The Social Science Research Network (SSRN) is a terrific resource for current scholarship in a variety of academic fields, and a particularly valuable resource for legal scholarship. It’s also a great way to see other publications and works in progress by a particular scholar, as just about everyone posts their papers on SSRN. So if you liked one article by a scholar and wanted to read more, go to the author’s SSRN homepage. And it’s almost always free to download the papers; no account needed.

For administrative law and regulation junkies, another great SSRN resource is the U.S. Administrative Law eJournal, which is edited by William Funk. This eJournal collects in one place all of the administrative law scholarship posted on SSRN. SSRN provides statistics — and rankings — for these papers based on the number of downloads. You can access the download rankings for the top-ten all-time and recent papers in administrative law here. At the end of each month, I’ll provide a brief recap of the most-downloaded recent papers (those announced in the last 60 days). While not a perfect proxy for gauging what folks are reading in administrative law in a given month, these rankings provide some insight into the trending topics and papers. So here is my recap for September:

The top three papers all deal with Philip Hamburger‘s new book Is Administrative Law Unlawful?, which Jeff and I have blogged about here and here. The top two are reviews of the book, to be published in the Texas Law Review. First, there is Adrian Vermeule‘s brilliantly titled and must-read review, “No,” about which I concur with Will Baude‘s assessment.

Well, this is certainly the best title for a book review I have ever seen: http://t.co/JkQZMHg8ZY (review by @avermeule; link via @sbagen).

— William Baude (@WilliamBaude) September 1, 2014

Exceeding 800 downloads in just over a month, Professor Vermeule’s review has already cracked the top ten most-downloaded papers of all time in the U.S. Administrative Law eJournal. Gary Lawson’s review, “The Return of the King: The Unsavory Origins of Administrative Law,” is also a must-read and provides a more sympathetic review of the book. The third-most-downloaded recent paper is by Professor Hamburger himself, entitled “Deference to Administrative Interpretation: The Unasked Questions.” This paper builds on his book by raising two constitutional questions about judicial deference to agency statutory interpretations. (Attention Law Review Editors: this paper does not appear to be forthcoming anywhere yet.)

The fourth-most-downloaded recent paper — “When Bank Examiners Get It Wrong: Financial Institution Appeals of Material Supervisory Determinations” — is by Julie Hill and is forthcoming in the Washington University Law Review. In this paper, Professor Hill examines (based on materials obtained via FOIA) the appeals process for certain regulatory review of banking practices (material supervisory determinations) and makes three recommendations for how to improve the appeals process.

Rounding out the top five is Collin Scheuler‘s “A Framework for Judicial Review and Remand in Immigration Law,” forthcoming in the Denver University Law Review. In this paper, Professor Scheuler explores when a court should remand a statutory interpretation question to a federal agency — a topic I also explore in a forthcoming paper. For those interested in judicial review of agency statutory interpretation, this is a fun and well-written piece with implications far outside the paper’s immigration focus.

And here is the rest of the top ten:

6. Administrative Antitrust, by Gus Hurwitz (George Mason Law Review forthcoming)

7. Cost-Benefit Analysis of Financial Regulation: Case Studies and Implications, by John Coates (Yale Law Journal forthcoming) [Note: A prior version of this paper has >1,000 downloads and is ranked in the top 10 most-downloaded papers of all time within the U.S. Administrative Law eJournal.]

8. Towards Better Cost-Benefit Analysis: An Essay on Regulatory Management, by John Coates (Law and Contemporary Problems forthcoming)

9. The Rise of Speed Deportation and the Role of Discretion, by Shoba Sivaprasad Wadhia (Columbia Journal of Race and Law forthcoming)

10. Chevron Inside the Regulatory State: An Empirical Assessment, by Christopher J. Walker (Fordham Law Review forthcoming)

I’ll return to this list at the end of next month to check in again on what folks are reading/downloading from SSRN in administrative law and regulation.