The Middle East Legal Studies Seminar (MELSS) brings together leading practitioners, judges, and legal academics from across the Middle East to meet with YLS faculty and students. The Law School became involved in the Middle East to create a forum in which influential judges, lawyers, and scholars from the region could exchange ideas and forge ties with one another at an annual meeting held since 1998 in which papers related to a chosen theme are discussed. Past topics have included the concept of legal authority, fundamental rights, and religious pluralism. The seminar has successfully brought together established and emerging leaders who are open to reform and committed to democracy in their own countries.
