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Jens Meierhenrich

 

Jens Meierhenrich

Assistant Professor of Government and of Social Studies
 
E-mail:
Phone:
Fax:
 jmeierhenrich@gov.harvard.edu
617-496-7376
617-495-0438
 CGIS N423
1737 Cambridge St.
Cambridge, MA 02138
Office Hours: Fridays, 12-2

Biographical Note:

Jens Meierhenrich (D.Phil. Oxford, 2002) is Assistant Professor of Government and of Social Studies at Harvard University, where he is also a Faculty Associate at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. He recently served as the Carlo Schmid Fellow in Trial Chamber II of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, and has previously worked with Luis Moreno Ocampo, the Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court. A Rhodes Scholar, Professor Meierhenrich is the author of The Legacies of Law: Long-Run Consequences of Legal Development in South Africa, 1650-2000 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008) in which he examines the function of legal norms and institutions in the transition to—and from—apartheid. He is currently completing a genocide trilogy, comprising The Rationality of Genocide (Princeton: Princeton University Press, forthcoming); The Structure of Genocide (Princeton: Princeton University Press, forthcoming); and The Culture of Genocide (Princeton: Princeton University Press, forthcoming). He is also preparing, for Oxford University Press, Genocide: A Reader and Genocide: A Very Short Introduction. Other work in progress, aside from co-edited volumes with Dinah Shelton, Alex de Waal, Devin Pendas, and Nigel Eltringham, respectively, includes a book on judicial responses to the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, entitled The Invention of Gacaca: Transitional Justice in Rwanda; a doctrinal analysis of international jurisprudence, entitled The Responsibility of Individuals for International Crimes; and The Supply and Demand of States, a long-term project on state formation and state collapse. Professor Meierhenrich’s publications also include a series of articles and book chapters on foreign, comparative, and international law and politics, most recently, "The Foundations of Constitutionalism: An Analysis of Debaathification,” Constitutional Political Economy (forthcoming); "The Language of 1948," Rutgers Law Review (forthcoming); "What Difference Does International Law Make?," International Studies Review (forthcoming), "The Rhetoric of International Law," Actes de la Recherche en Sciences Sociales, No. 173 (June 2008); "The UN International Criminal Tribunals: The former Yugoslavia, Rwanda and Sierra Leone” (Review Essay), American Journal of International Law, Vol. 102, No. 2 (April 2008); "Varieties of Reconciliation," Law & Social Inquiry, Vol. 33, No. 1 (Winter 2008); "The Trauma of Genocide," Journal of Genocide Research, Vol. 9, No. 4 (December 2007); "Perpetual War: A Pragmatic Sketch," Human Rights Quarterly, Vol. 29, No. 3 (August 2007); "Conspiracy in International Law," Annual Review of Law and Social Science, Vol. 2 (2006); "A Question of Guilt," Ratio Juris, Vol. 19, No. 3 (September 2006); "Analogies at War," Journal of Conflict and Security Law, Vol. 11, No. 1 (Spring 2006); "The Ethics of Lustration," Ethics & International Affairs, Vol. 20, No. 1 (April 2006); and "Presidential and Parliamentary Elections in Rwanda, 2003," Electoral Studies, Vol. 25, No. 3 (September 2006). Professor Meierhenrich is a member of Harvard's University Committee on Human Rights Studies, Standing Committee on Degrees in Social Studies, and Standing Committee on African Studies as well as the Scholars at Risk Committee. He also co-chairs (with Jack Goldsmith and Ryan Goodman of Harvard Law School and with Beth Simmons of the Government Department) the International Law and International Relations Seminar at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. Professor Meierhenrich has conducted extensive archival and field research in several international organizations as well as in Africa (South Africa, Rwanda), Asia (Japan, Cambodia), Europe (Germany), and Latin America (Argentina). His research has been supported by, among others, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, the Social Science Research Council, the American Council of Learned Societies, the Japan Foundation, the American Bar Foundation, and Harvard Medical School. His courses at Harvard, past and present, include "Genocide," "Crimes against Humanity," "The Geneva Conventions," "International Courts," "Human Rights," "Retroactive Justice," "Political Trials," "Jurisprudence: An Introduction to Law and Morals," "The Political Economy of Law," "Sexual Violence," "State Formation and State Collapse," "States in Africa," "The Sophomore Tutorial" (with Stanley Hoffmann), and (with Susan Pharr and Thomas Remington), the "Research Workshop on Comparative Politics." In 2007, Professor Meierhenrich was appointed Visiting Associate Professor of Law at the University of Tokyo.

Papers:

Varieties of Reconciliation Jens Meierhenrich, “Varieties of Reconciliation,” Law & Social Inquiry, Vol. 33, No. 1 (Winter 2008), pp. 195-231
The Trauma of Genocide Jens Meierhenrich, “The Trauma of Genocide,” Journal of Genocide Research, Vol. 9, No. 4 (December 2007), pp. 549-573
Perpetual War: A Pragmatic Sketch Jens Meierhenrich, “Perpetual War: A Pragmatic Sketch,” Human Rights Quarterly, Vol. 29, No. 3 (August 2007), pp. 631-673
Conspiracy in International Law Jens Meierhenrich, “Conspiracy in International Law,” Annual Review of Law and Social Science, Vol. 2 (2006), pp. 341-357
A Question of Guilt Jens Meierhenrich, “A Question of Guilt,” Ratio Juris, Vol. 19, No. 3 (September 2006), pp. 314-342
Presidential and Parliamentary Elections in Rwanda, 2003 Jens Meierhenrich, “Presidential and Parliamentary Elections in Rwanda, 2003” Electoral Studies, Vol. 25, No. 3 (September 2006), pp. 627-634
Analogies at War Jens Meierhenrich, “Analogies at War,” Journal of Conflict and Security Law, Vol. 11, No. 1 (Spring 2006), pp. 1-40
The Ethics of Lustration Jens Meierhenrich, “The Ethics of Lustration,” Ethics & International Affairs, Vol. 20, No. 1 (April 2006), pp. 99-120
Forming States after Failure Jens Meierhenrich, “Forming States after Failure,” in Robert I. Rotberg, ed., When States Fail: Causes and Consequences (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004), pp. 153-169
Establishing Collective Norms: Potentials for Participatory Justice in Rwanda Jens Meierhenrich, “Establishing Collective Norms: Potentials for Participatory Justice in Rwanda” (with Catie Honeyman, Shakirah Hudani, Alfa Turineh, Justina Hierta, Leila Chirayath, and Andrew Iliff), Peace & Conflict, Vol. 10, No. 1 (2004), pp. 1-24.