Human Rights and the Decay of Democracy
Other Research Groups
Group Publications
Human Rights Group Paper 2014
Human Rights Group Paper 2015
Human Rights Group Paper 2016
Human Rights and the Decay of Democracy
Group Members

Co-Chair
Bertil Emrah Oder is the Dean and Professor of Constitutional Law at Koç University Law School, received her PhD in both public and private law from University of Cologne (Germany). Dr. Oder’s research focuses on comparative constitutional law, European Union law and international human rights law. She is a full member of the Science Academy and has national and international awards for her scholarly achievements. She has been also selected as Henry Morris Lecturer of International and Comparative Law in 2012 by Chicago-Kent College of Law. She has served as international consultant of UN Women and Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) and published four books, dozens of articles, editorials and book chapters on various subjects in public law with focus on human rights and judicial review. Fluent in English, German and Turkish, Dr. Oder holds also LLB and MA/LLM degrees from the University of Istanbul and Marmara University (Turkey).

Associate Professor and Executive Director
Dr. Upasana Mahanta is an Associate Professor and Executive Director, Centre for Women, Law & Social Change, Jindal Global Law School, O.P. Jindal Global University (JGU).

Atagün Mert Kejanlıoğlu is currently a doctoral student at McGill University Faculty of Law. His dissertation is focused on populist challenges to constitutionalism and responses that constitutional theory can develop against these challenges.

Dr. Adam Shinar is an assistant professor at the Radzyner Law School in IDC Herzliya. He has an S.J.D. from Harvard Law School, where he also served as the Clark Byse Fellow. He also holds an LL.B. from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and an LL.M. from Harvard Law School. He clerked for the President of the Israeli Supreme Court, Aharon Barak, and worked as an attorney for several human rights NGOs in Israel and India. He specializes in constitutional law and theory, administrative law, and labor law.

Associate Professor in the Department of Commercial Law
After obtaining her LLB in 1995, Tracy completed her articles and was admitted as an attorney in 1997. Thereafter she worked as a legal advisor and, in 2003 she joined the law faculty as a lecturer. After a short absence from the law faculty and employment at the South African Revenue Service, she rejoined the faculty in March 2015. She is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Commercial Law and is involved in the teaching of both undergraduate and postgraduate law students, in the areas of tax and finance law. Her research interests are in the areas of business law, tax law, finance law, international tax law and legal education. Her PHD thesis focused on the methods used to relieve international double taxation in South African domestic legislation and tax treaties entered into by South Africa. See more.

Prof Anton Kok holds the degrees BCom (Law) LLB LLM LLD (Pret). After completing his articles of clerkship at Deneys Reitz Inc (now Norton Rose Fulbright), Sandton, Anton was appointed senior lecturer to the Department of Legal History, Comparative Law and Legal Philosophy (now the Department of Jurisprudence) in 1999. He completed his doctorate in March 2008, entitled “A socio-legal analysis of the Promotion of Equality and Prevention of Unfair Discrimination Act 4 of 2000”. He was promoted to associate professor in 2010. He was appointed as the Programme Coordinator for the LLB for 2008 and 2009 and as Deputy Dean of the Faculty in 2010 and as acting dean from January to October 2011. He was reappointed for a second term as Deputy Dean in 2014.
At undergraduate level, Anton has taught Legal Skills, Critical Race and Gender, Introduction to Law, Law and Literature and Human Rights. He is the coordinator for Essay and Seminar 400. At postgraduate level he has taught on Discrimination Law in the LLM (Human Rights and Constitutional Practice), LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa) and the LLM/MPhil (Multi-disciplinary human rights).His main areas of interest are equality legislation, human rights and legal education.

Professor of Law at IE Law School
Professor of Law at IE Law School and Legal Adviser in the Council of State (Spain) since 1991, and having served as Undersecretary of Defense for the Spanish government for four years, Víctor Torre de Silva is an expert in administrative law, and is also interested in contracts and property law. He has also served as director in the board of several companies, including the Spanish railways company, the Spanish ports authority and “Construcciones Aeronáuticas, S.A.” (today part of EADS), and has been chief of staff of the Speaker of Spanish Parliament (Congreso de los Diputados). He received the Isabel la Católica Great Cross by royal decree in May 2004. In the course of his career he has had numerous articles and research works published in specialised journals, including Revista de Administración Pública (Spanish public sector journal) and Revista Española de Derecho Administrativo (Spanish administrative law journal). Professor Torre de Silva’s research projects include a thesis undertaken at Harvard on regulatory agencies.