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Research Programs and Centers

Harvard Law School's research programs and centers produce cutting-edge work in a wide range of fields and disciplines. From civil rights law to cyberlaw, human rights law to law and economics, these "idea laboratories" host lectures, symposia, and conferences that enhance intellectual discourse and debate on campus and beyond. The programs also provide students with valuable research opportunities and the chance to work directly with faculty members on projects at the cores of their scholarly agendas.

Berkman Center for Internet and Society
An entrepreneurial research program founded in 1997 to explore cyberspace, share in its study, and help pioneer its development.

Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice
The Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice seeks to further the vision of racial justice and equality through research, policy analysis, litigation and scholarship. The Houston Institute will place a special emphasis on the issues of voting rights, the future of affirmative action, the criminal justice system and related areas.

Child Advocacy Program
Committed to advancing children's interests through facilitating productive interaction between academia and the world of policy and practice, and through training generations of students to contribute in their future careers to law reform and social change.

East Asian Legal Studies Program
Seeks to respond to the interest in the legal cultures of China, Japan, Korea, and Southeast Asia on the part of lawyers, historians and scholars of international and comparative law.

Environmental Law Program
Dedicated to promoting and supporting scholarship, coursework, clinical practice, and academic programming at HLS in the field of environmental law.

European Law Research Center
A collaborative faculty effort to foster new thinking about European international and comparative law. Founded in 1991, the Center focuses on the law of the European Communities, national law in western and central Europe and the European intellectual tradition.

Harvard Project on Disability
The Harvard Project on Disability works to promote the human rights of people with disabilities worldwide. Our central mission is facilitating domestic-level implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, a human rights treaty that impacts the lives of some 650 million disabled persons globally. Founded in 2004 by Vice Dean Alford and Visiting Professor Stein, HPOD engages in academic research, international advocacy, and human rights training.

Human Rights Program
Gives impetus and direction to international human rights work at Harvard Law School through clinical and course work, student participation, research and scholarship, and links with human rights groups.

Islamic Legal Studies Program
Dedicated to achieving excellence in the study of Islamic law through objective and comparative methods.

John M. Olin Center for Law, Economics and Business
Supports research, issues discussion papers, and offers research assistantships and fellowships to Harvard Law students in law and economics.

Labor and Worklife Program
A multidisciplinary, research and policy program examining labor issues and the world of work.

The Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics
Launched in 2005, the Petrie-Flom Center is an interdisciplinary research program dedicated to the scholarly research of important issues about the intersection of law and health policy, including issues of health care financing and market regulation, biomedical research, and bioethics.

Program on Corporate Governance
Fosters research and scholarship about corporate governance.

Program on International Financial Systems
Promotes research and instruction linking law, economics, and finance; provides public policy assistance in commercial and financial law reform; and conducts international symposia that foster building the financial system.

Program on Negotiation
An inter-university (Harvard, MIT, Tufts) research center dedicated to improving the theory and practice of negotiation and dispute resolution.

Program on the Legal Profession
Promotes research, scholarship and teaching about the norms, structures, and functions of the legal profession in the United States and around the world.

Tax Law Program
The Harvard Law School International Tax Program was founded in 1952 pursuant to a resolution of the United Nations. There are now more than 900 alumni, many of whom occupy senior positions in governments, international organizations the private sector, and academia. The program currently provides two opportunities for the study of tax law at Harvard--Visiting Scholars and Researchers in Taxation and the LL.M. Concentration in Taxation (which offers a significant array of courses, seminars, and reading groups in U.S. tax law, all of which are open to students in both the J.D. and LL.M. programs.)

Research Programs

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