The Phanor J. Eder Prize is named after the first president of the American Society of Comparative Law. It is awarded in recognition of the best paper written by an undergraduate law student, J.D. or LL.B., in response to the Call for Papers for every annual meeting of the YCC. Submissions are open to any student writing on public or private comparative law, and the selected author will receive a stipend toward presenting their work at a YCC forum.
Prize Winners:
2024:
Recipient: Jasmine Oesterling, J.D. Candidate, University of Akron School of Law, “I Can’t Breathe”: A Comparison of Racial Inequity and Police Brutality in France and the United States
2023:
Recipient: Yahel Gerlic, University of Tel Aviv Faculty of Law, A New Dawn for Corporate Accountability in the Context of Transitional Justice: The Lafarge Case
Honorable Mention: Emily Kocher, University of North Carolina School of Law, If Germans Played American Football: Understanding the U.S. Case of Kennedy v. Bremerton School District through the Lens of German Jurisprudence
2022:
Recipient: Ian R. Maddox, J.D. Candidate ’23, University of North Carolina School of Law, South Africa’s Dormant Emergency Clause and the Value of an Emergency Constitution
2021:
Recipient: Jane Tien, Duke University School of Law, “Fighting Words: Catalonia at the Language Instructions Crossroads”
Honorable Mention: Robin Liu, Duke University School of Law, “Giving the People a Voice Where It Counts: A Presumption in Favor of Allowing Permanent Residents to Vote in Local Elections”
2020:
Recipient: Hayley N. Lawrence, Duke University School of Law, “A Comparative Study of the Political Question Doctrine: Cases of Political Failures in the United States and the United Kingdom”
Honorable Mention: Alexander Bednar, Duke University School of Law, “Democratic Backsliding and Attacks on an Independent Judiciary: A Comparative Analysis of Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia”
2019:
Recipient: Emily Hazen, Gonzaga University School of Law, “Restructuring US Military Justice Through a Comparative Analysis of Israel Defense Forces”
Honorable Mention: Samridda Sen and Atreya Chakraborty, Department of Law, University of Calcutta, “Regulating Political Financing in India: A “Legal Perspective on the Case Study of Electoral Reform”
2018:
Recipient: Alec Duncan, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand, “The Long Shadow of Constituent Power: An Historical Critique”
First Honorable Mention: Blake van Santen, Queen’s Law School, “The Separation of Powers in the United States and Canada”
Second Honorable Mention: Wei Xuan, National University of Singapore, “Fight or Flight? – Contextualizing Judicial Strategic Responses Towards Court-Curbing Measures in Indonesia and Singapore”
2017:
Recipient: Megan K. Bradley, J.D. Candidate, 2018, Florida State University College of Law, “The Failure of Fact Pleading in the American System: Why the Convergence of Pleading Standards is Not Working and Comparative Solutions to How it Can be Fixed”
First Honorable Mention: Jaka Kukavica, LL.B. Candidate, 2017, University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Law, Slovenia, “National Consensus and the Eighth Amendment: Is There Something to be Learned from the United States Supreme Court”
Second Honorable Mention: Shir Fulga, J.D. Candidate, 2018, Queen’s University, Faculty of Law, Canada, ““…And Democratic”: Israeli Constitutional Law Through Canadian Eyes”
2016:
Recipient: Thomas Patrick, Boston College Law School, “The Zeitgeist of Secession Amidst the March Toward Unification: Scotland, Catalonia, and the Future of the European Union”
First Honorable Mention: Tierney O’Rourke, Stanford Law School, “Judicial Independence and Foreign Investment: The Argentine Experience”
Second Honorable Mention: Rachel Schatz, Tulane University Law School, “Forum Non Conveniens and the Foreign Sovereign Immunity Act: The Seventh Circuit Illustrates the Art of Rejecting Jurisdiction”
2015:
Recipient: Tom Brower, J.D. Candidate, University of Virginia School of Law, “Constitutions as Counter-Curses: Revenue Allocation Institutions and the Resource Curse”
First Honorable Mention: Philip M. Thoennes, J.D. Candidate, Lewis & Clark Law School, “Eo Nomine: The Divergence of State and Foreign Immunity”
Second Honorable Mention: Julian Yang, J.D. Candidate, Queen’s University Faculty of Law, “Comparative Analysis of Merger Control Under Chinese Anti-Monopoly Law”
2014:
Recipient: Tom Brower, J.D. Candidate, University of Virginia School of Law, “The Tide of the Times? A Sectoral Approach to Latin America’s Resistance to the Investor-State Arbitration System”
First Honorable Mention: Geoffrey Yeung, LL.B. Candidate, Hong Kong University Faculty of Law, “Religious Exemptions in Sexual Orientation Anti-Discrimination Laws: A Comparative Study”
Second Honorable Mention: Lawrence David, BCL/LL.B. Candidate, McGill University Faculty of Law, “Subnational Constitutionalism and the Concurrent Protection of Religious Freedom: Canada-Quebec Federalism”
2013:
Recipient: Yaron Nili, S.J.D. Candidate, Harvard Law School, “Missing the Forest for the Trees: A New Approach to Shareholder Activism”
Honorable Mentions:
Alan Koh, LL.B. candidate, National University of Singapore Faculty of Law, LL.M. candidate, Boston University School of Law, “Appraising Japan’s Appraisal Remedy”
Zhao Chen, J.S.D. Candidate, Washington University—St. Louis, “The Interpretation of ‘Public Use’ in the United States and China and its Relation to Economic Development”
Scott Stephenson, J.S.D. Candidate, Yale Law School, “Is the New Commonwealth Model of Constitutionalism Exportable?”
2012:
In 2012 the YCC awarded a prize to the best paper presented at its first Annual Conference that year to Jill I. Goldenziel, Harvard University, for her paper “Veiled Political Questions: Islamic Dress, Constitutionalism, and the Ascendance of Courts”
Colin B. Picker Graduate Prize
Awarded in recognition of the best paper submitted by a graduate student to the annual YCC Global Conference. Named in honor of the founding chair of the YCC.
Prize Winners:
2024
Recipient: Akshat Agarwal, J.S.D. Candidate, Yale Law School, The Promise of Constitutional Parents’ Rights
Honorable Mention: Pavithra Rajendran, J.S.D. Candidate, Notre Dame Law School, Butterfly Effects: Women and Criminal Law
2023
Recipient: Rama HyeweonKim, S.J.D. Candidate, Harvard Law School, Historicizing Same-Sex Marriage Debate in the Periphery: Savigny, Nakagawa, and the Korean Marriage
Honorable Mention: Sam Bookman, S.J.D. Candidate, Harvard Law School, and Matthias Petel, S.J.D. Candidate, Harvard Law School, Climate Litigation & Climate Justice: The Distributional Implications of Rights-Based Climate Actions
2022:
Recipient: Sam Bookman, S.J.D. Candidate & Byse Fellow, Harvard Law School, “Three Constitutional Responses to Environmental Crises (Or, What We Talk About When We Talk About ‘Environmental Constitutionalism’)”
Honorable Mentions:
Jonathan Brosseau-Rioux, Ph.D. Candidate, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne and McGill University, “A Jurisdictional Framework for Resolving ‘Ethical’ Issues Related to Party Representation: Distinguishing the Procedural from the Deontological”
Sandra M.T. Magalang, J.S.D. Candidate, Yale Law School, and Ana Beatriz Robalinho, J.S.D. Candidate, Yale Law School, “A Roadmap to Democratic Backsliding: Lessons from the Global South”
2021:
Recipient: Weilin Xiao, J.S.D. Candidate, Yale Law School, “Expansion and Restriction: A Comparative Study of Modernization of Family Laws in Japan and China, 1868-1930”
Honorable Mention: Ernesto Vargas Weil, Ph.D. student and Associate Lecturer (Teaching), The University College London (UCL) Faculty of Laws, “The Numerus Clausus as a Constitutional Rule of Property Law: a Macro-Comparative Approach”
2020:
Recipient: Yiran Zhang, S.J.D. Candidate, Harvard Law School, “Rethinking the Global Governance of Migrant Domestic Workers: The Heterodox Case of Informal Filipina Workers in China”
Honorable Mention: Emre Turkut, Ph.D. Candidate, Ghent University, “Emergency Powers, Constitutional (Self-) Restraint and Judicial Politics: The Turkish Constitutional Court in an Authoritarian Setting”
2019:
Recipient: Achalie M. Kumarage, American University, “Oversimplifying Legal Realities: Gender Indicators and Aspiring Law Reforms Based on Skewed Outcomes”
Honorable Mention: Rafi Reznik, Georgetown University, “Purposive Originalism: The Rise of American Conservatism in Israel”
2018:
Recipient: Alan Koh, National Singapore University, “Shareholder Protection in Close Corporations: The Curious Case of Japan”
2017:
Recipient: Dustin Klaudt, Osgoode Hall Law School, “Can Canada’s “Living Tree” Constitution and Lessons From Foreign Climate Litigation Seed Climate Justice and Remedy Climate?”
Honorable Mentions:
Daniele D’Alvia, Birkbeck, University of London, “The Remarkable Story of SPACs Between a Legal Standardised Regulation and a Standardisation by Market Practices”
Yincheng Hsu, University of Glasgow, “Virtual Cultures, Cultural Rights and Self-regulation”
Anna Lukina, Hertford College, University of Oxford, “Russia v ECtHR – Resistance or Dialogue: a Comparative Analysis”
2016:
Recipient: Soterios Loizou, University of Cambridge and Harvard Law School, “Deconstructing Second Parallel Legal Regimes: The Peculiar Case of Applying Foreign Law”
Honorable Mentions:
Doron Dorfman, Stanford Law School, “The Inaccessible Road to Motherhood—The Tragic Consequence of Not Having Reproductive Policies for Israelis with Disabilities”
Vera Korzun, Fordham University School of Law, “Arbitrating Antitrust Claims: From Suspicion to Trust”
2015:
Recipient: Katharine Schmidt, Yale Law School, “De-Naturalizing ‘American Legal Exceptionalism’: Early 20th Century Trans-Atlantic Divergences and Contemporary Comparative Law Scholarship”
Honorable Mentions:
Shoaib Ghias, University of California, Berkeley School of Law, “Defining Shari’a: Stoning and the Politics of Islamic Judicial Review”
Benjamin Chen& Li Zhiyu, University of California, Berkeley School of Law, “Who May Sue the One-Party Dominated State”
2014:
Recipient: Gilat Bachar, J.S.D. Candidate, Stanford University, “The Occupation of the Law: Power Dynamics Between the Israeli Judiciary and Legislature Over Controlling Palestinians’ Tort Claims Against IDF”
Honorable Mentions:
Itay Ravid, J.S.D. Candidate, Stanford University, “Watch & Learn”: Illegal Behavior and Obedience to Legal Norms Through the Eyes of Popular Culture: The Case of Popular American and Israeli TV Shows”
Alan K. Koh & Chun Zhou, LL.M. Candidate, Boston University; Ph.D. Candidate, Peking University, “Enforcing Corporate Governance in China: Or Why We Should Stop Worrying and Learn to Love the CSRC”
Richard M. Buxbaum Prize for Teaching in Comparative Law
Awarded to an untenured scholar in a tenure-track position at an ASCL Member School or who is an Individual Member of the ASCL in recognition of teaching excellence in any subject of comparative law. Named in honor of the 2014 recipient of the ASCL Lifetime Achievement Award.
Prize Winners:
2023: Mandy Meng Fang, City University of Hong Kong School of Law
2017: Jabeur Fathally, University of Ottawa, Faculty of Law
2016: Timothy Webster, Case Western Reserve University School of Law
2015: Inaugural Prize: Kirsten Anker, McGill University, Faculty of Law
Hessel Yntema Prize
Established in 1991 to honor the first editor in chief of the American Journal of Comparative Law, the Hessel Yntema prize of $1,500 recognizes the “most outstanding” article by a younger scholar under 40 years of age published in a recent volume of the Journal.
Prize Winners:
2023: Tami Groswald Ozery, “The Politicization of Corporate Governance: A Viable Alternative?”, 70 Am. J. Comp. L. 1 (2022)
2022: Saska Lettmaier, “A Tale of Two Countries: Divorce in England and Prussia 1670-1794”, 69 Am. J. Comp. L. 1 (2022).
2021: co-winners James Fowkes, “Normal Rights, Just New: Understanding the Judicial Enforcement of Socioeconomic Rights”, 68 Am. J. Comp. L. 722-759 (2020); and Han Liu, “Regime Centered and Court-Centered Understandings: The Reception of American Constitutional Law in Contemporary China”, 68 Am. J. Comp. L. 95-150 (2020).
2020: Michelle Miao, “Defining Death-Eligible Murder in China”, 67 Am. J. Comp. L. 327-382 (2019).
2019: Jaakko Salminen, “The Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh”, 66 Am. J. Comp. L. 411-451 (2018)
2018: James G. Stewart & Asad Kiyani, “The Ahistoricism of Legal Pluralism in International Criminal Law” 65 Am. J. Comp. L. 393-449 (2017)
2017: Maya Berinzon & Ryan C. Briggs, “Legal Families Without the Laws: The Fading of Colonial Law in French West Africa”, 64 Am. J. Comp. L. 329-370 (2016)
2016: Philomila Tsoukala, “Household Regulation and European Integration: The Family Portrait of a Crisis”, 63 Am. J. Comp. L. 747-800 (2015)
2016: Yan Lin, “Constitutional Interpretation in Lawmaking: China’s Invisible Constitutional Enforcement Mechanism”, 63 Am. J. Comp. L. 467-492 (2015)
2013: Mariana Pargendler, “Politics in the Origins: The Making of Corporate Law in Nineteenth Century Brazil,” 60 Am. J. Comp. L. 805 (2012).
2012: Andreas Abegg, “The Evolution of the Contracting State and Its Courts,” 59 Am. J. Comp. L. 611 (2011).
2011: Amalia D. Kessler, Lewis Talbot and Nadine Hearn Shelton, Professor of International Legal Studies, & Professor (by courtesy) of History Stanford Law School. “Marginalization and Myths: The corporatist Roots of France’s Forgotten, Elective Judiciary” 58 Am. J. Comp. L. 679 (2010).
2010: Richard Albert, “The Fusion of Presidentialism and Parliamentarism,” 57 Am. J. Comp. L. 531 (2009).
2009: Haider Ala Hamoudi, “The Muezzin’s Call and the Dow Jones Bell: On the Necessity of Realism in the Study of Islamic Law” 56 Am. J. Comp. L.423 (2008).
2008: Ron Scalise, “Why No ‘Efficient Breach’ in the Civil Law?: A Comparative Assessment of the Doctrine of Efficient Breach of Contract” 55 Am. J. Comp. L. 721 (2007).
2007: Máximo Langer, “The Rise of Managerial Judging in International Criminal Law,” 53 Am. J. Comp. L. 853-910 (2005).
2006: Aditi Bagchi, “The Political Economy of Merger Regulation,” 53 Am. J. Comp. L. 1-30 (2005).
2005: Zdenĕk Kühn, “Worlds Apart: Western and Central European Judicial Culture at the Onset of the European Enlargement,” 52 Am. J. Comp. L. 531-67 (2004).
2004: Mark D. West & Emily M. Morris, “The Tragedy of the Condominiums: Legal Responses to Collective Action Problems After the Kobe Earthquake,” 51 Am. J. Comp. L. 903-40 (2003).
2003: Katharina Pistor, “The Standardization of Law and Its Effect on Developing Economies,” 50 Am. J. Comp. L. 97-130 (2002).
2002: Tom Ginsburg, “Dismantling the ‘Developmental State’?: Administrative Procedure Reform in Japan and Korea,” 49 Am. J. Comp. L. 585-625 (2001).
2001: Elisabetta Grande, “Italian Criminal Justice: Borrowing and Resistance,” 48 Am. J. Comp. L. 227-59 (2000).
2000: Jeremy Sarkin, “The Drafting of South Africa’s Final Constitution from a Human-Rights Perspective,” 47 Am. J. Comp. L. 67-87 (1999).Stuart Dutson, “Product Liability and Private International Law: Choice of Law in Tort in England,” 47 Am. J. Comp. L. 129-46 (1999).
1996: Steve J. Boom, “The European Union after the Maastricht Decision: Will Germany Be the ‘Virginia of Europe’?,” 43 Am. J. Comp. L. 177-226 (1995).
1995: Jonathan E. Levitski, “The Europeanization of British Legal Style,” 42 Am. J. Comp. L. 347-80 (1994).· 1992: Martin Boodman, “The Myth of Harmonization of Laws,” 39 Am. J. Comp. L. 699-724 (1991).
Senior Scholar Prize
Established in 2001 to honor a recently deceased ASCL member, the Prizes Committee selects an individual to remember for his or her scholarly legacy and service to the ASCL. The prize of $1,500 recognizes and is awarded for the best scholarly article published in a recent volume of the Journal. The Committee seeks a congruence between the subject matter of the article selected for the prize and the scholarly work of the deceased person in whose honor the prize is named.
Prize Winners:
2021: Howard Abrams Prize – Alessandro Morelli & Oreste Pollicino, for their co-authored article “Metaphors, Judicial Frames, and Fundamental Rights in Cyberspace”, 68 Am. J. Comp. L. 616-646 (2020).
2019: Roger Goebel Prize – Wolf-Georg Ringe for the article “Changing Law and Ownership Patterns in Germany: Corporate Governance and the Erosion of Deutschland AG”, 63 Am. J. Comp. L. 493 (2015).
2015: H. Patrick Glenn Prize – James Gordley of Tulane University
2015: John Henry Merryman Prize – James Q. Whitman of Yale Law School
2008: Ed Wise Prize — Jacqueline Ross, “The Place of Covert Surveillance in Democratic Societies: A Comparative Study of the United States and Germany,” 55 Am. J. Comp. L.(2007).
2008: Rudy Schlesinger Prize — Comparative Methodology — David Clark, “The Modern Development of American Comparative Law: 1904-1945,” 55 Am. J. Comp. L. 587 (2007).
2006: Dan Henderson Prize — Asian Law and Civil Procedure — Carlos Wing-Hung Lo and Ed Snape, “Lawyers in the People’s Republic of China: A Study of Commitment and Professionalism,” 53 Am. J. Comp. L. 433-456 (2005).
2005: Herbert L. Bernstein Prize — Contracts — James Gordley, “Impossibility and Changed and Unforeseen Circumstances,” 52 Am. J. Comp. L. 513-30 (2004).
2005: Edward M. Wise Prize — Criminal Law and Procedure — Jacqueline E. Ross, “Impediments to Transnational Cooperation in Undercover Policing: A Comparative Study of the United States and Italy,” 52 Am. J. Comp. L. 569-623 (2004).· 2002 Friedrich K. Juenger Prize — Private International Law — Symeon C. Symeonides, “Choice of Law in the American Courts in 2000: As the Century Turns,” 49 Am. J. Comp. L. 1-47 (2001).
Lifetime Achievement Award
Established in 2003 to honor living senior comparativists whose writings have changed the shape or direction of American comparative or private international law. It is a non-monetary recognition of lifetime extraordinary scholarly contributions to comparative law in the United States.
Prize Winners:
2023: John H. Langbein, Sterling professor Emeritus of Law and Legal History, Yale Law School
2022: Vivian Grosswald Curran, Vice-President, International Academy of Comparative Law Distinguished Professor of Law, University of Pittsburgh School of Law
2022: James Russell Gordley, W.R. Irby Chair in Law Professor, Tulane University School of Law
2016: George A. Bermann, Jean Monnet Professor of European Union Law, Walter Gellhorn Professor of Law, and director of the Center for International Commercial and Investment Arbitration and the Center for European Legal Studies, Columbia Law School
2014: Symeon Symeonides, Alex L. Parks Distinguished Professor of Law, Willamette University College of Law
2014: Richard M. Buxbaum, Jackson H. Ralston Professor of International Law (emeritus), University of California at Berkeley School of Law
2013: Jerome Cohen, Professor of Law, New York University School of Law
2012: Alan Watson, Distinguished Research Professor and Ernest P. Rogers Chair, University of Georgia School of Law
2009: Mirjan Damaška, Sterling Professor of Law Emeritus, Yale Law School
2004: John Henry Merryman, Nelson Bowman Sweitzer & Marie B. Sweitzer Professor of Law Emeritus and Affiliated Professor of Art Emeritus, Stanford University
2004: Eric Stein, Hessel E. Yntema Professor of Law Emeritus, University of Michigan·
2004: Arthur T. von Mehren, Story Professor of Law Emeritus, Harvard University
