Dr. B. R. Ambedkar Law Lectures

The Ambedkar Law Lectures is an annual community-wide two-lecture series supported by the Dr. B.R. Ambedkar endowment at Columbia Law School. 

About the Ambedkar Law Lectures 

Delivered by prominent scholars of public law and other students of politics, the lectures aim to further our understanding of justice, democracy, equality, development, and governance from historical, comparative, and philosophical perspectives.

The Ambedkar Law Lectures are named in honor of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, an influential Indian political thinker and anti-colonial activist who studied at Columbia University and played a central part in framing the Constitution of independent India. 

The Ambedkar Law Lectures are chaired by Columbia Law School Professors Jamal Greene, Madhav Khosla, and Jedediah Purdy

2022 Lectures

Historical Injustice, Agency, and Resentment

In societies marked by deep and enduring structural inequality—often along lines of caste, race, gender, or other forms of identity—how is the responsibility for such injustice assigned? How is the agency necessary to overcome historical injustice imagined? These lectures will use Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar’s writings as a starting point to explore the moral psychology of responding to historical injustice. 

Lecturer: 

Pratap Bhanu Mehta, Laurance S. Rockefeller Visiting Professor for Distinguished Teaching, Princeton University; Senior Fellow, Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi

With commentary by:

David Bromwich, Sterling Professor of English, Yale University
Jamal Greene, Dwight Professor of Law, Columbia Law School
Katharina Pistor, Edwin B. Parker Professor of Comparative Law, Columbia Law School

Watch the 2022 Ambedkar Law Lectures: Historical Injustice, Agency, and Resentment, held on March 28 and March 31.

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