Spotlights

Major Royal Accolade

Sweden’s Queen Silvia awarded Professor Franklin Zimring the Stockholm Prize in Criminology, the field’s top international award, in an online ceremony June 15. Zimring and co-winner Philip Cook were hailed for their evidenced-based explanations of gun policy effects. You can watch the ceremony here, with remarks by the recipients and music performances from Stockholm City […]

Entertainment Law Hub

The Hollywood Reporter ranked Berkeley Law the fourth-best school for entertainment law and named seven alumni to its annual top 100 power lawyer list. The dynamic deal-makers, high-stakes litigators, and big-merger facilitators include Scott Edelman ’84, Bruce Gellman ’91, Cliff Gilbert-Lurie ’79, David Maltof ’92, Michael Schenkman ’90, Douglas Stone ’86, and Matthew Syrkin ’03.

Home Loan Inequality

An updated study of nearly 10 million home loans, co-written by Professor Robert Bartlett, shows that Black and Latinx residents are systematically overcharged. The gap, over $450 million a year for minority owners, holds true even if they have the same credit score and down payment percentage as white homebuyers — and even when computer […]

Prized Triple Crown

Professor Rachel Stern (pictured), Ph.D. student Tobias Smith, and Legal Studies grad Raika Kim received Law and Society Association awards. Stern won the Article Prize for a paper co-written with Lawrence Liu on China’s expectations for its bar, Smith the Dissertation Prize for “The Contradictions of Chinese Capital Punishment,” and Kim the Undergraduate Paper Prize […]

Pursuing Equal Justice

Jina Kim ’21 (left) and Mattie Armstrong ’21 have received coveted two-year Equal Justice Works fellowships. Armstrong will work to prevent the detention and deportation of immigrants who have criminal records in Southern California, and Kim will advocate with low-income residents of color in East Oakland for environmental justice and community resilience.

Wastewater Innovation

A report by our Center for Law, Energy & the Environment questions a common premise about what slows wastewater management innovation to keep up with climate change, aging infrastructure, and population growth. The center’s nationwide survey found broad agreement between utility managers and regulators, often seen as groups whose conflicts deter the deployment of new technologies.

Debt Collection Expert

Professor Prasad Krishnamurthy was appointed to the California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation’s new debt collection advisory committee. The committee’s only academic, Krishnamurthy will help shield consumers on the heels of a 2020 state law expanding the department’s authority to deny or revoke debt collector licenses for fraudulent, deceitful, or dishonest acts.

World-Class Economist

Professor Alan Auerbach is among four recipients of the American Economics Association Distinguished Fellow Award this year, given to top economists in the U.S. and Canada. President of the Western Economic Association International and director of our Burch Center for Tax Policy and Public Finance, Auerbach is past president of the National Tax Association.

National Student Honor

Shao Zhao ’23 is this year’s Minority Corporate Counsel Association Robert Half Legal Scholar, receiving $10,000 for tuition. The program buoys diverse student leaders who are interested in corporate law and diversity and inclusion issues, and offers many outlets of career support. Zhao has staffed a homeless shelter, tutored immigrants, and mentored young adults.

High-Energy Production

The Center for Law, Energy & the Environment, a driving force of our top-ranked environmental law program, has released its 2021 CLEE Snapshot. It tracks the center’s prodigious work on climate, water, oceans, and land use in 2020, describing wide-ranging efforts to craft effective laws, policies, and implementation systems that lead to equitable and sustainable outcomes.