Thomas Jefferson School of Law

Susan W. Tiefenbrun is a Professor of Law at Thomas Jefferson School of Law. She received her J.D. from New York University Law School, a Ph.D. with distinction from Columbia University, an M.A. and a B.S. from the University of Wisconsin where she was Phi Beta Kappa as a junior and graduated magna cum laude. She now teaches international law in Thomas Jefferson School of Law where she is the Director of the Center for Global Legal Studies and the former Director of the LL.M. Programs in International Trade and in American Legal Studies. She was awarded the French Legion of Honor, France’s highest distinction, by Presidential Decree from the Republic of France on July 7, 2003. She was awarded for her service to legal education from the San Diego County Bar Association on April 3, 2004. She was appointed to the Book Awards Committee of the American Society of International Law in 2003 and re-appointed in 2004, and she has been a member of ASIL since l999. She was appointed Master and Scholar in Residence of the Oliver Wendell Holmes American Inns of Court from 2002 to the present. Her special interests are international law, international business transactions, international intellectual property, international human rights law, and law and literature. She has written a book-length study of Soviet laws and Eastern European joint venture laws, numerous articles on international intellectual property and piracy, the World Court, ad hoc courts,  and international human rights, as well as global sex trafficking. She has edited three books on law and the arts, war crimes and legal ethics. She has published three books recently:  Decoding International Law: Semiotics and the Humanities (Oxford Univ. Press, 2010), Tax Free Trade Zones of the World and in the United States (Edward Elgar Press, 2012), and Women’s International and Comparative Human Rights (Carolina Academic Press, 2012). She is President of the Law & Humanities Institute West-coast Branch. She lectures in English, French and Russian on private international law transactions and international trade. Professor Tiefenbrun speaks ten foreign languages. Professor Tiefenbrun is the founding director of the China Program in Hangzhou, China.

Pierre Leval is a judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He is a graduate of Harvard College (58), and Harvard Law School (63), where he served as Note Editor of the Harvard Law Review. After clerking for Judge Henry J. Friendly of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in 1963-64, Judge Leval served for four years as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of New York, where he was Chief of Appeals. During 1969-74, Judge Leval practiced, first as an associate, then a partner, at Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton, primarily in international finance and litigation.  He then joined the District Attorney of New York County, serving as First Assistant and Chief Assistant. In 1977 he was appointed to the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, where he served until his appointment to the Court of Appeals in 1993. Judge Leval has published and lectured on copyright, intellectual property and free speech issues. He is an adjunct professor at the New York University School of Law and a member of the Council of the American Law Institute.

Rudy Hasl is the Dean, President, and a Professor of Law at Thomas Jefferson School of Law. Dean Hasl has earned the distinction of currently being the longest serving law school dean in the nation. He has achieved more than 30 years as dean at TJSL and three other ABA law schools, including Saint Louis University, St. John’s University and Seattle University. Over the decades, he has built a successful track record in fundraising, capital improvement planning and oversight, and institutional reputation building. At TJSL, he has significantly increased the diversity of the faculty and staff as well as the student population so that TJSL is consistently ranked as one of the most diverse law schools in the nation. He has added several new and successful academic programs, including summer study abroad programs in Hangzhou, China, and Nice, France, and launched three new LL.M. programs with an international focus. He also has significantly bolstered the academic support programs at TJSL.

Much of Dean Hasl’s time and energy the past few years was devoted to the planning and construction of TJSL’s new eight-story campus that opened for classes in January 2011. He has extensive experience in leadership positions within the American Bar Association (ABA), the Association of American Law Schools (AALS) and the Law School Admissions Council. Dean Hasl has served as Chair of the ABA Council of the Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar and its Accreditation and Standards Review Committees. He also served as the ABA representative on the board of the Council on Legal Education Opportunity (CLEO). Dean Hasl recently was appointed to serve a three-year term on the AALS Committee on the Recruitment and Retention of Minority Faculty and Students. In addition, he served four years as a member of the TJSL Board of Trustees from 2001-2004 before being appointed Dean in 2005.

Aaron Schwabach is a Professor of Law at Thomas Jefferson School of Law. At Berkeley, Professor Schwabach was an associate editor of the Ecology Law Quarterly. After graduation, he clerked with the Department of Justice’s Executive Office of Immigration Review, working on employer sanctions and anti-discrimination cases arising under IRCA. Professor Schwabach then taught at the University of Miami School of Law and Gonzaga University School of Law before coming to TJSL. He has published books and articles on topics including international environmental law, intellectual property, Internet law, immigration policy, the life of Thomas Jefferson and the law of Harry Potter.

Claire Wright is an Associate Professor of Law at Thomas Jefferson School of Law. Prior to joining the TJSL faculty, Professor Wright was a partner at the international law firm of Baker & McKenzie, where she practiced both real estate and international trade law. She also was a partner at the consulting firm of Ernst & Young LLP. At Ernst & Young LLP, Professor Wright directed the firm’s World Trade Organization (WTO) Center, where she advised a large number of countries and companies regarding WTO issues. Professor Wright has special expertise in matters involving Mexico and China, and she often teaches a trade law course in TJSL’s summer program at Zhejiang University (Guanghua) School of Law in Hangzhou, China. During the summer of 2011, she taught a course entitled Reconciling Cultural Diversity and Free Trade in the Global Economy in TJSL’s summer program at the University of Nice School of Law in Nice, France. She has also taught WTO law at both Stanford Law School and the Graduate School of International Relations and Pacific Studies at the University of California, San Diego.

She is a member of a committee of the American Law Institute which publishes a review of the cases decided each year by the Appellate Body of the WTO. Professor Wright was a law clerk for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, where she worked primarily for then-Judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg. She has worked on a variety of human rights matters for Amnesty International and she has spoken and published widely on issues involving international trade, the WTO, U.S.-China relations, U.S.-Mexico relations, international trade in cultural products and media services, urban policies and human rights.

Yongxin Song is a Professor of Law at Zhejiang University Guanghua School of Law. He earned his LL.M. from Beijing University Department of Law and also has a degree in western languages and literature from Beijing University. He was a visiting scholar at the University of Indiana where he did research on American business law. He teaches International law, comparative business organizations, the law of the WTO, Chinese commercial law, international economic law, legal English, and an introduction to the Chinese legal system. He has been a Visiting Professor at several universities outside of China:  Griffith University School of Law in Australia, American University Washington College of Law, Marshall University at the John Deaver Drinko Academy, Capital University Law and Graduate Center, and Indiana University School of Law in Bloomington, Indiana. Professor Song has written several books including a Guide to the Law of International Economic Organizations, Unincorporated Business Organizations of the United States, A Concise Dictionary of International Law, and Private International Law, among others. He has also written many scholarly articles on a wide range of subjects including the international human rights obligations of multinational corporations, the application of the comparative fault principle to contracts in China, Chinese partnership law, a new type of limited liability company in the United States, some unique features of the Chinese law of corporations, and China’s new bankruptcy law and its English translation. Professor Song is an active participant in the establishment of the Thomas Jefferson School of Law and Zhejiang University Guanghua School of Law joint venture in international law.

Hongdao Qian is a Doctor of Jurisprudence and earned a post-doctorate degree in economics. He is the first post-doctorate scholar doing research on the intersection of law and economics. He undertakes an economic analysis of law from the new point of view of Chinese characteristics, has done theoretical work on corporate law, economic law, and comparative law. Before joining Guanghua Law School of Zhejiang University as a professor of law, Professor Qian was a scholar and professor in the graduate school of the Chinese Academy of Social Science, and a senior visiting scholar of Waseda University in 2001. He was also the administrative assistant editor of the Chinese Academic Yearbook, vice-chairman of the China Society of Comparative Law, Chairman of the Board of Supervisors of the China Venture Capital Co., Ltd., commissioner of the Investment Decision Committee, director and vice dean of China Venture Capital Research Institute, and chairman of the Society of Commercial Law of Zhejiang Province, China.

Leslie Kuan-Hsi Wang is the Assistant Dean and  Professor of Law at the Zhejiang University Guanghua Law School in Hangzhou, China and an Adjunct Associate Professor at the Shizouka University Law School in Shizouka, Japan. Professor Wang has been a visiting scholar at the Harvard-Yenching Institute in Cambridge, Massachusetts in the U.S. and the Soochow University Law School in Taipei, Taiwan and a postdoctoral researcher at the Renmin University of China Law School in Beijing, China.

Jun Zhais is an Associate Professor at Guanghua Law School, Zhejiang University. He currently serves as the head of Research Institute of International law,  Zhejiang University. He earned his J.D. at Cornell Law School, LL.M. at Harvard Law School, and LL.B. at Zhejiang University. Before joining Guanghua Law School, he was a visiting scholar at Harvard Law School, East Asian Legal Studies. He also worked as a corporate associate at Mintz Levin Cohn Ferris Glovsky and Popeo P.C. and Kirkland & Ellis International LLP, where he focused his practice on mergers, acquisitions, private equity, public offerings, and private placements. He has published widely on international economic law and comparative law in top journals. He is a Director and Deputy Secretary-General of Commercial Law Section, Law Society of Zhejiang Province. He also serves as a Director of International Economic Law Section, Law Society of Zhejiang Province.