal institutions function as arenas for political contestation (lawfare).
The multi-disciplinary and international nature of the Bergen Exchanges makes it a unique space for improving research strategies and methods to grasp the effects of law and lawfare. This includes the use of legal instruments by governments to shape societies – whether through constitutional change, international treaties, statutes or regulations – as well as by social actors who go to court or otherwise engage rights and law to advance their goals. Effects take different forms. How legal strategies alter political dynamics, ideas and discourses can be as important for long term transformation as more immediate changes in laws, policies, or the distribution of resources. We also seek to better understand the functioning of legal and administrative institutions as they adjudicate, interpret and implement legal norms.
In connection with the Bergen Exchanges, we have an annual, interdisciplinary PhD course on Effects of Lawfare: Courts and law as battlegrounds for social change. The PhD course is free of charge and open to applicants from Norwegian and international institutions, but out-of-town applicants have to cover their own travel and accommodation costs.
Want to volunteer during the Bergen Exchanges or with LawTransform during the year? contact Lara.cortes@uib.no
Bergen Exchanges 2023
Previous editions of Bergen Exchanges
2022: Program and Recorded Sessions
2021: Program, Summary, and Recorded Sessions
2020: Program & summary and Recorded sessions
2019: Program and Recorded sessions
2018: Program and Recorded sessions
2016: Program