Robbins J.S.D. Fellows

Walters’ work specifically aims to unravel how legislative frameworks in both Canada and the United States surveil and criminalize the kinship ties of marginalized communities who are marginalized based on their race and class status. In addition to her Juris Doctor from the University of Ottawa, Walters holds a Master of Laws from Columbia University, where she was recognized as a Fulbright Scholar and a Davis Polk Leadership Fellow, graduating with high honors. Her ambitious doctoral research is further bolstered by a multi-year scholarship from Canada’s Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. Walters also contributes to academia as a part-time faculty member at the University of Ottawa where she is developing a course on critical race theory for students who will go on to work in a common law context.

Gunn Jiravuttipong’s research as a J.S.D. student focuses on the diffusion of digital economy regulation from the United States and the European Union to developing countries, especially regarding digital competition law, data protection law, and content moderation law. This topic was inspired by Jiravuttipong’s work as a policy analyst at the Thailand Development Research Institute (TDRI), where he studied Thailand’s adaptation of technology law from Western nations. Before joining the J.S.D. program, Gunn received an LL.B. from Thammasat University, Thailand, and an LL.M. from Berkeley Law.

Coming to Berkeley Law from Ireland, Helen Jennings’ research, builds upon her LL.M. thesis, exploring a transitional justice response to the child sexual abuse crisis in the Catholic Church. A barrister from Northern Ireland, Jennings previously studied law at the University of Cambridge and received an LL.M. from New York University School of Law in 2021 as a Fulbright Scholar. She has also worked for the United Nations in multiple capacities: as a legal researcher for UN Women, as an intern at the UN Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar and as a legal assistant at the International Law Commission.

Jelena J.S.D. research will focus on internet governance, privacy, and cybersecurity issues.  She received an LL.M. from Berkeley Law, and an LL.M. in International and Comparative Contracting from the University of Chile. She has an LL.B. from the University of Novi Sad in Serbia. While working on her LL.M. in Chile, she became interested in the relationship between information and communication technology, legal institutions, institutional change, and economic development from a comparative perspective.

Joonmo’s J.S.D. dissertation, “Comparative Perspectives on Judicial Reform in Korea,” stems from his interest in developing a method of analysis and evaluation of the function of the judicial systems in various countries, to determine the scope and feasibility of judicial reform. He recently served as the Director of the Legislation and Judiciary Division of the National Assembly Research Service in Korea, and practiced at Lee & Ko, a top-tier law firm in Korea. He received his LL.B. from Seoul National University College of Law and his LL.M. from Berkeley Law.

Luis Otavio Barroso da Graca is a Robins JSD Fellow and Fulbright(US)-Capes(Brazil) Scholar. His JSD research at Berkeley Law is entitled “The Legal Nature of the Legislative Process.” He is a Senior Legislative Advisor and Drafter at the Federal Senate of Brazil, where he has been working on a non-partisan basis for almost twenty years. Luis holds an LLM from University College London (UK), where he studied with the support of the Chevening Scholarships (UK). He also holds an LLB and a Master’s degree in Economics, both from the University of Brasilia (Universidade de Brasília, Brazil), and an Engineering Baccalaureate from the Technological Institute of Aeronautics (Instituto Tecnológico de Aeronáutica, Brazil).

Shih-wei Chao’s research focuses on how platforms resolve intellectual property infringement complaints brought against content or listings posted by other users. As platforms emerge as a prominent IP enforcement domain, he aims to explore the advantages and deficiencies of their resolution procedure, as well as potential implications for substantial IP doctrine. Aside from intellectual property, Shih-wei’s interests also include antitrust, artificial intelligence regulation, and technology’s influence on modern democratic societies. Prior to earning his LL.M. degree at Berkeley Law, Shih-wei completed his first law degree at Taiwan’s National Chiao Tung University. Shih-wei is a Taiwan Ministry of Education Key Fields Scholarship Fellow.

Mahwish received her LLB from the Punjab University Law College, graduating first in her class. She recently earned her L.L.M. at Berkeley Law, with a specialization in International Law and also served as associate editor for the Berkeley Journal of Middle Eastern & Islamic Law. Prior to coming to Berkeley, she taught Comparative Constitutional Law, Jurisprudence, and the Law of Torts at the Superior College of Law in Lahore, Pakistan. She has published extensively on topics related to human rights and the rule of law. In addition, she has a masters degree in Political Science from University of Punjab and a diploma certificate for Intellectual Property Laws from Punjab University Law College.

Ms. Sharaban Tahura Zaman is an environmental lawyer and academic working to promote environmental and climate justice. Her dissertation title is “Energy Transition under the Paris Agreement: Assessing Legal Pathways.” Ms. Zaman serves as a senior lecturer at the North South University, Bangladesh, and is a senior research fellow with the Centre for Climate Justice-Bangladesh. As a Chevening Scholar, Ms. Zaman completed her LL.M at the University of Edinburgh. Ms. Zaman is also a member of the Legal Research Group, Centre for International Sustainable Development Law, Canada. She has also been involved with the UN climate change negotiation process since 2012, and in 2017 started negotiations as a government delegate on the “compliance” and “mitigation” issue on behalf of LDCs Climate Negotiators Group and is serving as a legal advisor of the LDCs Group member of the “Paris Agreement Compliance Committee.” Ms. Zaman is keen to work on climate justice utilizing laws and policies as a tool. Her interests include low carbon development, energy, climate-induced displacement, NDC, market mechanism, human rights, and gender.

Alex Huang is the Lloyd M. Robbins J.S.D. Fellow at UC Berkeley School of Law. Additionally, he serves as a Berkeley Empirical Legal Studies Fellow at the Berkeley Center for the Study of Law and Society. Huang’s research focuses on bankruptcy law, corporate law, and judicial behavior, with a particular emphasis on the computational analysis of legal theory. At Berkeley, Huang serves as a lecturer, tutor, and graduate student instructor within both the legal studies program and the School of Law, teaching courses in Law and Economics I & II, Sociology of Law, Law in Chinese Society, and Fundamentals of U.S. Law. Huang’s work has been published in both Chinese and English. He has acted as a referee for law reviews and holds the position of research associate at the Sun Yat-sen University Law and Economics Research Center.

Sylvia Lu’s research focuses on the intersection of technology, privacy, and intellectual property (IP).

Sylvia’s projects focus on the intersection between artificial intelligence, data privacy, and Asian legal systems. She researches issues concerning data privacy and data governance; trade secret and corporate disclosure; big data, innovation, and civil rights; transnational IP and dispute resolution. As a Robbins J.S.D. Fellow, Sylvia also works on Comparative Legal Responses to COVID-19.

Ella Corren completed her Bachelor of Laws at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel. She completed her Master of Laws at Berkeley Law, graduating with distinction from the Thesis Track program, and recently started her doctoral studies at Berkeley Law. Ella studies information privacy, antitrust law, law and economics, and intellectual property law. Her research is focused on privacy regulation in digital markets.

Zehra Betul Ayranci’s research explores whether national copyright law is adequately functioning or whether there is a need for a broader reorientation of copyright law fit for the modern marketplace and current technologies, transnationally and across industries. She suggests that legislative attempts, like the EU Copyright Directive, the US Music Modernization Act, and Chinese sui generis regulations, show that traditional national copyright laws are not adequately functioning, applicable or compatible with the entertainment industries today. Her research analyzes the feasibility of the solution from a formal, normative, and comparative institutional perspective: Is the European approach of top-down regulation, or the American approach of free market and bottom-up lawmaking, more desirable?

Jiahui Duan’s current research studies workplace sexual harassment issues in China, aiming to understand the development of workplace sexual harassment issues in Chinese society and explore a potential anti-sexual harassment route in the emerging economy and political context such as China’s. Her research is built on substantial fieldwork where she conducts in-depth interviews with individual employees who have been harassed and investigates how they navigate such a regulatory environment. Her fields of interest also include anti-discrimination development in China, rural women’s land rights issues, legal consciousness, and the role of the internet in shaping legal culture. She earned her LL.M. at Berkeley law. Prior to joining Berkeley, she was a certified lawyer in China.