PrintDeborah Isser
Senior Rule of Law Adviser, Rule of Law Center of Innovation
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Deborah Isser joined the Rule of Law Center of Innovation in August 2004. She directs projects on the role of non-state justice systems in post-conflict societies and on addressing property claims in the wake of conflict. Previously, she was a senior policy adviser at the Office of the High Representative in Bosnia and Herzegovina, where she focused on economic reform and efforts to address serious crime and corruption. From 2000 to 2001, she was a special adviser for the U.S. Mission to the U.N. She received the Department of State’s Distinguished Honor Award for her work on U.N. peacekeeping reform in the context of the Brahimi Report. She was also a member of the team responsible for settling U.S. arrears to the U.N.
From 1998 to 2000, Isser practiced law with the firm of Morrison and Foerster in New York. During that period she also co-founded the International Legal Assistance Network, which linked human rights lawyers overseas with U.S. law firms providing pro bono assistance. From 1996 to 1998, she served as judicial clerk to the Honorable Dalia Dorner of the Supreme Court of Israel. A recipient of several human rights fellowships, Isser worked at human rights organizations in Geneva, Cambodia and Washington, D.C. She also taught English and American history at a university in Kunming, China.
Isser received a J.D. from Harvard Law School, a master’s in law and diplomacy from The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and an A.B. from Columbia University.
Publications:
- Land, Property and the Challenge of Return for Iraq's Displaced, coauthor, April 2009 USIP Special Report
- Combating Serious Crimes in Postconflict Societies: A Handbook for Policymakers and Practitioners, coauthor, edited by Colette Rausch (USIP Press, 2006).
- "Bosnia and Herzegovina," in Governments of the World: A Global Guide to Citizens' Rights and Responsibilities (Macmillan Reference USA, 2006).
- "Outsiders Can't Build a Nation for Bosnia," Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (December 2005).
Resources & Tools
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This report presents the research findings and analysis of ten months of field study as part of the United States Institute of Peace and George Washington University project titled "From Current Practices of Justice to Rule of Law: Policy Options for Liberia's First Post-Conflict Decade." The analysis we present, based on three types of research methods (focus groups, individual interviews with parties to specific disputes, and interviews with chiefs, zoes [traditional leaders], and other justice practitioners) employed primarily in three counties (Grand Gedeh, Lofa, Nimba, and less extensively in parts of Monrovia), is intended to provide the Liberian government and other stakeholders in the country with more robust evidence than has hitherto been available on how both formal and customary justice systems are perceived and utilized by Liberians. |
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This path-breaking volume presents broad guidelines and specific prescriptions for combating serious crime in societies emerging from conflict. |
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This path-breaking volume presents broad guidelines and specific prescriptions for combating serious crime in societies emerging from conflict. |
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Iraq today is faced with a multilayered displacement crisis that is massive in both size and complexity. It is estimated that 3.8 million Iraqis were displaced from their homes from 2003 to 2008, with the majority of them becoming displaced in 2006 and the first half of 2007 |
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This path-breaking volume presents broad guidelines and specific prescriptions for combating serious crime in societies emerging from conflict.
Countries: Afghanistan, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Cambodia, Haiti, Iraq, Kosovo, Liberia, Sierra Leone
| Issue Areas: Civil Society, Rule of Law
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Events
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November 20, 2009
As Liberia continues its struggle to rebuild institutions destroyed by years of brutal conflict, the rule of law has emerged as a focus area of national and international development efforts. A key policy question concerns the future of Liberia’s dual justice system under which a hierarchy of chiefs’ courts managed by the Ministry of Internal Affairs exists in parallel to the formal judiciary. Co-authors Deborah Isser and Stephen Lubkemann discuss the policy implications of the newest USIP Peaceworks with the Chair of the Liberian Law Reform Commission. Countries: Africa, Liberia
| Issue Areas: Governance, Identity, Ethnicity, and Culture, Rule of Law, Transitional Justice
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December 19, 2008
A public event co-sponsored with the International Organization for Migration Countries: Iraq
| Issue Areas: Demographics, Humanitarian Efforts, International and Regional Organizations, Population and Diaspora
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December 14, 2007
A public event co-sponsored with the Brookings Institution Issue Areas: Population and Diaspora
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