Jeffrey Kahn
Full-time faculty
University Distinguished Professor, Altshuler Distinguished Teaching Professor, and Professor of Law
Biography
His latest research on U.S. legal topics focuses on the right to travel and national security law. His most recent book, MRS. SHIPLEY'S GHOST: THE RIGHT TO TRAVEL AND TERRORIST WATCHLISTS (University of Michigan Press, 2013, paperback edition 2014), critically examines the U.S. Government's No Fly List. Among other publications, his articles have appeared in the UCLA Law Review, Michigan Law Review, Virginia Journal of International Law, and the peer-reviewed Journal of National Security Law and Policy. He has launched a new website, Watchlist Law, a clearinghouse on the latest news and litigation concerning the U.S. No Fly List. His blog posts have been featured on Lawfare, Just Security, and Concurring Opinions.
His work on Russian law has been noted by name by the editors of the New York Times and published in various law reviews as well as the peer-reviewed journals Post-Soviet Affairs and Review of Central and East European Law. His latest research has focused primarily on the influence in Russia of the European Convention on Human Rights. In 2011, Russian President Dmitrii Medvedev’s Human Rights Council asked him─the one American among six other experts from Russia, one from Germany, and one from the Netherlands─to write an expert report on the second conviction of Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Platon Lebedev. Professor Kahn described this work and its repercussions in an op-ed published in the New York Times (online) and International Herald Tribune (print).
He is a graduate of Yale College, Oxford University (where he won the Hodgson Martin Prize for Best Dissertation for his doctoral work on Russian federalism), and the University of Michigan Law School. His first book, based on that dissertation, was published by Oxford University Press while he was a law student. During law school, he also served as a lecturer on European human rights law at summer training programs in Moscow for Russian lawyers sponsored by the Council of Europe. After law school, he was a law clerk to the Honorable Thomas P. Griesa of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. He served as a trial attorney in the Civil Division, United States Department of Justice, from October 2003 until April 2006.
At SMU he was a founding member of the Advisory Board for the SMU Embrey Human Rights Education Program. SMU is the first university in the South, and only the fifth in the country, to offer an academic major in human rights. During the fall 2013 semester, he was an O’Brien Research Fellow in Residence in the Faculty of Law at McGill University. During the spring 2014 semester, he was a visiting professor teaching constitutional law in the School of Law at Washington & Lee University.
Areas of Expertise
- U.S. Constitutional Law
- Russian Law
- National Security Law
- International Human Rights Law
- European Convention on Human Rights
- Administrative Law
Education
M.Phil., Oxford University
Ph.D., Oxford University
J.D., University of Michigan Law School
Courses
Administrative Law
Legislation and Regulation
Perspectives on Counterterrorism (Seminar)
European Convention on Human Rights (Seminar)
Books
NATIONAL SECURITY LAW AND THE CONSTITUTION (with Geoffrey Corn & Jimmy Gurulé, 2017; with Geoffrey Corn, Jimmy Gurulé & Gary Corn, 2d ed., 2021)
MRS. SHIPLEY’S GHOST: THE RIGHT TO TRAVEL AND TERRORIST WATCHLISTS (University of Michigan Press 2013)
FEDERALISM, DEMOCRATIZATION, AND THE RULE OF LAW IN RUSSIA (Oxford University Press 2002)
Articles
The 'Anti-Deference' Device: Article 18 of the European Convention on Human Rights, 31 Journal of Transnational Law & Policy 117 (2021-2022)
SSRN | SMU Repository
The Relationship between the European Court of Human Rights and the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation: Conflicting Conceptions of Sovereignty in Strasbourg and St. Petersburg 30 European Journal of International Law 933 (2019)
Oxford Academic
The Rule of Law Under Pressure: Russia and the European Human Rights System 44 Review of Central and East European Law 275 (2019) (co-guest editor)
Brill
The Unreasonable Rise of Reasonable Suspicion: Terrorist Watchlists and Terry V. Ohio, 20 William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal 383 (2017)
SSRN | SMU Repository
Very Like A Whale: Analogy & the Law, 13 Law, Culture & the Humanities 335 (2017)
SSRN | SMU Repository
"Protection and Empire": The Martens Clause, State Sovereignty, and Individual Rights, 56 Virginia Journal of International Law (2016)
SSRN | SMU Repository
The Nacirema Revisited, 67 SMU Law Review 807 (2014)
SSRN | SMU Repository
Freedom of Expression in Post-Soviet Russia, 18 UCLA Journal of International Law & Foreign Affairs 1 (2013)
SSRN | SMU Repository
The Case of Colonel Abel, 5 Journal of National Security Law & Policy (2011)
SSRN | SMU Repository
The Extraordinary Mrs. Shipley: How the United States Controlled International Travel before the Age of Terrorism, 43 Connecticut Law Review 819 (2011)
SSRN | SMU Repository
Report on the Verdict against M.B. Khodorkovsky and P.L. Lebedev, 4 Journal of Eurasian Law 321 (2011)
SSRN | SMU Repository
Zoya's Standing Problem, or, When Should the Constitution Follow the Flag?, 108 Michigan Law Review 673 (2010)
SSRN | SMU Repository
No-Limit Texas Hold’em, or, The Voir Dire in Dallas County, 13 Green Bag 2D 383 (2010)
SSRN | SMU Repository
Ten Questions on National Security (invited essay), 36 William Mitchell Law Review Journal of the National Security Forum 5041 (2010)
SSRN | SMU Repository
The Unification of Law in the Russian Federation (with A. Trochev & N. Balayan), 25 Post-Soviet Affairs 310 (Oct.-Dec. 2009)
SSRN | SMU Repository
Vladimir Putin & the Rule of Law in Russia, 36 Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law 511-58 (2008)
SSRN | SMU Repository
Russia’s Criminal Procedure Code Five Years Out, (with William Burnham) 33 Review of Central & East European Law 1 (2008)
SSRN | SMU Repository
International Travel and the Constitution, 56 UCLA Law Review 271 (2008)
SSRN | SMU Repository
The Search for the Rule of Law in Russia, 37 Georgetown Journal of International Law 353 (2006)
SSRN | SMU Repository
Russia’s ‘Dictatorship of Law’ and the European Court of Human Rights, 29 Review of Central & East European Law 1 (2004)
SSRN | SMU Repository
Russian Compliance with Articles Five & Six of the European Convention of Human Rights as a Barometer of Legal Reform & Human Rights in Russia, 35 Michigan Journal of Law Reform 641-94 (2002) (translated into Russian as Кан Джеффри. Исполнение Россией ст. 5 и 6 ЕКПЧ как показатель соблюдения прав человека //Российский бюллетень по правам человека. № 17 (2003))
SSRN | SMU Repository
The Parade of Sovereignties: Establishing the Vocabulary of the New Russian Federalism, 16 Post-Soviet Affairs 58 (2000)
SSRN | SMU Repository
Book Chapters
Hybrid Warfare, International Humanitarian Law, and the Case of Ukraine, in COMPLEX BATTLESPACES: THE LAW OF ARMED CONFLICT AND THE DYNAMICS OF MODERN WARFARE 191-221 (Oxford University Press 2019)
Свобода СМИ: краткая и незаконченная история из Америки, КАК ПРИНЕСТИ ПРАВА ЧЕЛОВЕКА ДОМОЙ: ЗАЩИТА ПРАВ ЧЕЛОВЕКА В НАЦИОНАЛЬНЫХ И МЕЖДУНАРОДНЫХ ИНСТАНЦИЯХ 269 (Под ред. Антона Леонидовича Буркова, М., 2018) [Freedom of the Press: A Short and Incomplete History from America, in HOW TO BRING HUMAN RIGHTS HOME: PROTECTION OF HUMAN RIGHTS IN NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTIONS (A.L. Burkov, ed. 2018)]
The Richelieu Effect: The Khodorkovsky Case and Political Interference with Justice, in A SOCIOLOGY OF JUSTICE IN RUSSIA 231 (Cambridge University Press 2018)
Four chapters (on history, separation of powers, prevention detention, and freedom of the press), in NATIONAL SECURITY LAW AND THE CONSTITUTION (Aspen/Wolters Kluwer 2017) (with Geoffrey Corn & Jimmy Gurule)
Terrorist Watchlists, in THE CAMBRIDGE HANDBOOK OR SURVEILLANCE LAW 71 (Cambridge University Press 2017)
SSRN | Cambridge University Press
The Law is a Causeway: Metaphor & the Rule of Law in Russia, in THE LEGAL DOCTRINES OF THE RULE OF LAW & THE LEGAL STATE (Rechtsstaat) (Ius Gentium: Comparative Perspectives on Law & Justice, Vol. 38) 229 (Silkenat, Hickey, & Barenboim eds. 2014)
SSRN | SMU Repository
How Federal Is The Russian Federation? in FEDERALISM & LEGAL UNIFICATION: A COMPARATIVE EMPIRICAL INVESTIGATION OF TWENTY SYSTEMS (Ius Gentium: Comparative Perspectives on Law & Justice, Vol. 28) 355 (Halberstam & Reimann, eds. 2014) (with Trochev & Balayan)
The Rule-of-Law Factor, in INSTITUTIONS, IDEAS AND LEADERSHIP IN RUSSIAN POLITICS 159 (Palgrave Macmillan 2010)
SSRN | SMU Repository
Adversarial Principles and the Case File in Russian Criminal Procedure, in RUSSIA & THE COUNSEL OF EUROPE: TEN YEARS AFTER 107 (Palgrave Macmillan 2010)
SSRN | SMU Repository
Presentation of Jeffrey Kahn, in THE RUSSIAN CONSTITUTION AT FIFTEEN: ASSESSMENTS & CURRENT CHALLENGES TO RUSSIA'S LEGAL DEVELOPMENT 54 (Dresen & Pomeranz eds., Occasional Paper #304, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, 2010)
SSRN | SMU Repository
Комментарий, Верховенство права и проблемы его обеспечения в правоприменительной практике (Москва: Издательство «Статут», 2009)
Putin’s Federal Reforms: A Legal-Institutional Perspective, in BEYOND THE GARDEN RING: DIMENSIONS OF RUSSIAN REGIONALISM 73 (Kivinen & Pynnöniemi eds., Kikimora 2002)
SSRN | SMU Repository
What Is The New Russian Federalism?, in CONTEMPORARY RUSSIAN POLITICS: A READER 374 (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2001)
SSRN | SMU Repository
Федерализм и федератция, and Федерализм и демократия, in Основы теории и практики федерализма: Пособие для студентов высших учебных заведений 9 (Garant 1999)
Federalism, Democracy and Asymmetry: Issues in Comparative Perspective, in FEDERALISM: CHOICES IN LAW, INSTITUTIONS AND POLICY. A COMPARATIVE APPROACH WITH FOCUS ON POLICY 23 (Garant 1998)
Other Publications
Russia, the Council of Europe, and “Ruxit,” or, Why Illiberal Regimes Join International Organizations, 67 PROBLEMS OF POST-COMMUNISM 64 (2020) (with Irina Busygina)
Taylor & Francis Online
'Unlawful Influence' and the al-Nashiri Military Commission at Guantánamo Bay, 20 Journal of International Peacekeeping 219 (2016)
Brill
Media
Wall Street Journal, quoted in Before Trial in Russia, Defendants Can Spend Months Behind Bars (April 2023)
CBS News (Dallas), quoted in North Texas responds to release of WNBA, Baylor star Brittney Griner (December 2022)
The Washington Post, quoted in Muslims suing over watch-list status say U.S. tactics block scrutiny (October 2022)