Through the generous support of a donor, Kline School of Law is pleased to announce the creation of three Dean’s Research Fellowships, beginning this year. The fellowships, which will last for two years, were established to recognize and support faculty who have made significant research contributions to the legal academy.
Professors Tabatha Abu El-Haj, David S. Cohen and Rachel E. López have been selected as the inaugural Dean’s Research Fellows. “Beyond their research productivity, all three faculty members have become central members of their relevant scholarly communities, joining and advancing important dialogues and debates,” said Dean Dan Filler. “Congratulations, Tabatha, David and Rachel!”
Abu El-Haj is a leading expert on the First Amendment and the right of peaceable assembly. Her principal interest is in the American political process, with a focus on increasing the democratic accountability and responsiveness of government to ordinary Americans through both statutory reform and constitutional law. Her scholarship has been included in the Columbia Law Review, the UCLA Law Review and the Boston College Law Review.
López, who is an expert on state responsibility for mass abuse, transitional justice and the carceral state, has published widely while also being a tireless advocate for human rights and government accountability at home and abroad. She is also currently a Fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School and a Visiting Fellow at the Lauterpacht Centre for International Law at the University of Cambridge.
Cohen is an expert working at the intersection of constitutional law and gender. He also researches voting anomalies in the Supreme Court. He has co-authored two books. His second book, Obstacle Course: The Everday Struggle to Get an Abortion in America, published in 2020, explores the practical realities of accessing abortion amidst the tangled web of restrictions across the country. His first book, Living in the Crosshairs: The Untold Stories of Anti-Abortion Terrorism, examines how abortion providers are individually targeted by anti-abortion extremists and how law can better respond to this type of harassment.
The next rounds of Dean’s Research Fellows will be selected in spring 2023 and again in 2025.