Elizabeth Bartholet

“Much of the world…focuses on the bad things that happen when kids get placed in international adoption. When you shut down international adoptions in order to address bad things which occasionally happen, what you do is commit monumental human rights violations.” That was the testimony of Harvard Law School Professor and Faculty Director of HLS’s Child Advocacy Program Elizabeth Bartholet ’65 before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights on Nov. 6.

Harvard Law School Professor Elizabeth Bartholet ’65 will testify before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights on November 6 regarding the “Human Rights of Unparented Children and International Adoption Policies” in the Americas. The hearing comes after a request made by the HLS Child Advocacy Program (CAP) and the Center for Adoption Policy.

Support for International Adoption principles is growing, says HLS Professor Elizabeth Bartholet, citing endorsements for Policy Statement and the recent Malawi ruling in the Madonna case.

In a May 10 New York Times editorial “Celebrity Adoptions and the Real World,” HLS Professor Elizabeth Bartholet ’65, the faculty director of the Child Advocacy Program at Harvard Law School, was one of six contributors who shared their opinions on international adoption and what the standard should be for allowing international adoptions.

Harvard Law School Professor Elizabeth Bartholet ’65 has issued a public letter in support of international adoption as news that a court in Malawi denied a petition for adoption by the entertainer Madonna. Bartholet was joined in the statement by a  group of experts in child welfare. The text of the letter is below.

Harvard Law School Professor Elizabeth Bartholet '65 testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee today about mandatory pre-dispute arbitration, a practice often used in workplaces and by credit card companies to ensure that employees and consumers agree to resolve all conflicts through arbitration instead of through the court system.

At a February 12 event, Harvard Law School faculty members joined juvenile court judges and experts in child development to discuss how neuroscience can be better used in the courtroom to break the cycle of child maltreatment.

When Professor Elizabeth Bartholet ’65 spoke at a conference on international adoption in Guatemala City early this year, she addressed a room full of activists, lawyers and politicians. But at the heart of her speech, and her pro bono advocacy, are children–living in institutions or foster care around the world.

For many years after HLS began admitting women, male faculty still predominated. That's changed, and women faculty members talk about what their presence has meant for the school and for themselves.

The Bulletin interviews Elizabeth Bartholet about her recent book, which looks at how policies affect children victimized by abuse and neglect.