Book Project
Frontier Courts: Justice, Change, and Law on the Margins
The law relies on a fiction that its authority is apolitical, immune to the tensions, contradictions, and pressures of the social world. But legal institutions, like all organizations, are social creatures. In this book project, I explore how legal institutions operating beyond the traditional reach of state authority — the International Criminal Court in The Hague, the Special Jurisdiction for Peace in Colombia, and the Red Hook Community Justice Center in New York City — do not simply enforce the law, but actively shape the meaning and practice of justice. Drawing on a decade of fieldwork across diverse global contexts, the book examines how these “frontier courts” navigate political resistance, fragile legitimacy, and competing legal frameworks to address social harm and institutional accountability. Rather than treating courts as neutral arbiters, this book situates them as dynamic spaces of struggle where legal norms are contested, negotiated, and reimagined. In doing so, I aim to highlight the significance of these institutions for communities engaged in building peace, advancing justice, and redefining the role of law in transitional and marginalized settings.
Op-Eds & Blogs
2025 “New Metaphors, Same Framing: Breaking the Cycle of Punitive Public Safety Policy.” Columbia University School of Professional Studies.
2025 “From Punishment to Transformation: Investing in Youth to Build Community Safety.” Salzburg Global Seminar.
2024 “Safety is a system, and reducing crime is just one part of it.” The Fulcrum
2024 “How to Measure the Impact of Community Justice in Brooklyn.” M.S. in Negotiation and Conflict Resolution, Columbia University.
2023 “Americans do talk about peace − just not the same way people do in other countries.” The Conversation. With Amy Lerman, Naomi Levy and Fiorella Vera-Adrianzén.
2022 “Mixing Images and Indicators to Build Inclusive Rigour.” Action Research +. With Tiffany Fairey and Pamina Firchow.
2022 “Everyday Peace Indicators: An effective tool for measuring hard to measure social concepts.” Open Philanthropy Effective Altruism Forum. With Pamina Firchow, Roger Mac Ginty and Naomi Levy.
2022 “Opinion: To build peace in war-torn Colombia, we need to think smaller.” DevEx. With Alejandro Castillejo Cuéllar and Pamina Firchow.
2020 “U.S. cities and states are discussing reparations for Black Americans. Here’s what’s key.” The Washington Post.
2020 “Trash is Piling up in Rural Colombia. That’s a Bad Sign for Peace.” Political Violence at a Glance. With the EPI Colombia Research Team.
2020 “Dabeiba (Antioquia), más allá de la fosa común.” El Espectador Colombia 2020. With the EPI Colombia Research Team.
2016 “Reparations and Assistance for Victims: Lessons from the ICC and Colombia.” Beyond The Hague.
2013 “On the Eve of the AU Summit: How the ICC Is Being Defended.” Justice in Conflict.
Refereed Publications
Forthcoming “A Two-Headed Monster: Balancing Criminal Justice Reform with Transformation.” Northwestern Law Review. With Hadar Dancig-Rosenberg.
Forthcoming “Justice of Our Own: Community Justice in Red Hook, Brooklyn.” Vanderbilt Law Review. With Hadar Dancig-Rosenberg
2025 “The Politics of Measurement in the Age of Localization: Comparing Top-down versus Bottom-up Metrics of Reconciliation.” International Political Sociology. With Pamina Firchow.
2024 Measures of Justice: A Symposium in Honor of Sally Engle Merry. Editor of Accepted Symposium in Law and Social Inquiry. With Pamina Firchow.
2023 “The Paradox of Justice: From Transitional to Everyday Justice.” Law and Social Inquiry. With Pamina Firchow and Fiorella Vera-Adrianzén.
2023 “Reimagining Public Safety: Defining ‘Community’ in Participatory Research.” Law and Social Inquiry. With Amy Lerman and Naomi Levy.
2022 “Images and indicators: mixing participatory methods to build inclusive rigour.” Action Research Journal. With Tiffany Fairey and Pamina Firchow.
2022 “Collective Justice: Ex-Combatants and Community Reparations in Colombia.” Journal of Human Rights Practice. With Pamina Firchow.
2019 “Postconflict Reparations.” Oxford Research Encyclopedia of International Studies, edited by William R. Thomson. Oxford: Oxford University Press. With Luke Moffett and Adriana Rudling.
2017 “Reparations in the Transition from Violence to Peace.” Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics, edited by Renée Marlin-Bennett. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
2016 “Reparations, Assistance and the Experience of Justice: Lessons from Colombia and the Congo.” International Journal of Transitional Justice.
2016 “Evaluating Transitional Justice: The Role of Multi-Level Mixed Methods Datasets and the Colombia Reparation Program for War Victims.” Transitional Justice Review. With Phuong N. Pham, Patrick Vinck, Bridget Marchesi, Douglas Johnson, and Kathryn Sikkink.
2013 "International Criminal Justice as a Transnational Field: Rules, Authority and Victims." International Journal of Transitional Justice. With Chris Tenove.
Book Chapters
2023 “From Transitional to Everyday Justice: Understanding Justice and Coexistence in Daily Life.” Reconciliation: Experiences in Colombia and the World, edited by Angelika Rettberg. Bogota: Universidad de Los Andes. With Pamina Firchow and Fiorella Vera-Adrianzén.
2023 “Transitional Justice and Development.” Research Handbook on Transitional Justice, Second Edition, edited by Cheryl Lawther, Luke Moffett, and Dov Jacobs. London: Edward Elgar Publishing.
2017 “Transitional Justice and Development.” Research Handbook on Transitional Justice, edited by Cheryl Lawther, Luke Moffett, and Dov Jacobs. London: Edward Elgar Publishing.
2015 “Reparations and the Politics of Recognition.” Contested Justice: The Politics and Practice of International Criminal Court Interventions, edited by Carsten Stahn, Christian de Vos, and Sara Kendall. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Reports & Guidelines
2022 Belfast Guidelines on Reparations in Post-Conflict Societies. Queen’s University, Belfast. With Luke Moffett, Cheryl Lawther, Kieran McEvoy, and Clara Sandoval.
2022 Handbook on Civil Society Organizations and Donors Engagement on Reparations. Queen’s University, Belfast. With Luke Moffett, Cheryl Lawther, Kieran McEvoy, and Clara Sandoval.
2019 Alternative Sanctions before the Special Jurisdiction for Peace: Reflections on International Law and Transitional Justice. Belfast: Queens University Belfast. With Luke Moffett, Cheryl Lawther, Kieran McEvoy, and Clara Sandoval.
2015 An Evaluation of Comprehensive Reparations Measures in Colombia: Accomplishments and Challenges. Cambridge: Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, Harvard Humanitarian Initiative. With Kathryn Sikkink, Phuong N. Pham, Douglas A. Johnson, Peter J. Dixon, Bridget Marchesi, and Patrick Vinck.
2014 Le Droit de Connaitre: Vérité et Reconciliation en Ituri. Amsterdam: IKV Pax Christi.
2011 Reviewing Rehabilitation Assistance and Preparing for Delivering Reparations. The Hague: International Criminal Court, Trust Fund for Victims.
Banner Photo: Peter Dixon, Nyankunde, Democratic Republic of the Congo