National and International Security

Ambassador Samantha Power ’99 expressed both skepticism and hope for the current state of international affairs during a panel discussion of her new memoir "The Education of an Idealist."

The British-trained French attorney who chose Harvard Law School for its human rights training plans to continue working on international human rights and international humanitarian law litigation.

As a former top national security official and current adviser to companies in the defense, intelligence, and technology sectors, Michael Leiter ’00 has spent his life assessing threats.

The latest from alumni authors, chronicling travels to the moon and the Arctic, the dawn of a code war, and the unwinding of a miracle.

Jessica Tisch has put data-driven policing tools in the hands of New York City’s 36,000 uniformed police officers, including 911 dispatch information and electronic report forms on iPhones.

Six members of the Class of 2019 share their unique perspectives, varied experiences, and the lessons they will take with them from their time at Harvard Law School.

Harvard Law School has formed a new partnership with Service to School’s VetLink program, an initiative that directly connects transitioning military veterans seeking higher education with partner schools that align with their academic goals, aspirations, and potential.

Logan Leslie JD/MBA ’19 loved military service and planned to spend his lifetime in it. But a growing family—along with the ‘heartbreaking’ poverty and failed institutions he witnessed in Afghanistan—spurred him to serve in a different way.

Radhika Kapoor LL.M. ’19 came to HLS to take advantage of Harvard’s institutional expertise in international law, humanitarian law and post-conflict stability—and to foster her love of reading.

Lindsay Bailey’19, Lisandra Novo’19 and Elisa Quiroz ’19 are the winners of the team 2019 David Grossman Exemplary Clinical Student Award.

Harvard Law scholars are weighing in on recent decisions made by the White House, the Department of Justice and Congress that mark a significant escalation in the protracted conflict over the Mueller report.

Hours after the Mueller report was released, the Harvard Gazette spoke with former prosecutor Alex Whiting, a professor of practice at Harvard Law School who teaches issues and procedures related to domestic and international criminal prosecutions.

Nearly a decade after Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning shared classified materials with WikiLeaks, the site’s founder, Julian Assange, was arrested in London for his role in the disclosures. The Harvard Gazette recently spoke with three faculty members, including Yochai Benkler, the Harvard Law professor who has publicly defended the disclosure as whistleblowing.

In a recent Q&A, Professor of Practice Samantha Power, former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and author of the Pulitzer-prize winning 'A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide,' reflects on the tragedy in Rwanda and the lessons learned—and not learned—since.

Professor of Practice Naz Modirzadeh ’02, founding director of the Harvard Law School Program on International Law and Armed Conflict, spoke before the United Nations Security Council in New York City on April 1 on safeguarding humanitarian assistance in counterterrorism contexts.

The Harvard Law School Library recently hosted Claire Finkelstein, professor of law and philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania, for a discussion on "Sovereignty and the New Executive Authority," a volume of essays exploring the growing struggle to maintain the legal and ethical boundaries surrounding executive authority in the post- 9/11 United States.

The 2019 Harvard Negotiation Law Review symposium, “Redressing Harm Through Restorative Justice,” focused on the challenges of addressing power imbalances and trauma through implementation of restorative practices within communities.

William P. Alford ’77, the Jerome A. and Joan L. Cohen Professor of East Asian Legal Studies at Harvard Law School, has received the Li Buyun Law Prize from the Shanghai Institute of Finance and Law, a leading Chinese academic society.

During Winter Term, 12 Harvard Law School students traveled to 12 countries as Cravath International Fellows to pursue clinical placements or independent research with an international, transnational, or comparative law focus. Four of them share their experiences.

HLS faculty blogs on law-related topics are reaching thousands—sometimes millions—and have become required reading for experts.

Europe’s crisis—the challenges to liberal democracy across the continent, the rise of right-wing nationalist parties, the backlash against the European Union—isn’t a rebellion of economic have-nots, according to former HLS professor Joseph Weiler, who delivered the Herbert W. Vaughan Memorial Lecture, “The European Culture War 2003-2019,” on Feb. 6.

Speaking at Harvard Law School, U.S. Rep. Joe Kennedy III '09 (D., Mass.) called Monday for a new national economic agenda based on “moral capitalism” that addresses the needs of embattled workers.

"I think criminal procedure is a very fundamental part of the constitutional law of democracy,” says Assistant Professor Daphna Renan, who writes about structural constitutional law, administrative law, and the Fourth Amendment. “When can the government use force against its own citizens? When can it search individuals, communities and communications? How do emergent technologies challenge existing legal frameworks? For anyone who cares about power and how law constrains and enables it, there are no more pressing questions than these.”

The American Academy of Political and Social Science (AAPSS) has announced that Ambassador Samantha Power '99, diplomat, academic, and human rights advocate, will receive the 2019 Daniel Patrick Moynihan Prize in Social Science and Public Policy.

President Trump may be able to build a wall along the Mexican border, Harvard analysts say, but then the ripples will widen.

Harvard’s recent two-day conference, “Money as a Democratic Medium,” challenged its participants to re-examine the history of money in America, and to redefine its future.

Christine Desan, the Leo Gottlieb Professor of Law at Harvard Law School, organized the conference, “Money as a Democratic Medium,” a two-day event that challenged its participants to re-examine the history of money in America, and to redefine its future.

In a ruling issued on December 21, 2018, the Massachusetts Superior Court found in favor of three Massachusetts veterans represented by the Veterans Legal Clinic in their challenge to the state government’s denying them the Welcome Home Bonus, which these veterans earned by serving overseas in Afghanistan and elsewhere.

In the “Countless Stories” video series, Paul Clement ’92, a former United States Solicitor General and current partner at the law firm of Kirkland & Ellis, discusses his advocacy before the Supreme Court.

John J. Gibbons ’50, a former federal judge who argued for rights for Guantánamo detainees and dedicated his five-decade career to protecting the rule of law in the United States, died Dec. 9. He was 94.

Monika Bickert, head of global policy management at Facebook, joined Harvard Law Professor Jonathan Zittrain for a wide-ranging conversation hosted by the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society, about the social media giant’s policies and its evolution--including some tough questions from audience members on the company’s recent headline-making controversies.

Andrew Leon Hanna ’19 recently won the 2018 Bracken Bower Prize from the Financial Times and McKinsey & Company for the best book proposal about emerging businesses from someone 35 or under. Hanna’s book proposal, “25 Million Sparks”, aims to celebrate refugee entrepreneurs.

Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States Sonia Sotomayor was at Harvard Law School on Nov. 13 to hear finalists in the 2018 Ames Moot Court Competition.

After serving as an officer in the U.S. Navy, M. Alejandra Parra-Orlandoni focused on international law and national security during her time at Harvard Law School. But the most important things she learned, she says, were the ability to think critically and the importance of learning from the experience of others.

The service and unique perspective of the veterans currently enrolled at Harvard Law School enrich the entire HLS community, elevating awareness about the legal and policy issues affecting veterans and the significance of law in contemporary warfare; three military veterans in this year’s entering class shared their experiences in the military and at HLS.

Eve L. Howe ’21 is an expert in nuclear submarines -- specifically, the fluid systems that cool the nuclear reactors in military submarines. Drawn to military service because she wanted to use her engineering skills for public service, Howe spent five years as an officer in the U.S. Navy, where she solved complex technical problems to ensure the submarines would be able to accomplish their missions.

During his undergraduate studies, Stephen Petraeus wanted to explore a different world from the military life in which grew up. But as a sophomore, Petraeus felt a longing for that world and joined ROTC—a decision that led to eight years in the U.S. Army and two deployments to Afghanistan, including with the storied 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team.

With no other members of the military in the extended family, the parents of U.S. Navy Lieutenant Commander Sara Plesser Neugroschel LL.M. ’19 were “very, very surprised” when she decided to commission in the Navy after her 2L year at the University of Miami Law School, from which she graduated in 2009.

Students and faculty from the Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinical Program spent a week in Texas volunteering at the Karnes Detention Center, where they met with fathers and sons who had been forcibly separated from each other under President Trump’s zero-tolerance policy. They offer their thoughts on this powerful and eye-opening experience.

On Oct. 22, Lee Gelernt, the ACLU lawyer who spearheaded a national class action lawsuit against the Trump administration’s “zero-tolerance” policy on immigrants and asylum seekers attempting to cross the U.S.-Mexico border, spoke to HLS staff and students about the litigation’s claims and the ongoing efforts to reunite families.

U.S. veterans and active duty military members who want to pursue graduate studies at Harvard will now have even more support thanks to a new graduate studies fellowship announced today by the Harvard Kennedy School.

Dieter Grimm LL.M. ’65, a noted scholar, academic and public intellectual, and former justice of the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany, returned to Harvard Law School on September 18 to speak on “Courts under Political Pressure.”

Last week, Harvard commemorated the centennial of the 1918 influenza pandemic that killed more than 50 million people worldwide with Outbreak Week, a series of events across the university.

In a Q&A with the Harvard Gazette, Urs Gasser LL.M. ’03, executive director of the Berkman Klein Center, discusses what might be done to protect users from companies that profit from people’s data.

Former Attorney General of the United States Loretta Lynch ’84, the first African-American woman attorney general, shares her HLS experience and discusses her career as the country’s chief law enforcement officer. Lynch will be one of hundreds of Harvard Law alumnae gathered on campus on Sept 14-15 to commemorate Celebration 65. 

On Class Day, May 23, U.S. Senator Jeff Flake told the Class of 2018 assembled on a sunny Holmes Field that they were entering the legal profession in a critical moment.

In recognition of their demonstrated excellence in representing clients and undertaking advocacy or policy reform projects, Amy Volz ’18 and Ha Ryong Jung (Michael) ’18 were named the 2018 recipients of the David A. Grossman Exemplary Clinical Student Award, named in honor of the late Clinical Professor David Grossman ’88.

It’s been two decades since Harvard Law School Professor Lawrence Lessig published ‘The Laws of Cyberspace;’ recently, an event at the Berkman Klein Center celebrated how that groundbreaking paper provided structure to the Center's field of study.

The global impact of populist movements was the topic of “Human Rights in a Time of Populism,” a two-day symposium held at Harvard Law School, where participants examined the challenges that current developments characterized as populist pose to the goals of the international human rights system.

Students of Professor Urs Gasser’s Spring 2018 Comparative Digital Privacy seminar hosted a symposium on 'Privacy by Design,' convening experts from government, private practice, industry, and academia to weigh in on all things privacy-related, from the difficulty of defining privacy to a comparison of the regulatory regimes in the United States and the European Union.