Defamation with Bayesian Audiences

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

6-2023

Journal Title

Journal of Legal Studies

ISSN

0047-2530

DOI

10.1086/722803

Abstract

How strictly should the law regulate false defamatory statements? We first show that the presence of judicial errors often puts defamation law on a Laffer curve: regulation that is too lax or too strict is inferior to moderate regulation. While moderate regulation is ideal, it is not always attainable because of practical and legal constraints. With these constraints, we consider a Bayesian audience that takes the strictness of defamation law into account when evaluating statements. The optimal standard is then laxer than is prescribed by standard models with naive audiences. These findings underscore the importance of accounting for audience effects in analyzing defamation law.

First Page

445

Last Page

483

Num Pages

39

Volume Number

52

Issue Number

2

Publisher

The University of Chicago Law School

Link to Full Text

SSRN

Share

COinS