CCLFR research seminar with Professors Lorna Fox O’Mahony and Marc L. Roark

Title: ‘Property and Resilience’

Abstract: Property theory is at a crossroads. The problems it seeks to address, particularly concerning land, can no longer be contained within the analytical silos of the 19th and 20th centuries. Meanwhile, as legal systems navigate the new opportunities and risks of digitalised, AI-enabled “platform real estate”, property law systems, policies, and practices are being re-scaled, with implications for the governance of real property transactions. In this paper, we draw on a range of case studies including homeless squatting on empty land, new governance models for energy communities, the intersection of property law and consumer protection in the digital realm, and the impact of climate change litigation on property law’s object and subject, to set out a prolegomena for a new property paradigm.

Bios: Marc Roark is a Professor of Law at the University of Tulsa College of Law. His research primarily considers how narratives and norms are scaled in property conflicts around housing. Together with Lorna Fox O’Mahony, he is the author of “Squatting and the State: Resilient Property Theory in an Age of Crisis.” Roark is currently working on several projects focused on applying vulnerability theory in the context of resilience gaps and resilient property theory across numerous areas including housing, ruralism, Indian law, and commercial law.

Lorna Fox O’Mahony is Professor of Law at Essex Law School. Her work to develop a legal concept of home is often cited as laying the foundations for new approaches to the idea of home in law, including giving content to rights to housing and home, and was adopted by the Irish Housing Commission in 2023.