Podcast on "Eminent Domain: A Comparative Perspective"

The Federalist Society has posted a podcast of a recent teleforum about my new book Eminent Domain: A Comparative Perspective (co-edited with Hojun Lee and Iljoong Kim), which analyzes the use and abuse of eminent domain in countries around the world. The podcast includes my presentation about the book, and commentary by NYU law Professor Richard Epstein, probably the world's leading academic expert on takings and eminent domain.

Here's a brief summary of the book:

The taking of private property for development projects has caused controversy in many nations, where it has often been used to benefit powerful interests at the expense of the general public. This edited collection is the first to use a common framework to analyze the law and economics of eminent domain around the world. The authors show that seemingly disparate nations face a common set of problems in seeking to regulate the condemnation of private property by the state. They include the tendency to forcibly displace the poor and politically weak for the benefit of those with greater influence, disputes over compensation, and resort to condemnation in cases where it destroys more economic value than it creates. With contributions from leading scholars in the fields of property law and economics, the book offers a comparative perspective and considers a wide range of possible solutions to these problems.

The Introduction to the book (which summarizes the rest) is available for free at the SSRN website.

In May, the Volokh Conspiracy hosted a symposium with posts by several contributors to the book. Here is a post where I included links to those by the other contributors. In this post, I summarized some of the findings of my chapter in the volume on the use of eminent domain in the United States, and noted some possible lessons of the American experience for other countries.