Listen in on ABF Research Prof. Natacha Nsabimana's conversation with Rwandan filmmaker Amelia Umuhire on a new episode of the @eflux.bsky.social podcast. Highlighting two works by Umuhire. Listen here 🔗: www.youtube.com/watch?v=8x-Y...

Thank you to NAPABA for welcoming ABF to its 2025 convention, where we hosted a reception for Portrait Project 2.0 w/ remarks by ABF Research Prof. Ajay Mehrotra and Hon. Goodwin Liu on why Asian Americans remain underrepresented in the legal profession. www.americanbarfoundation.org/projects/por...

"The film’s feminist themes, which include misogyny in the criminal legal system and reproductive autonomy, are remarkably nuanced and compassionate, especially for its time." ABF Doctoral Fellow Anna Fox on what to watch over the 2025 winter break. 🔗: news.uchicago.edu/story/what-r...

"Global Reflections on Positionality in Rural Access to Justice Research" — edited by ABF Affiliated Scholar Michele Statz — examines rural access to justice through reflections from leading scholars, including several ABF Research Professors. 🔗: www.bloomsbury.com/us/global-re...

ABF Research Prof. @lbthatsme.bsky.social offers insight on what Northwestern's regained $790M in research funds from the Trump administration might mean — raising concerns about academic freedom and institutional independence. 🔗: www.nprillinois.org/education-de...

Tomorrow, 12/3, @joseatiles.bsky.social, of the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, will lead the ABF Speaker Series on "Crisis by Design: Emergency Powers and Colonial Legality in Puerto Rico." 🔗: www.americanbarfoundation.org/event/speake...

This Wednesday, 11/19, Assistant Professor @ginopauselli.bsky.social, of the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, will lead the ABF Speaker Series on "Finding the Right Forum: Non-State Actor Engagement in International Organizations." 🔗: www.americanbarfoundation.org/event/speake...

On Wednesday, 11/12, @ucirvinelaw.bsky.social Prof. Shauhin Talesh will lead the ABF Speaker Series on 'Insuring Cyberinsecurity: Insurance Companies as Symbolic Regulators.' November 12 at 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm CST 🔗: www.americanbarfoundation.org/event/speake...

🚨In a new @entitledpodcast.bsky.social, ABF Research Prof. @tomginsburg.bsky.social discusses how sanctions are being used and abused by the Trump administration, and how other UN members are responding to the sanctioning of their colleagues for speaking out.

The American Bar Foundation (ABF) is seeking its next Executive Director. Join one of the world’s leading institutes for the empirical and interdisciplinary study of law in advancing justice and shaping the future of sociolegal research. 📍 Chicago, IL Learn More: www.imsearch.com/open-searche...

🚨If you are an early-career scholar who researches civil justice topics -- please consider applying to join our next cohort! Participants join an awesome community of A2J scholars (& receive a research stipend!). Applications due November 24 (bit.ly/abfecw) @abfresearch.bsky.social

Please join us today at 1:00 pm CT / 2:00pm ET for our National Fellows Webinar, "The Legal Profession and the Rule of Law in Asia," featuring Terry Halliday, Jothie Rajah, Sital Kalantry and moderated by David K.Y. Tang. 🔗: www.americanbarfoundation.org/event/nation...

Tomorrow, 10/22, ABF Speaker Series will be led by ABF/AccessLex Institute Postdoctoral Fellow in Legal and Higher Education, Grigory Gorbun. Gorbun will argue that moot courts shift the grounds of law’s authority away from state sovereignty and toward a transnational legal professional community.

Alex Heba, a former ABF Doctoral Fellow, recently published, "Fuzzy Boundaries: A Mechanism for Group Accumulation of Advantage," which examines the evaluation of the "good moral character" qualification of lawyers’ licensing laws. Learn more: journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Tuesday, October 21, 2025, Northwestern's 36th Annual Leopold Lecture will be moderated by ABF Research Prof. @lbthatsme.bsky.social—featuring @npr.org's Award-Winning Legal Affairs Correspondent and author @ninatotenberg.bsky.social 🎟️ Get tickets: weinberg.northwestern.edu/about/events...

Tomorrow, 10/15, ABF Speaker Series will be led by ABF/Northwestern Doctoral Fellow in Law and Social Science, Kris Rosentel, and ABF/UChicago Doctoral Fellow in Law and Social Science, @annafox.bsky.social. Topics on policing, inequality, and more. 🔗: www.americanbarfoundation.org/event/speake...

🚀 Day 2 of the @opengovpartnership.org Global Summit 🚀 Today, we learned about: 🇸🇱 The national justice efforts in Sierra Leone. 💰 #JusticeActionCoalition’s work on the economic case for #PeopleCenteredJustice and people-centered justice data, led by @oecd-ocde.bsky.social.

This Wed., 10/8, ABF Speaker Series will be led by ABF/AccessLex Institute Postdoctoral Fellow in Legal and Higher Education, Ellie Frazier—on, "Pathways to Justice Work: Nonlawyer Educational Choices, Identities, and Professionalization in the U.S." 🔗: www.americanbarfoundation.org/event/speake...

We are pleased to announce that we are now accepting applications for the 2026 cohort of Summer Undergraduate Research Fellows! Open to current college sophomores and juniors, applications will be open until January 16, 2026. Learn more! 🔗: american-bar-foundation.breezy.hr/p/cf1b8602f9...

On Law Next: "Justice Workers — Reimagining Access to Justice as Democracy Work" The ABF's Rebecca L. Sandefur & Matthew Burnett argue that the justice gap is a "crisis of democracy," and that trained community justice workers may hold the solution. 🎙️ Watch here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=eofZ...

Next Wed., 10/1, ABF Speaker Series will be led by ABF/LSA Doctoral Fellow in Law & Inequality Christopher Robertson, and ABF/AccessLex Institute Doctoral Fellow in Legal & Higher Education Jane Y. Jeong. 🔗: www.americanbarfoundation.org/event/speake...

In the wake of Charlie Kirk’s assassination, ABF Research Prof. and @uchicagolaw.bsky.social's @tomginsburg.bsky.social urges universities to do more than stay neutral — they must actively promote First Amendment principles and ideological diversity. Read more from: @usatoday.com 🔗:

Next Wed., 9/24, ABF Speaker Series will be led by @gabrielwinant.bsky.social, Associate Professor of History at the University of Chicago. Winant will discuss the "brittleness of the institutions of the welfare state constructed during the New Deal." 🔗: www.americanbarfoundation.org/event/speake...

Constitution Day! Join the Illinois Conference of the American Association of University Professors, @projectcensored.bsky.social, and the Park Center for Independent Media for a free webinar on academic freedom and the higher ed. crisis — Today from 3-4pm CT. 🔗: www.facebook.com/events/19165...

Tomorrow, 9/16, our ABF Speaker Series is led by Prof. of Sociology and Co-Dir. of the Appalachian Justice Research Center @profmichellebrown.bsky.social. Brown will discuss tribal sovereignty amidst carceral expansion and raises key questions about sovereignty granted by the settler state. 🔗:

ABF Faculty Fellow Rebecca Sandefur and Director of Research and Programs Matthew Burnett discuss resolutions made by the Conference of Chief Justices, Conference of State Court Administrators, and ABA––for studying and implementing community justice worker programs. www.law360.com/articles/238...

This Wed., 9/16, the ABF Speaker Series returns with Zhandarka Kurti, Assistant Prof. of Criminal Justice and Criminology at @loyolachicago.bsky.social and Jarrod Shanahan, Associate Prof. of Criminal Justice at Governors State University. 🔗 www.americanbarfoundation.org/event/speake...

The ABF welcomes seven Visiting Scholars to our 2025–26 cohort: Portia Jin Xiong, Rashmee Singh, William Darwall, Winnifred Fallers Sullivan, Joachim Savelsberg, Kasey Henricks, and Katheryn Birks Harvey. www.americanbarfoundation.org/the-abf-anno...

The ABF welcomes @swethaa.bsky.social as the 2025–26 William H. Neukom Fellows Research Chair in Diversity and Law. Ballakrishnen previously served as an AccessLex Visiting Scholar on Legal Education at the ABF, from 2017 to 2018. Learn more: www.americanbarfoundation.org/the-abf-welc...

“Law, Anthropology, and Their Languages,” a new article by ABF Research Prof. Elizabeth Mertz and Faculty Fellow Justin Richland, uses linguistic anthropology and outsider scholarship to explore the discourses of law and anthropology. Read more: www.americanbarfoundation.org/wp-content/u...

Check out this week’s episode of The Lawyerist Podcast, in which host Zack Glaser speaks with ABF Faculty Fellow Rebecca L. Sandefur and Dir. of Research and Programs Matthew Burnett about their research on community justice workers. Watch here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=7siI...

The ABF announces the 2025-26 doctoral and postdoctoral fellows. The ABF’s incoming doc fellows are Anna Fox, Jane Y. Jeong, Christopher E. Robertson, and Kris Rosentel. The ABF’s postdoc fellows are Ellie Frazier and Grigory Gorbun. Learn more: www.americanbarfoundation.org/the-american...

Join the ABF's Access to Justice Research Initiative and FGV Law School São Paulo: Monday, August 25, 7:20 AM–3:30 PM CT for "Envisioning a People-Centered Justice Research and Data Agenda for Latin America"— a one-day conference available via livestream. ☑️ RSVP for livestream: lnkd.in/dyWTZAYR

Thank you to all who joined us in Toronto! The Fellows of the ABF hosted several memorable events during the @americanbar.org's #ABAAnnual — from the CLE Program: "Safeguarding Democracy" to the Fellows Business Breakfast. We look forward to next year's #ABAMidyear in San Antonio Texas!

“We want our students to be prepared to succeed professionally in the intersecting space of AI and the law, which is only going to keep growing,” says ABF Research Prof. and chair of @uchicagolaw.bsky.social's AI Committee, @williamhjhubbard.bsky.social—on the school's new AI Lab coming this fall.

“Looking across backsliding democracies, you see a distinctive pattern in which law is deployed as an instrument to unravel democratic institutions.” At the Fellows CLE at #ABAAnnual, ABF Affil. Scholar Aziz Huq opens a talk on evolving tactics and efforts to defend rule of law. @americanbar.org

Welcome, ABF Fellows, to #ABAAnnual in Toronto! Visit Fellows registration for ribbons and details on the weekend line-up, from a CLE w/ ABF Affil. Scholar Aziz Huq and @daviddriesen.bsky.social to an Oscar-worthy opening reception. 🎬 @americanbar.org www.americanbarfoundation.org/event/fellow...

"This kind of agreement ends the Northwestern that so many people in Chicago land are so proud of." ABF Research Professor @lbthatsme.bsky.social in a recent @abc7chicago.bsky.social article on a potential deal with the Trump Administration. Read more: abc7chicago.com/post/northwe...

A new article by ABF Director of Research and Programs Matthew Burnett and Faculty Fellow Rebecca L. Sandefur explores—"the role of access to justice in building and enlivening democracy through a critical mechanism to demonopolize and democratize the law: justice workers." Learn more:

“It really is a peculiar feature that these two federal judges are striking down the will of the people as well as the will of the California legislature,” says ABF Affiliated Research Prof. John Donohue — @cbsnews.com discussing California’s recently struck ammo background check law. Read more:

The American Bar Foundation has announced the reappointment of ABF Affiliated Research Professor and University of California-Irvine School of Law Distinguished Professor Emeritus Bryant Garth as Interim Executive Director, effective September 2, 2025. Learn more:

"Like a delicate hand-blown sculpture, “rule of law” is valued for its artistry, but we now know it requires a high level of care and protection if we want it to survive." Former ABF Board Member Paula Boggs writes in a new @bloomberglaw.com article. Read more: news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

"We’ve lost a lion for justice.” The American Bar Foundation is deeply saddened to share news of the passing of William H. “Bill” Neukom, esteemed Philanthropist Fellow, former ABF Board Member, and tireless advocate for the rule of law. www.americanbarfoundation.org/william-h-ne...

"Our democratic survival requires that the presidency be brought back under the system of checks and balances that the Founders envisaged. They would ask no less of us." ABF Research Prof. @tomginsburg.bsky.social examines the dangers of “Hyper-Presidency” in a new piece for Persuasion. Read more:

The ABF thanks Mark Suchman for nearly two years of dedicated service and contributions to the organization’s mission. As of July 11, Suchman stepped down from the role of Executive Director and will continue with the ABF as a Research Professor, jointly appointed at @purdueuniversity.bsky.social.

We are saddened to learn of the passing of Bill Paul, who served w/ distinction as Chair of the Fellows and on our Board of Directors. A former ABA President, Paul left an indelible mark on the ABF through his belief in research to strengthen the legal profession. www.americanbar.org/news/abanews...

Former ABF Visiting Scholar @hilakeren.bsky.social argues that the Supreme Court’s US v. Skrmetti ruling leaves "key questions about due process and the First Amendment unanswered." Read more: news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

Are judges and juries next to be automated? ABF Research Professor Shari Diamond is featured in a new ABA Journal article exploring the future of AI in the courtroom. Should AI play a role in legal decision-making? Read more: www.abajournal.com/web/article/...

ABF Research Professor Jacob Goldin is featured in the @washingtonpost.com, highlighting findings from his study, Health Insurance and Mortality: Experimental Evidence from Taxpayer Outreach. 📝Study: law.stanford.edu/wp-content/u... 📰Washington Post:

Thirty-one men at Bluebonnet Detention Center in Anson, Texas, positioned their bodies in the shape of the letters “SOS." "The SOS is not an isolated event but a symptom of a greater problem." New from @johnmajoreason.bsky.social the William H. Neukom Fellows Research Chair in Diversity and Law: