Panel 1: Setting the Table

This opening session will situate the symposium’s core questions, outlining the conceptual, doctrinal, and empirical stakes of secrecy and transparency in modern civil litigation. Panelists will frame how these tensions play out across protective orders, settlements, and public access to court records. They will present new research showing that, despite formally stringent legal standards, judicial record sealing in federal courts operates as a largely unreviewed, party-driven process—one in which secrecy is routinely granted without meaningful scrutiny, often without opposition, and frequently without application of the governing law.