Conference on Conflict of Interest, Carnegie Mellon University in September, 2003

Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh PA

Investigators

Abstract

Recent financial scandals, from fraudulent accounting at Enron and WorldCom to stock analysts on Wall Street, all involve conflicts of interest of some type. Conflicts of interest can introduce a host of corruptions, biases and inefficiencies into the market. Preventing or reducing these negative effects depends crucially on understanding how conflicts of interest operate. We propose a conference that attracts scholars from a wide variety of disciplines and backgrounds, all of whom are doing research on conflict of interest. The potential contribution of the conference is great, given the breadth and importance of the topic, the interest in the topic in diverse scholarly domains, and the opportunity to connect people across disciplines. The goals of this conference are (1) to bring together people working on conflict of interest in a forum that fosters the efficient synthesis of a new body of knowledge; (2) to showcase research on conflicts of interest; (3) to define future research areas on the topic; and (4) to disseminate research findings about conflicts of interest, their dangers, and their solutions. The conference will be held at Carnegie Mellon University in September, 2003. The organizers plan to publish the papers presented at the conference in a special edited book.