Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions

About the Goal

peace-and-justice

The United Nations aims to build more effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels of society by 2030.

Northwestern is engaged in a broad range of initiatives aimed at realizing this goal, including research and other programming examining international law and the rule of law, human rights, democracy and equality, political and economic issues confronting the post-colonial and developing world, tribal constitutions and self-determination, the politics of violent conflict and foreign military assistance, as well as innovative learning opportunities for students to study journalism and public access to information through a global lens.

Northwestern Experts and Initiatives

Juliet Sorensen

Juliet Sorensen is a Clinical Professor of Law associated with the law school’s Center for International Human Rights, where her teaching and research interests included international criminal law, corruption, and health and human rights. Professor Sorensen is the director and founder of the Northwestern Access to Health Project, an interdisciplinary partnership that analyzes access to health in resource limited settings. From 2017 -2019, Professor Sorensen served as the Associate Dean for Clinical Legal Education and Director of the Bluhm Legal Clinic. Professor Sorensen is also employed as the Executive Director of Injustice Watch, a non-partisan, not-for-profit, multimedia-journalism organization that conducts in-depth research exposing institutional failures that obstruct justice and equality.

Ian Hurd

Ian Hurd is Professor of Political Science and the Director of the Weinberg College Center for International and Area Studies at Northwestern University. His research on international law and politics combines contemporary global affairs with attention to the conceptual frames that serve to make sense of the world. His latest book, How to Do Things with International Law (Princeton 2017), examines the ideology of the rule of law in international affairs. Hurd is also the author of a book on the power of legitimacy and international authority in the United Nations, After Anarchy: Legitimacy and Power in the UN Security Council, as well as a leading textbook for students of international organizations and global governance, International Organizations: Politics, Law, Practice (4th edition, 2020).

Paul Gowder

Paul Gowder is a Professor of Law at Northwestern’s Pritzker School of Law. His research focuses on the rule of law, democratic theory, social and racial equality, institutional and organizational governance, and the law of technology, as well as the technology of law. He has taught a variety of classes including constitutional law, torts, critical race theory, professional responsibility, and introductory programming and statistics for law students. In his practice days, he was a civil rights and legal aid lawyer. In those contexts, he represented victims of police misconduct (once winning a rare qualified immunity reversal from the Fourth Circuit), predatory lending, employment discrimination, unlawful eviction, domestic violence, and numerous other injustices.

Featured Course

Politics, Media and The Republic (352-0-20)

As the 2022 midterm election season enters high gear, with control of Congress at stake, this seminar examines the most challenging period for American political journalism since Watergate and the Vietnam War - and one of the most fascinating. Count on developing your own understandings of how the country reached this point, what role journalism plays and what will happen next, after the most tumultuous campaign for the presidency and Congress in at least 50 years. We will explore such themes as polarization, political image-making and advertising, voting rights and voter suppression, as well as campaign rhetoric and policy issues.

Explore the course