Deborah M. Weissman
Reef C. Ivey II Distinguished Professor of Law

Areas of Expertise
- Access to Justice
- Asylum and Refugee Law
- Civil Rights and Discrimination
- Criminal Justice Politics
- Critical Legal Theory
- Domestic and Sexual Violence
- Family Law
- Feminist Legal Theory
- Gender and the Law
- Gender Violence
- Human Rights Law
- Immigration Law
- International Human Rights
- Law and Society
- Political Economy and the Law
- Public Interest Law
- Public Law and Legal Theory
- Social Welfare Law
Biography
Deborah M. Weissman joined the Carolina Law Faculty in 1998 and is the Reef C. Ivey II Distinguished Professor of Law. She was the Director of Clinical Programs from January 2001 through July 2010. Her teaching and research interests include law and political economy, migration/immigration, human rights, critical legal theories, and gender violence. Weissman is the author of numbers articles, essays, and book chapters on the political economy of gender violence, language rights, immigration-related issues, and human rights. Her work has appeared in the Boston College Law Review, the William & Mary Law Review, Columbia Human Rights Journal, among others. She received the ACLU’s Frank Porter Graham Award for Outstanding Civil Rights Work.
Weissman is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Syracuse University and graduated cum laude from Syracuse University Law School. After law school, she had extensive experience in all phases of legal advocacy for persons unable to access counsel in the private market. Her practice included labor law, family and education related civil rights, and immigration law in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Tampa, Florida, and as a partner in a civil rights firm in Syracuse, New York. From 1994 to 1998, she was Deputy Director and then Executive Director at Legal Services of North Carolina.
Education
- J.D. (cum laude), Syracuse University (1975)
- B.A. (magna cum laude), Syracuse University (1972)
Selected Publications
In Pursuit of Economic Justice: The Political Economy of Domestic Violence Laws and Policies, 2020 UTAH L. REV. 1 (2020).
Westlaw | SSRN | Hein
The Politicization of Domestic Violence, in THE POLITICIZATION OF SAFETY: CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON DOMESTIC VIOLENCE RESPONSES (J. Stoever, ed.) (NYU Press 2019).
The Politics of Immigrant Rights: Between Political Geography and Transnational Interventions (with J. Hagan et al.), 2018 MICH. ST. L. REV. 117 (2018).
Westlaw | Lexis/Nexis | SSRN | Hein | BEPress
The Community Politics of Domestic Violence, 82 BROOK. L. REV. 1479 (2017).
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Countering Neoliberalism and Aligning Solidarities: Rethinking Domestic Violence Advocacy, 45 SW. L. REV. 915 (2016).
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The Politics of Narrative: Law and the Representation of Mexican Criminality,
38 FORDHAM INT'L L.J. 141 (2015).
Westlaw | Lexis/Nexis | SSRN | Hein | BEPress
Remaking Mexico: Law Reform as Public Policy, 35 CARDOZO L. REV. 1471 (2014).
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Rethinking a New Domestic Violence Pedagogy, 5 U. MIAMI RACE & SOC. JUST. L. REV. 635 (2015).
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Public Power and Private Purpose: Odious Debt and the Political Economy of Hegemony, (with L. Perez) 32 N.C. J. INT'L L. & COM. REG. 699 (2007).
Westlaw | SSRN | Hein | BEPress
The Personal is Political--and Economic: Rethinking Domestic Violence, 2007 B.Y.U. L. REV. 387 (2007).
Westlaw | Lexis/Nexis | SSRN | Hein | BEPress
In the Media
- Weissman: The Political Economy of Domestic Violence (Law and Political Economy Blog)
- Weissman, Students and Citizens to the UN: Investigate Our “Torture Chambers in the Sky” (Just Security)
- Weissman Testifies in Torture Hearing (IndyWeek)
- Op Ed: Weissman Writes about Guantanamo Bay's Inability to Deliver Justice (News & Observer)
- Op Ed: Weissman Writes Ambiguous Classifications of Puerto Rico and its Colonial Status (News and Observer)
- Weissman Discusses Who's Responsible for Torture (The State of Things, WUNC)
- Weissman: A “No Show” at the IACHR: A Portentous Absence (Human Rights at Home)
- Weissman Op-Ed: Shed Light on NC Ties to U.S. Torture (News and Observer)
- Weissman Explains New Anti 'Sanctuary' Law (News and Observer)
- Special Visa for Immigrant Victims of Crime Proves Controversial, Weissman Comments (National Public Radio)