Professor Oona Hathaway ’97 to Deliver Inaugural Lecture April 12

WATCH THE VIDEO OF PROFESSOR HATHAWAY’S LECTURE

Professor Oona Hathaway ’97 will deliver her inaugural lecture as the Gerard C. and Bernice Latrobe Smith Professor of International Law on Monday, April 12, at 4:30 p.m. in Room 127. Her lecture is titled “Democracy in the Balance: Strengthening Accountability in U.S. International Lawmaking.” It is free and open to the public. A reception will follow in the Alumni Reading Room.

“My talk will focus on the growth in presidential power over international lawmaking in the United States and the increasing problem of democratic accountability that has accompanied this shift,” said Professor Hathaway. “It will also outline my proposals for asserting a stronger congressional role and increasing transparency and accountability in the international lawmaking process.”

Professor Hathaway is one of the nation’s leading voices on international law and international relations, transnational law, and the law of U.S. foreign policy. She has testified before Congress several times on legal issues surrounding the U.S. war in Iraq and has written extensively on the subject.

She joined the Yale Law School faculty in 2002 and was named the Gerard C. and Bernice Latrobe Smith Professor of International Law in 2009. She has also held faculty positions at the U.C. Berkeley School of Law and the Boston University School of Law and has been a visiting professor at the University of Toronto School of Law and Harvard Law School. She currently serves on the Advisory Committee on International Law for the Legal Adviser to the U.S. Department of State. She is recipient of a Carnegie Scholars Award and The Macmillan Center’s Director’s Award.

She earned her B.A. summa cum laude at Harvard University and her J.D. from Yale Law School, where she was editor-in-chief of The Yale Law Journal. She went on to serve as a law clerk for Judge Patricia Wald of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit and for Justice Sandra Day O’Connor of the United States Supreme Court, followed by fellowships at Harvard University's Carr Center for Human Rights Policy and Center for the Ethics and the Professions.

The Gerard C. and Bernice Latrobe Smith Professorship in international law, diplomacy, and cross-cultural studies was established in 1993 in honor of Ambassador Gerard C. Smith '38 and in memory of his wife, Bernice Latrobe Smith, through gifts from family, friends, and the Ingalls Foundation. It was previously held by Harold Hongju Koh.