Southwestern Law School Dean Bryant G. Garth to speak on "Colonialism, the Cold War and the Rule of Law in Asia" at IIT Chicago-Kent
Bryant G. Garth, internationally recognized scholar and dean of Southwestern Law School in Los Angeles, will speak at IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law, addressing the topic "Colonialism, the Cold War and the Rule of Law in Asia." The lecture, which is free and open to the public, will begin at noon September 14 in Chicago-Kent's Judge Abraham Lincoln Marovitz Courtroom, 565 West Adams St. (between Clinton and Jefferson streets) in Chicago.
Dean Garth's lecture will focus on issues explored in his forthcoming book Asian Legal Revivals: Lawyers in the Shadow of Empire, co-authored with Yves Dezalay (University of Chicago Press, 2010). He will analyze varied colonial experiences of several South and Southeast Asian countries and address the increasing importance of the law and lawyers in the region. Tracing the transformation of the relationship between law and state in different colonial settings, Dean Garth will discuss how nationalist legal elites—in countries such as India, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and South Korea—came to wield political power as agents in the move toward national independence.
Dean Garth graduated magna cum laude with a degree in American Studies from Yale University. He earned his J.D. from Stanford University Law School and received a doctorate from the European University Institute in Florence, Italy.
Proficient in four foreign languages, Dean Garth was editor-in-chief of the Stanford Journal of International Studies and went on to serve as a judicial clerk to Judge Robert Peckham of the U.S. District Court, Northern District of California.
Prior to his appointment as dean of Southwestern Law School in 2005, Dean Garth served fourteen years as director of the American Bar Foundation, the independent nonprofit research center established by the American Bar Association for the empirical study of law, legal institutions and legal processes. Under his guidance, the foundation became a preeminent resource for lawyers, scholars, legal educators, and policymakers throughout the world. In 1979, he joined the faculty of Indiana University School of Law, Bloomington, where he taught civil procedure, legal profession, international and comparative law and human rights, and served as dean from 1986 to 1990.
Dean Garth's scholarly research focuses on the legal profession, dispute resolution, globalization and the rule of law. He is the author or co-author of more than 16 books and 75 articles and is co-editor of the Association of American Law Schools' (AALS) Journal of Legal Education. In recent years, Dean Garth has addressed more than 100 forums across the United States and in more than a dozen foreign countries. He has served as a consultant to the World Bank, the U.S. Agency for International Development and major philanthropic foundations.
Dean Garth has held numerous leadership positions within the ABA and the AALS. He currently chairs the Law School Survey of Student Engagement advisory board and serves on the executive coordinating committee of the pioneering "After the J.D." study of lawyer careers. According to Dean Garth, "Information from these and other studies will help us take the lead in designing innovative curricula and programs that best suit our students' needs."
