May 2016 World-renowned Constitutional Expert to Speak at Law Conference at NUI Galway

Professor Mark Tushnet, a world-renowned constitutional expert from Harvard Law School, will be the keynote speaker at the seventh Annual Conference of the Irish Society of Comparative Law (ISCL). This conference, organised by the NUI Galway’s School of Law in collaboration with the Irish Centre for Human Rights, will be held from 23-24 May at Áras Moyola, NUI Galway.

The theme of the conference is ‘(Dis)Locating Comparative Law’ and will explore the role of space or place in the comparative law arena, in an increasingly interconnected world. The conference will question the traditional narratives of comparative law in the context of the increasing complexity of legal orders within, between and beyond states. Speaker panels will address various comparative topics such as: Privacy and Responses to Terrorism, Human Dignity, Comparative Constitutional Law, and a host of other topics stemming from private law, criminal law and criminal justice, public law, legal education and international law.

Professor Mark Tushnet is a William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. He is the co-author of four casebooks, including the most widely used casebook on constitutional law, has written numerous books, including a two-volume work on the life of Justice Thurgood Marshall and, most recently, Advanced Introduction to Comparative Constitutional Law, In the Balance: The Roberts Court and the Future of Constitutional Law, Why the Constitution Matters, and Weak Courts, Strong Rights: Judicial Review and Social Welfare Rights in Comparative Perspective, and has edited several others. Professor Tushnet was President of the Association of American Law Schools in 2003.  In 2002 he was elected a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. His presentation for this year’s Irish Society of Comparative Law Conference is entitled The Boundaries of Comparative Law.

Professor Donncha O’Connell, Head of the School of Law at NUI Galway said: “It is a great honour for the School of Law to host the Annual Conference of the Irish Society of Comparative Law and, in particular, to welcome Professor Tushnet to NUI Galway. The comparative approach to law is of critical importance at this particular stage in the development of the rule of law nationally and internationally. The School of Law in NUI Galway and its research centres have always been outward-looking and internationally-aware and this event will provide a very rich opportunity for speakers and participants to make the most of that tradition.”

For further information is available at http://www.conference.ie/Conferences/index.asp?Conference=218

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