UNSW builds its ADR footprint and the ADR Research Network welcomes a new member
The UNSW Law Faculty is full of surprises.
Headed by our energetic Dean, Professor George Williams, (whose weekly schedule leaves me exhausted) we have been lucky to attract accomplished academics with a remarkable diversity of talents.
Some years ago we persuaded Lisa Toohey to join us from the University of Queensland with her unusual combination of expertise in ADR and Trade Law.
Lisa has recently taken a role as Professor and Deputy Dean (Research) at the University of Newcastle’s Law School. Happily she has retained her relationship with UNSW in an adjunct role but has left a big pair of shoes to fill.
We are delighted that we have now been joined by Professor Amy Cohen – an accomplished international academic who is upholding our tradition of diversity with specialties in ADR and Food Law. Amy comes to us on secondment from the Moritz College of Law at Ohio State University.
Professor Amy Cohen
Her CV is remarkable.
Amy has held visiting professorships at Harvard Law School; Osgoode Hall Law School; the University Of Turin Faculty Of Law; and the West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences. She has held fellowships from the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University; the American Institute of Indian Studies at the University of Chicago; the Fulbright Program; and the Collegio Carlo Alberto. She has also been a visiting scholar with UNSW and with Cornell Law School.
Before joining the Moritz faculty, Amy taught at the Kathmandu School of Law in Nepal as a Fulbright scholar; clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit in Denver, Colorado; and worked on community development initiatives in Ghana, Nepal, and Thailand.
Along the way Amy was a student and Teaching Assistant of Professor Frank E.A.Sander, whose work was a cornerstone of the development of ADR as we know it today.
She was recruited to join Ohio State University and has continued to be supported by the remarkable Professor Nancy Rogers – former Attorney General of Ohio; a former Dean of the Ohio State University Moritz College of Law and the former holder of the Michael E. Moritz Chair in Alternative Dispute Resolution at the Moritz College of Law. Professor Rogers’ contributions to ADR in general and mediation in particular have been an international influence.
Her academic approach
Amy uses the study of informal dispute resolution to understand broader shifts in law and society. For example, her recent work has focused on alternatives in the US criminal justice system. One set of articles examines specialised prostitution courts in New York City in the wake of international anti-sex trafficking campaigns and criticisms of broken windows policing. They trace how misdemeanour criminal courts increasingly use informal and consensus-based procedure to administer new forms of social welfare and social control.
Her next work – a genealogy of American restorative justice, beginning with ‘new left’ activism in the 1960s and 1970s and tracing secular/religious, anti-statist/statist, left/right translations over time, including how today restorative justice has captured the attention of institutions devoted to principles of economic freedom and limited government (a recent blog post about that article is here).
We welcome Amy to the ADR Research Network and look forward to her joining us as a fellow blogger. She tells me she is eager to join local conversations about how “alternative” ideas and practices influence regulatory governance; criminal justice reform; and civil court practice.
Further Reading
This article was published on 15 July 2019 on ADR Research Network.
Wikipedia, Ohio Attorney General (Web page).
Wikipedia, Dean (education) (Web Page).
Dr Rosemary Howell is the Principal of Strategic Action a business dedicated to providing tailored Mediation, Coaching, Facilitation and Skills Development services to business, government and not-for-profit organisations.
If you would like to talk with Dr Howell about your organisation’s needs please email rosemary@strategicaction.com.au
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