American Bar Foundation
@abfresearch.bsky.social
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The American Bar Foundation (ABF) is a sociolegal research institute. We conduct rigorous, empirical research that explores the intersection of law and society—creating insights that underpin today’s most pressing issues.
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🚀 Day 2 of the @opengovpartnership.org Global Summit 🚀

Today, we learned about:
🇸🇱 The national justice efforts in Sierra Leone.
💰 #JusticeActionCoalition’s work on the economic case for #PeopleCenteredJustice and people-centered justice data, led by @oecd-ocde.bsky.social.
abfresearch.bsky.social
This Wed., 10/8, ABF Speaker Series will be led by ABF/AccessLex Institute Postdoctoral Fellow in Legal and Higher Education, Ellie Frazier—on, "Pathways to Justice Work: Nonlawyer Educational Choices, Identities, and Professionalization in the U.S."

🔗: www.americanbarfoundation.org/event/speake...
Speaker Series: Ellie Frazier - ABF
Over the past three decades, programs training nonlawyers, such as limited licensed practitioners (LLPs) and community justice workers (CJWs), have arisen in the United State in response to access to…
www.americanbarfoundation.org
abfresearch.bsky.social
On Law Next: "Justice Workers — Reimagining Access to Justice as Democracy Work"

The ABF's Rebecca L. Sandefur & Matthew Burnett argue that the justice gap is a "crisis of democracy," and that trained community justice workers may hold the solution.

🎙️ Watch here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=eofZ...
Justice Workers: Access to Justice as Democracy Work, with Rebecca Sandefur and Matthew Burnett
YouTube video by LawNext
www.youtube.com
abfresearch.bsky.social
ABF Research Professor @tomginsburg.bsky.social and @thefireorg.bsky.social's @sarahemclaugh.bsky.social will discuss the "Constitutionality of government restraints on higher education in the US." Don't miss out!
abfresearch.bsky.social
Constitution Day! Join the Illinois Conference of the American Association of University Professors, @projectcensored.bsky.social, and the Park Center for Independent Media for a free webinar on academic freedom and the higher ed. crisis — Today from 3-4pm CT.
🔗: www.facebook.com/events/19165...
Higher Education in Crisis: Academic Freedom and the Constitution
Event by Illinois AAUP on Wednesday, September 17 2025
www.facebook.com
abfresearch.bsky.social
Tomorrow, 9/16, our ABF Speaker Series is led by Prof. of Sociology and Co-Dir. of the Appalachian Justice Research Center @profmichellebrown.bsky.social. Brown will discuss tribal sovereignty amidst carceral expansion and raises key questions about sovereignty granted by the settler state.
🔗:
Speaker Series: Michelle Brown - ABF
In the United States, the formation and ongoing articulation of tribal sovereignty has been inseparable from the logics and institutions of the settler colonial carceral state.
www.americanbarfoundation.org
abfresearch.bsky.social
ABF Faculty Fellow Rebecca Sandefur and Director of Research and Programs Matthew Burnett discuss resolutions made by the Conference of Chief Justices, Conference of State Court Administrators, and ABA––for studying and implementing community justice worker programs.

www.law360.com/articles/238...
3 Questions To Guide Research On Justice Worker Movement - Law360
As legal profession leaders formally encourage courts to study nonlawyer justice worker programs as a tool to address the access to justice crisis, we should begin with asking what we know, what we ne...
www.law360.com
abfresearch.bsky.social
The ABF welcomes seven Visiting Scholars to our 2025–26 cohort: Portia Jin Xiong, Rashmee Singh, William Darwall, Winnifred Fallers Sullivan, Joachim Savelsberg, Kasey Henricks, and Katheryn Birks Harvey.

www.americanbarfoundation.org/the-abf-anno...
The ABF Announces 2025-26 Visiting Scholars - ABF
The American Bar Foundation is pleased to welcome seven Visiting Scholars to the ABF research community.
www.americanbarfoundation.org
abfresearch.bsky.social
“Law, Anthropology, and Their Languages,” a new article by ABF Research Prof. Elizabeth Mertz and Faculty Fellow Justin Richland, uses linguistic anthropology and outsider scholarship to explore the discourses of law and anthropology.

Read more:
www.americanbarfoundation.org/wp-content/u...
www.americanbarfoundation.org
abfresearch.bsky.social
Check out this week’s episode of The Lawyerist Podcast, in which host Zack Glaser speaks with ABF Faculty Fellow Rebecca L. Sandefur and Dir. of Research and Programs Matthew Burnett about their research on community justice workers.

Watch here:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=7siI...
Community-Based Legal Solutions for Everyday Problems, with Rebecca Sandefur & Matthew Burnett
YouTube video by Lawyerist.com
www.youtube.com
abfresearch.bsky.social
The ABF announces the 2025-26 doctoral and postdoctoral fellows. The ABF’s incoming doc fellows are Anna Fox, Jane Y. Jeong, Christopher E. Robertson, and Kris Rosentel.

The ABF’s postdoc fellows are Ellie Frazier and Grigory Gorbun.

Learn more:
www.americanbarfoundation.org/the-american...
ABF Announces 2025 Doctoral and Postdoctoral Fellows - ABF
The ABF has awarded doctoral and postdoctoral fellowships to six outstanding scholars for their significant research proposals in law and social science.
www.americanbarfoundation.org
abfresearch.bsky.social
Join the ABF's Access to Justice Research Initiative and FGV Law School São Paulo: Monday, August 25, 7:20 AM–3:30 PM CT for "Envisioning a People-Centered Justice Research and Data Agenda for Latin America"— a one-day conference available via livestream.

☑️ RSVP for livestream:
lnkd.in/dyWTZAYR
abfresearch.bsky.social
Thank you to all who joined us in Toronto! The Fellows of the ABF hosted several memorable events during the @americanbar.org's #ABAAnnual — from the CLE Program: "Safeguarding Democracy" to the Fellows Business Breakfast.

We look forward to next year's #ABAMidyear in San Antonio Texas!
abfresearch.bsky.social
“We want our students to be prepared to succeed professionally in the intersecting space of AI and the law, which is only going to keep growing,” says ABF Research Prof. and chair of @uchicagolaw.bsky.social's AI Committee, @williamhjhubbard.bsky.social—on the school's new AI Lab coming this fall.
abfresearch.bsky.social
Concluding the panel, Deborah Enix-Ross urges the audience, “It’s important for us to pull together on this fundamental aspect of the legal profession. . . . to consider the things we, in the profession, can—and should—be doing now.” #ABAAnnual @americanbar.org
Deborah Enix-Ross, ABA Past President and Senior Adviser to the International Dispute Resolution Group of Debevoise & Plimpton, closes the Fellows CLE at ABA Annual 2025 in Toronto.
abfresearch.bsky.social
Huq and past ABA President Deborah Enix-Ross are joined by @syracuselaw.bsky.social's David Driesen, who argues an insufficiently constrained presidency is one of the biggest systemic threats to democracy. Driesen urges the US to learn from the mistakes of Hungary, Poland, and Turkey. #ABAAnnual
David Driesen, author of Specter of Dictatorship (Syracuse University Press), discusses how presidentialism threatens our democracy and what to do about it at the Fellows CLE Program at the ABA Annual Meeting in Toronto on August 8, 2025.
abfresearch.bsky.social
“Looking across backsliding democracies, you see a distinctive pattern in which law is deployed as an instrument to unravel democratic institutions.”

At the Fellows CLE at #ABAAnnual, ABF Affil. Scholar Aziz Huq opens a talk on evolving tactics and efforts to defend rule of law. @americanbar.org
Fellows CLE Program at ABA Annual Meeting 2025, “Safeguarding Democracy, a panel moderated by Deborah Enix-Ross, Senior Advisor to the International Dispute Resolution Group of Debevoise & Plimpton and the Past President of the American Bar Association and including Aziz Z. Huq, ABF Collaborating Scholar and Frank and Bernice J. Greenberg Professor of Law at The University of Chicago Law School and David M. Driesen, University Professor at the College of Law, Syracuse University