On December 2nd 2021 Professor Iris van Domselaar (Director of the Amsterdam Centre on the Legal Professions and Access to Justice) will deliver a keynote lecture at the “Judicial Character in Hard Times” Seminar titled: “Courage as a Judicial Virtue: A Realistic Approach”.
Iris van Domselaar is an associate professor in legal ethics and legal philosophy and founding director of the Amsterdam Center on the Legal Professions and Access to Justice. She has studied both philosophy and law and was a visiting fellow at the Department of Philosophy of Harvard University and at the Department of Philosophy of Chicago University.
Van Domselaar’s research focuses on the question of how to account for ethics in legal practice. She especially addresses this question in relation to the classic legal institutions and legal roles relevant for securing values of political morality and the rule of law. Drawing on neo-Aristotelian/neo-Wittgensteinian strands within practical philosophy and on social-empirical research, she seeks to come to grips with ethics as ‘lived experience’ on the part of legal professionals and of citizens who are directly involved in legal procedures.
In her PhD thesis ‘The Fragility of Rightness. Adjudication and the primacy of practice’ van Domselaar developed a virtue-ethical approach to legal decision-making in which a ‘six pack’ of judicial virtues, the concept of civic friendship and that of tragic legal choice play a key role. In 2015 she won the departmental prize for best article of the year with her article Moral Quality in Adjudication: On Judicial Virtues and Civic Friendship. She has published extensively in professional and international top journals. Most recently, she has published on the topic of moral perception in legal practice, moral remainders and legal reasoning, and legal ethics for (corporate) lawyers.
Van Domselaar is frequently invited as keynote/guest speaker on the topic of lawyers’ ethics, judicial ethics, tragic legal choice, professional courage, moral perception and law.
Van Domselaar has vast experience as a teacher in legal ethics. She is the coordinator of the bachelor ‘minor’ ‘The Legal Professions’ and teaches courses such as ‘legal ethics and integrity for legal professionals’, ‘legal ethics for lawyers’, ‘legal philosophy’ and ‘legal ethics for corporate lawyers’.
Since September 2021 Van Domselaar is editor-in-chief of the Netherlands Journal of Legal Philosophy.
Research interests/Expertise
Virtue ethics and law, moral perception in legal practice, ethics for corporate lawyers, tragedy and moral dilemma’s in law, legal and professional ethics, digital justice, professional courage, legal reasoning, theories of justice, theories of adjudication, law and emotions, law and film, neo-Aristotelian/neo-Wittgensteinian accounts of justice/professional ethics, civic friendship.
(source: https://www.uva.nl/profiel/d/o/i.vandomselaar/i.vandomselaar.html)
