IE Law School celebrates the third edition of the Comparative Law in Action Competition

Comparative Law in Action aims to promote positive change through education. The competition brings together law school students from de Bocconi University, Bucerius Law School, FGV Direito Rio, IE Law School, Maastricht University, SciencesPo, Tilburg University, Universidade Católica Portuguesa and University of Edinburgh to work on a multimedia case that combines the power of technology and comparative law.

Over the course of ten weeks, participants have studied and analyzed how law and policy adapt to new dynamics created by technology. In this third edition they have faced a scenario where a multinational company called “Empathy Inc” develops ‘Aurora’, an artificial intelligence software that allows its users to employ a very sophisticated surveillance technique to study the emotions of their objects. The multinational becomes the subject of controversy when it is revealed that the software has been used to oppress members of the political opposition in the fictional state of Ballica.

On April 22nd and 23rd, teams presented their conclusions to the juries at IE Tower. The selected juries for this edition were Gabriela Echeverría, IE Law School’s Adjunct Professor; Jorge Vega, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid’s Professor; Carlos Landazábal, Compliance Officer & Data Privacy EMEA at Canadian Solar Inc.; and Pedro Marqués, Manager at PwC Tax & Legal.

IE Law School’s Dean Soledad Atienza and Vice Dean Eugenia Castrillón welcomed the teams to this year’s competition. Afterwards, students had the opportunity of enjoying two sessions about legal innovation with IE Law School’s Adjunct Professor Erika Pagano; a networking activity with IE Law School’s Adjunct Professor Balvider Singh Powar; and different cultural proposals in the city of Madrid.

After two rounds of presentations on Saturday, two finalists were selected SciencesPo y Universidade Católica Portuguesa.

On Sunday, we celebrated the final round and the winner of the third edition of Comparative Law in Action was Universidade Católica Portuguesa. In addition, this university also won the "Best Memorandum" prize and the student Fatima Riaz from SciencesPo was granted the prize as “Best Orator”.

Congratulations to the winners and to all participants for being part of this unique experience!

Bocconi University

Coach: Pietro Dunn

Participants: Carla Franzone, Sofia Gustapane, Camilla Silvestri and Alessandro Vicari

Bucerius Law School

Coach: Christopher Bisping

Participants: Christian Lund Nyvang, Andrianna Martyniv, Tamari Ortoidz and Merve Tüzmen, Gizem Yildiz

FGV Direito Rio 

Coach: Bruna Diniz Franqueira

Participants: Anna Cecília Cabral, Juliana Rodrigues Valle, Tiago Borges Santiago, Ana Luísa Gouveia de Almeida and Pedro Burlini

IE University

Coach: François Delerue

Participants: Sara Lona Abou El Mona, Candelaria María Artola Brunetti, Dhruvi Khandelwal Sukhnani, Natasha Pulin Parikh and María Daniela Ramírez Cruz

Maastricht University

Coaches: Sascha Hardt and Hellen van der Kroef

Participants: Emma Evangelisti, Nicole Gibbs, Otso Karttunen and Ana Lazic

SciencesPo

Coach: Beatriz Botero and Lucas Costa Dos Anjos

Participants: Fatima Riaz, Adèle Tassart, Ines Benallal and Leila Martin Nafiti

Tilburg University

Coach: Richard Clements

Participants: Lucia Graso, Sandra Vettikattuvalappil Ramachar, René Bartholmeus Herranz and Lisa-Carolin Peterson

Universidade Católica Portuguesa

Coach: Benedita Menezes Queiroz

Participants: Laura Lellau, Maria Leonor Burnay Pereira Leal Barreto and Sebastian Steinert

University of Edinburgh

Coach: Burkhard Schafer and Nicolas Jondet

Participants: Cristina Herrera, Marcel Mir Teijeiro, Anna Mysyshyn and Amelia Retter