Jamie Rowen

Jamie Rowen is Professor of Legal Studies and Political Science at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and Founding Director of the UMass Center for Justice, Law and Societies. After earning a degree in Peace and Conflict Studies from UC Berkeley, she pursued a Ph.D. and J.D. from Berkeley School of Law, focusing on the use of law to address mass atrocity and aid vulnerable groups. She was a doctoral fellow at the American Bar Foundation in 2012-2013. Prior to her current position in legal studies at UMass, Dr. Rowen taught in the Centre for Criminology and Sociolegal Studies at the University of Toronto.

Dr. Rowen's work on Veterans Treatment Courts was supported with a National Science Foundation CAREER Award. Her first book Searching for Truth in the Transitional Justice Movement (Cambridge University Press 2017), focuses on efforts to make truth commissions in the Balkans, Colombia and the United States. Her work has been published in Law and Society Review, Law and Policy, Law and Social Inquiry, International Journal of Transitional Justice, Human Rights Quarterly, Journal of International Law and International Relations, Encyclopedia of Law and Behavioral Science, among other outlets. Over the past decade, Dr. Rowen has studied religion and post-conflict justice in Vietnam, developed life skills educational programs for orphans and vulnerable children in South Africa, studied refugee health in Morocco, and examined human rights protections in Latin America with the Inter-American Institute for Human Rights in Costa Rica.

Dr. Rowen's ongoing research examines prosecutorial reforms in the US, the confluence of domestic immigration and international criminal law within the Department of Homeland Security, as well as the experience of U.S. veterans in the criminal justice system. She is a regular contributor to media outlets such as Legal AF, WBAI in NYC, WNHN in Concord New Hampshire, and The Conversation.