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Event Details:
Join us at this career development workshop, where you will have the opportunity to hear from Stanford scholars, who will provide tips on how to pursue a career in international law and policy. This event is limited to Stanford students. RSVP is required, and lunch will be provided.
Panelists
Beth Van Schaack
Prior to returning to Stanford University, Dr. Van Schaack served as Ambassador-at-Large for Global Criminal Justice (GCJ) in the U.S. State Department office where she once served as Deputy. GCJ advised the Secretary of State and the Under Secretary of State for Civilian Security, Democracy, and Human Rights on issues related to war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide and the deployment of the whole range of transitional justice mechanisms in states emerging from violence or repression. Prior to returning to public service, Dr. Van Schaack was the Leah Kaplan Visiting Professor in Human Rights at Stanford Law School, where she taught international criminal law, human rights, human trafficking, and a policy lab on Legal & Policy Tools for Preventing Atrocities. In addition, she directed Stanford’s International Human Rights & Conflict Resolution Clinic. Ambassador Van Schaack has published numerous articles and papers on international human rights and justice issues, including her 2020 thesis, Imagining Justice for Syria (Oxford University Press). From 2014 to 2022, she served as Executive Editor for Just Security, an online forum for the analysis of national security, foreign policy, and rights.
In addition to her work as a Distinguished Fellow with Stanford’s Center for Human Rights & International Justice, Dr. Van Schaack is a Commissioner with the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ), a Senior Peace Fellow with the Public International Law & Policy Group, a Distinguished Fellow with the Atlantic Council’s Strategic Litigation Project, and a Distinguished Fellow with the Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace & Security. With seven other senior U.S. government human rights mandate holders, she is a co-founder of The Alliance for Diplomacy & Justice, which works to center human rights within U.S. foreign policy.
Earlier in her career, she was a practicing lawyer at Morrison & Foerster, LLP; the Center for Justice & Accountability, a human rights law firm; and the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunals for Rwanda and the Former Yugoslavia in The Hague. Dr. Van Schaack is a graduate of Stanford (BA), Yale (JD) and Leiden (PhD) Universities.
Julia Spiegel
Julia Spiegel is the Founder and CEO of GovAct and an award-winning attorney who has championed fundamental freedoms at the highest levels of federal, state, and local government. Prior to founding GovAct, Julia served as legal counsel and senior advisor to California Governor Gavin Newsom, directing litigation, and helping oversee and drive the state’s work on reproductive rights, health and human services, consumer protection, and immigration. In the wake of the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision, Julia worked under Governor Newsom’s leadership to build the Reproductive Freedom Alliance, a nonpartisan coalition of 23 governors committed to defending and expanding reproductive freedom through novel executive, administrative, legal, and policy initiatives. The New York Times featured this work as a leading example of innovative resistance to the rollback of fundamental rights in America.
Prior to joining the Governor’s office, Julia litigated high-impact cases on immigration, voting rights, and other social justice matters in the Santa Clara County Counsel’s Office, receiving California Attorneys of the Year and County Counsels’ Association of California awards for her work securing a nationwide injunction that barred the federal government from defunding sanctuary jurisdictions. Julia previously served as senior advisor to then-U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power, clerked for Judge M. Margaret McKeown on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, conducted field research on armed conflict in east Africa, and taught courses on foreign affairs and the U.S. Constitution at Stanford Law School and on U.S. foreign policy at Stanford’s Ford Dorsey Master’s in International Policy Program.
Julia has a B.A. from Stanford University, M.P.P from the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs, and J.D. from Yale Law School.
Professor E. Tendayi Achiume is an international legal scholar focusing on international human rights law, international refugee law and international migration law. Her academic research explores the global governance of racism and xenophobia, and the legal and ethical implications of colonialism and other forms of empire for the governance of international migration. In recognition of the “exceptional creativity” and “promise for important future advances,” of Achiume’s research in these areas, she was awarded a 2023 MacArthur Fellowship, commonly known as the “genius grant”. She is also an Extraordinary Professor in the Department of Jurisprudence at the University of Pretoria; a Research Associate with the African Centre for Migration and Society at the University of Witwatersrand; and a Research Associate with the Refugee Studies Center at the University of Oxford. Professor Achiume will spend the 2024-2025 academic year as a scholar in residence at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton.
In November 2017, the United Nations Human Rights Council appointed Professor Achiume the UN Special Rapporteur on Contemporary Forms of Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance, making her the first woman to serve in this role since its creation in 1993. In 2016, she was appointed to co-chair the 2016 Annual Meeting of the American Society of International Law (ASIL), and she is former co-chair of the ASIL Migration Law Interest Group. In 2021, she was appointed to the American Journal of International Law Board of Editors and in 2022 selected as a commissioner for the O’Neill-Lancet Commission on Racism, Structural Discrimination and Global Health.
Before coming to Stanford Law, she was the inaugural Alicia Miñana Professor of Law at the UCLA School of Law, where she received the Distinguished Teaching Award in 2020, UCLA’s highest honor for excellence in teaching, as well as the Eby Award for the Art of Teaching. She also served as a faculty director of the UCLA Law Promise Institute for Human Rights.
She earned her B.A. from Yale University and her J.D. from Yale Law School. She also earned a Graduate Certificate in International Development Studies from Yale University, and an International Baccalaureate Diploma from the United World Colleges (UWC), Atlantic College.
Moderator
Penelope Van Tuyl
Penelope Van Tuyl is a human rights lawyer who has worked closely with founding Director, David Cohen, for nearly two decades to shape Stanford's Center for Human Rights and International Justice into the vibrant academic and research community it is today. She first joined (what was then known as the Berkeley War Crimes Studies Center) in 2006 as a trial monitor working in Sierra Leone and Cambodia, and was hired full time in 2008 to oversee several key initiatives in Southeast Asia, West Africa, Europe, and the United States. She was promoted to Associate Director in 2011, and shepherded the Center through its 2013 transition from Berkeley to Stanford, which spurred a exciting period of rapid programatic growth. As Associate Director, Van Tuyl is integrally involved with all aspects of the Center's administration and strategic planning across program areas, on campus and overseas. She serves in a principal leadership position, managing the Center's digital archival partnership withe the Stanford University Libraries. She also runs the Minor in Human Rights, and teaches the required core course for the Minor HUMRTS 101: Cross-Disciplinary Perspectives on Human Rights Theory and Practice. Of the many hats she wears in her job, however, her favorite is that of mentor and advisor to the wonderful Stanford students who pass through the Center.
Van Tuyl has authored and edited numerous reports and articles on international criminal law and procedure. Her research interests touch on substantive, procedural, and administrative aspects of international criminal law practice, including Joint Criminal Enterprise liability, standards of pleading in international courts, and the institutional accountability mechanisms that are meant to support the effective and efficient administration of justice. She also writes and teaches about migration and asylum law in comparative perspective. Van Tuyl graduated Summa Cum Laude from Amherst College, with a BA in International Relations and Latin American Studies. She received her J.D. from the University of California, Berkeley School of Law, and is admitted to practice in the state of California.