The Advent of the Stockholm Centre for Commercial Law

Abstract

At regular intervals, the Faculty of Law at Stockholm University has been hit by significant financial setbacks, resulting in changes for the worse for the employees and the discontinuation of various of their benefits in a way that has stuck in the craw of certain of them. It has always been a practical challenge to have to offer conditions of employment to jurisprudential academics which have not in any way been able to match those of legal practitioners, even those at the start of their careers. Jan Hellner once said to me that one only chooses an academic career if one cannot think of anything else to do. The main attraction is of course academic freedom, that is to say the possibility of devoting oneself to just those questions for which one feels a burning passion, and also the chance through teaching to inspire new generations of young lawyers. If, however, the conditions of employment appear less attractive, then it can become extremely tempting to give up academic life, and the difficulty of attracting truly first-rate people to join one is a contributing factor. As I write this, circumstances at the Faculty in Stockholm seem to be marked by reductions at a level never seen before. The situation at the end of the 1990s was similar, if not yet as comprehensive, in that a number of my colleagues had indicated that they were considering resigning and terminations had been carried through in order to save costs.