Eric C. Christiansen serves as assistant dean for international affairs at the University of Michigan Law School.

Before joining Michigan Law, Christiansen was professor of law, associate dean for international partnerships, and interim law dean at Golden Gate University School of Law. He taught American and comparative constitutional law and researched in the areas of comparative constitutional history, social welfare rights, and the rights of sexual minorities.  

In addition to being a 2016-2017 Senior Fulbright Scholar at the University of Valencia in Spain, Christiansen directed the Comparative Law Institute and its Summer Program in Paris with the Université Paris Nanterre.

Christiansen previously worked in private legal practice, specializing in cross-border capital markets work for the London office of Latham & Watkins, and in international nonprofit management related to the AIDS epidemic. In 1999, he was named a Center for Transitional Justice Fellow, which led to a position as foreign law clerk to Chief Justice Arthur Chaskalson of the South African Constitutional Court.

Related Information

Education
  • University of Notre Dame, BA
  • University of Chicago, MA, Andrew W. Mellon Fellow of the National Endowment for the Humanities
  • New York University, JD, Root-Tilden Scholar

    • Clerkships

    • South African Constitutional Court, the Hon. Arthur Chaskalson
    Featured Scholarship

    “Forty Years from Fascism: Democratic Constitutionalism and the Spanish Model of National Transformation”

    Oregon Review of International Law
    WWW
    • International and Comparative Law
    • Constitutional Law

    Review of Angioletta Sperti’s “Constitutional Courts, Gay Rights and Sexual Orientation Equality”

    International Journal of Constitutional Law
    • International and Comparative Law
    • Constitutional Law

    “Substantive Equality and Sexual Orientation: Twenty Years of Gay and Lesbian Rights Adjudication Under the South African Constitution”

    Cornell International Law Journal
    WWW
    • International and Comparative Law
    • Constitutional Law
    • Human Rights
    • Civil Rights

    “Empowerment, Fairness, Integration: South African Answers to the Question of Constitutional Environmental Rights”

    Stanford Environmental Law Journal
    WWW
    • International and Comparative Law
    • Constitutional Law
    • Environmental and Energy Law
    See All Scholarship