Events

This symposium examines critical issues in human rights and the rule of law, including sentencing enforcement, correctional education, and recidivism prevention. We also explore how international judicial bodies interact with national legal systems, analyzing the intersection between global frameworks and domestic justice practices. The program features practical case studies demonstrating how human rights are implemented and managed in real-world contexts.
The symposium will address fundamental questions: What do universal human rights mean in contemporary society? How do these principles benefit our communities? And what legal and institutional mechanisms exist to uphold justice and protect individual rights across different legal traditions?

Welcoming Remarks:
Barbara Faedda, Executive Director, Italian Academy; Ambassador/Permanent Observer of the European Public Law Organization (EPLO) to the United Nations
Spyridon Flogaitis, Director, EPLO; Professor of Public Law, University of Athens

Keynote Speaker:
Giuliano Amato, Former President of the Italian Constitutional Court

Speakers:
John Bessler, Professor of Law, University of Baltimore School of Law
Marian Da Silva, TrialWatch Legal Fellow, Columbia Law School Human Rights Institute
Olatunde Johnson, Ruth Bader Ginsburg ’59 Professor of Law, Columbia Law School

Moderator:
Sarah Maree Knuckey, Lieff, Cabraser, Heimann and Bernstein Clinical Professor of Human Rights, Columbia School of Law

Special Intervention:
Miguel Ángel Moratinos, United Nations Under-Secretary-General; High Representative for the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (UNAOC) 

Co-Sponsor: 
European Public Law Organization (EPLO)

Organizer: 
Barbara Faedda  
Executive Director, Italian Academy; Ambassador/Permanent Observer, EPLO

Click here to register.

Check-in for registrants begins 30 minutes before the event. 
This event is in-person only.
The organizers do not intend to make a video recording for publication.

This conversation is part of the Italian Academy’s “Rule of Law” initiative, conceived by Barbara Faedda, which includes the 2023 roundtable “People, Rule of Law, and Supreme Courts Now,” the 2024 dialogue “Tales from the Legal Front Line,” the 2025 dialogue “Liberation! 80 Years Since the End of World War II in Italy,” and the 2021 collection of essays titled Rule of Law: Cases, Strategies, and Interpretations.

“It is essential…that human rights should be protected by the rule of law.”
    Universal Declaration of Human Rights 

ABOUT THE PARTICIPANTS 

Giuliano Amato, born in 1938, studied law at the University of Pisa, where he graduated in 1960. Master’s degree in Comparative Law at the School of Law of Columbia University (N.Y.) in 1962. Full Professor of Comparative Constitutional Law at the University of Rome, School of Political Science, from 1975 to 1997, he is Professor Emeritus of the European University Institute in Florence and of the University La Sapienza in Rome. Member of the Italian Parliament for 18 years, he was Under Secretary to the Prime Minister’s Office, Minister for the Treasury, Minister for Constitutional Reforms, Minister of Interior, Deputy Prime Minister and twice Prime Minister (in 1992/1993 and 2000/2001). He also headed the Italian Antitrust Authority from 1994 to 1997 and was Vice-President of the Convention on the Future of Europe (2002/2003) and Chairman of the International Commission on the Balkans, sponsored in 2005 by the Bosch Stiftung, the German Marshall Fund, the King Baudouin Foundation and the C.S. Foundation. He also chaired the Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana (2009/2013), the S. Anna Superior School in Pisa and the Center for American Studies in Rome. Justice of the Italian Constitutional Court since September 2013, he was elected President of it in January 2022. He is now President Emeritus. 
Elected Honorary Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2002, he has written books and articles on the economy and public institutions, European antitrust, personal liberties, comparative government, European Integration and Humanities.

John D. Bessler teaches at the University of Baltimore School of Law and the Georgetown University Law Center and is Of Counsel at Stinson LLP. A two-time Minnesota Book Award finalist, he has written multiple books on American legal history and capital punishment, including Cruel and Unusual: The American Death Penalty and the Founders’ Eighth Amendment (2012), The Death Penalty as Torture: From the Dark Ages to Abolition (2017), and The Death Penalty’s Denial of Fundamental Human Rights: International Law, State Practice, and the Emerging Abolitionist Norm (2023). He also edited U.S. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer’s Against the Death Penalty (2016), which reprints, annotates, and contextualizes Justice Breyer’s landmark dissent against capital punishment in Glossip v. Gross (2015)—the 5–4 decision upholding the constitutionality of Oklahoma’s three-drug lethal injection protocol. His 2014 book, The Birth of American Law: An Italian Philosopher and the American Revolution, was the recipient of an American Association for Italian Studies Book Award and the Scribes Book Award, a prestigious national award given out by The American Society of Legal Writers since 1961 for “the best work of legal scholarship published during the previous year.” He has a B.A. in political science from the University of Minnesota, a J.D. from Indiana University-Maurer School of Law in Bloomington, an M.F.A. degree from Hamline University in St. Paul, and a master’s degree in international human rights law from Oxford University. He has previously taught at the University of Minnesota Law School, the George Washington University Law School, Rutgers School of Law, the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, and the University of Trento in Italy. In 2018, he received the University System of Maryland Board of Regents’ Faculty Award for Research, Scholarship, or Creative Activity, and in both 2018 and during the 2024–2025 academic year he was a visiting scholar at the University of Minnesota Law School’s Human Rights Center. In 2024, he was elected to the American Law Institute.

Marian Da Silva is the TrialWatch Legal Fellow at the Columbia Law School Human Rights Institute. Before joining HRI, Da Silva built substantial expertise in human rights law, international advocacy, and strategic litigation. As a human rights lawyer at Defiende Venezuela and the Observatory for Crimes Against Humanity, she represented over 50 victims of serious human rights violations—including arbitrary detentions, extrajudicial executions, and torture—before bodies such as the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, the United Nations, and the International Criminal Court. Her strategic litigation and advocacy efforts extended to countries including Venezuela, Trinidad and Tobago, Bolivia, Nicaragua, and Cuba, where she focused on securing justice and accountability for human rights abuses. 
Da Silva has trained more than 200 human rights defenders globally, equipping them with the skills to navigate international human rights mechanisms and advocate for social change. She has led workshops and delivered public speaking training with a focus on empowering vulnerable groups, including women, journalists, and LGBTQ+ communities. At UCL, Da Silva was actively involved in the PIL Pro Bono Project, conducting research on discriminatory torture and the protection of vulnerable groups. She also co-authored Pathway to Freedom: Handbook for the Liberation of Political Prisoners, which provides guidance on advocating for the release of political prisoners. In her previous role as Deputy Secretary of the OAS Panel of Independent Experts investigating possible crimes against humanity in Venezuela, Da Silva contributed to high-level investigations and reporting that addressed henious human rights violations.   
She holds a Master of Laws (LL.M.) in Human Rights Law and International Law with honors from University College London (UCL).

Barbara Faedda serves at Columbia University as the executive director of the Italian Academy for Advanced Studies and as an adjunct professor in the Italian Department. She received her Ph.D. in Legal Anthropology and Social Science from the Università Suor Orsola Benincasa di Napoli after studying at Sapienza Università di Roma.
Among the programs she has designed are the International Observatory for Cultural Heritage (IOCH), the annual Holocaust Remembrance Day, Women Leaders Now (annual events for Women's History Month and International Women's Day), and the Rule of Law Initiative. 
In 2019, she was appointed ambassador, permanent observer for the European Public Law Organization to the United Nations. In 2022, the President of the Italian Republic named Barbara Faedda a “Commendatore Ordine al Merito della Repubblica” (Commander of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic).
Her books include From Da Ponte to the Casa Italiana: A Brief History of Italian Studies at Columbia University (Columbia University Press, 2017), Élite: Cultura italiana e statunitense tra Settecento e Novecento (Ronzani, 2020), Rule of Law. Strategies, Experiences, and Interpretations (editor, Ronzani & Italian Academy for Advanced Studies, 2021), A Lost Mediterranean Culture: The Giant Statues of Sardinia’s Mont’e Prama (co-editor, with P. Carta; Columbia University Press, 2023), and Tharros: A Sardinian Treasure in the Ancient Mediterranean (co-editor with P. Carta, Columbia University Press, 2025).

Spyridon Flogaitis, Docteur en Droit, Docteur en Histoire, Diplômé de l'Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes-IVème Section, Doctor Honoris Causa in several Universities, Director, European Public Law Organization (EPLO), Professor, Faculty of Law, University of Athens, Honorary Fellow, Wolfson College, Cambridge, Academic Bencher, Inner Temple, London, Attorney at Law at the High Court and the Council of State, Greece, Member, International Civil Service Commission, United Nations, Former Alternate Minister of Foreign Affairs (August-September 2015), Former Minister of Interior, (August-September 2009 and August-September 2007), Hellenic Republic, Chevallier de la Legion d’Honneur of the French Republic, Cavaliere Ordine al Merito of the Italian Republic, La Croix d’Officier de l’Ordre du Merite de Hongrie, Grande-Oficial da Ordem do Infante D. Henrique, Portuguese Republic.

Olatunde Johnson is the Ruth Bader Ginsburg ’59 Professor of Law at Columbia Law School. Known for her distinguished scholarship in civil procedure, legislation, and anti-discrimination law, she is equally committed to cultivating the next generation of civic-minded lawyers. In the classroom, Johnson draws on her background in legal practice and government service to illustrate how social change can be effected through litigation as well as problem-solving outside the courtroom.   
Johnson’s research has helped shape the national conversation on modern civil rights legislation, anti-discrimination, fair housing, congressional power, and innovations to address discrimination and inequality. Her recent work examines state and local governments’ efforts to enhance opportunities for historically excluded groups as well as the conflicts that arise when states preempt local efforts to address discrimination and promote wage increases and affordable housing. Together with a group of students, Johnson produced Through the Gale, the 2022 podcast that explored the role of lawyers in the struggle for multiracial democracy.   
In 2016, Johnson was awarded the Law School’s Willis L.M. Reese Prize for Excellence in Teaching and Columbia University’s Presidential Award for Outstanding Teaching. In 2009, Columbia Law School students selected Johnson as the Public Interest Professor of the Year, praising her as a “role model for aspiring public interest lawyers.” In February 2020, she was appointed by the U.S. Department of Justice to the Resolutions Committee honoring Justice John Paul Stevens, for whom she clerked.   
Nearly a decade after she joined the Columbia Law School faculty, in 2006, Johnson was appointed vice dean for Intellectual Life for the 2016–2018 term. In that role, she organized a wide range of events designed to engage the Law School community, from a Lawyers, Community, and Impact panel on recent developments in U.S. law and politics to a roundtable discussion on integration in America, faculty film series, and a book talk.
Johnson brings extensive public service experience to her work at Columbia Law School, including clerking for Judge David Tatel on the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia and Justice John Paul Stevens on the U.S. Supreme Court. From 1997 to 2001, Johnson worked at the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, where she conducted trial- and appellate-level litigation to promote racial and ethnic equity in employment, health, and higher education. From 2001 to 2003, she served as constitutional and civil rights counsel to Senator Edward M. Kennedy on the Senate Judiciary Committee, then as a senior consultant on racial justice in the ACLU’s National Legal Department from 2003 to 2004. 
In 2017, Johnson was elected a member of the American Law Institute.

Sarah Maree Knuckey is a human rights advocate and clinical professor of law, and she directs the Human Rights Clinic and the Human Rights Institute at Columbia Law School. 
Knuckey and Human Rights Clinic students work in partnership with social justice advocates, communities, and rightsholders around the world to investigate human rights abuses and advocate for justice and accountability. The clinic prepares students for lifelong careers in social justice advocacy and works to promote human rights and recalibrate the global power imbalances that drive economic and political inequality, exploitation, threats to physical security, poverty, and environmental injustice.
Knuckey has investigated human rights abuses around the world, including in Brazil, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kenya, the United States, and Yemen. Working with students and local activists, Knuckey has exposed sexual abuse by security guards at a mining company in Papua New Guinea and worked with affected women to advocate for their right to remedy. The Human Rights Clinic has also conducted advocacy about the neglected crisis of mental health in Yemen, interdisciplinary investigations into the right to water for indigenous communities in Papua New Guinea, investigations of U.S. drone strikes, and a landmark mass grave investigation in the Central African Republic.  
Knuckey has received the Columbia University Presidential Award for Outstanding Teaching and numerous grants, including the Columbia President’s Global Innovation Fund grant to research, alongside Yemeni experts, the psychological impacts of the war in Yemen.
Knuckey’s academic research interests include human rights methodologies, critical perspectives on human rights, clinical pedagogy, and mental health. In addition to teaching Columbia law students, she also conducts trainings for NGOs and activists around the world on human rights fact-finding, advocacy, and mental health. She is a co-founder of the Human Rights Methodology Lab, which innovates human rights research, and of the Human Rights Resilience Project, which seeks to improve well-being among activists. She is a founding editor of and contributor to Just Security, an online forum for analysis of U.S. national security law and policy. She also has served as an adviser to the United Nations special rapporteur on extrajudicial executions, as well as chair of the Legal Working Group on the redrafting of the Minnesota Protocol, international guidelines for the investigation of suspicious deaths. 

Miguel Ángel Moratinos is the United Nations Under-Secretary-General holding the post of High Representative for the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (UNAOC) since January 2019- present. In addition to his current portfolio as High Representative for UNAOC, he was appointed in May 2025 as the new United Nations Special Envoy to Combat Islamophobia, and in February 2020, as the UN Focal Point to monitor antisemitism and enhance a system-wide response.
Mr. Moratinos has committed his professional and political career to international relationships and development cooperation, notably as Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation of Spain from 2004 to 2010. During his tenure as Foreign Minister, Spain presided over the UN Security Council in 2004, held the chairmanships-in-office of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), the Council of Europe, and the Council of the European Union. Mr. Moratinos succeeded in fostering the implementation of the Treaty of Lisbon and the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union. 
As a true believer in the value of multilateralism, Mr. Moratinos helped in the creation and launching of the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations in 2005. He also supported the Group of Friends for UN Reform. Moreover, he contributed to the creation of innovative programs for development, healthcare, and women's empowerment within the United Nations system.