Scholarly and Professional Stein Programs

The Stein Center hosts an annual colloquium in collaboration with the Fordham Law Review on a theme relating to the legal profession.

The collaboration dates to the late 1990s and has culminated in the publication of hundreds of articles and essays by scholars and practitioners from around the country and abroad. In 1999, the Fordham Law Review received the New York State Bar Association’s Sanford Levy Award in recognition of “outstanding contributions in the field of legal ethics” for its annual publications in collaboration with the Stein Center. In recent years, the annual colloquia have examined access to justice, corporate lawyers, government lawyers, “subversive lawyering,” “lawyers and their institutions,” the “professional socialization of lawyers,” and the judicial regulation of the legal profession, among other themes.

The scholarship from the annual colloquia on the legal profession can be downloaded from the links below.

Judicial Role in Professional Regulation (October 2020) 

http://fordhamlawreview.org/issuescategory/march-2020-vol-88-no-4/ 

Corporate Lawyers (October 2019) published March 2020 

http://fordhamlawreview.org/issuescategory/april-2020-vol-88-no-5/

Lawyers in Government Service (October 2018)

http://fordhamlawreview.org/issuescategory/april-2019-vol-87-no-5/

Access to Justice and the Legal Profession in an Era of Contracting Civil Liability (October 2017)

http://fordhamlawreview.org/issuescategory/april-2018-vol-86-no-5/

The Stein Center annually co-sponsors and organizes the Criminal Justice Ethics Schmooze, a forum for junior and experienced faculty members to receive feedback on ideas and papers pertaining to the work of prosecutors and criminal defense lawyers.

Specifically, the Schmooze provides a small number of scholars of various levels of experience who write in the area of criminal procedure and legal ethics a chance to consider and discuss emerging topics and ongoing scholarship on criminal procedure and professional conduct relating to prosecutors, defense lawyers and the institutions in which they work. In addition to collegial interchange, the Schmooze promotes future scholarship and provides some ideas about where such scholarship might take us.  Articles incubated in the Criminal Justice Schmooze have been published in law reviews around the country.

If you have questions about the Criminal Justice Ethics Schmooze or would like an invitation to present an early-stage writing, please email steincenter@law.fordham.edu.

The Stein Center co-sponsors a bi-annual Legal Justice Ethics Schmooze, a forum for junior and experienced faculty members to receive feedback on ideas and papers pertaining to ethics and the legal profession.

The Stein Center has organized and hosted dozens of academic, professional and CLE programs and events on ethics and regulation of the legal profession. 

Noteworthy programs include the 2016 International Legal Ethics Conference VII: The Ethics and Regulation of Lawyers Worldwide: Comparative and Interdisciplinary Perspectives.  Organized in conjunction with the International Association of Legal Ethics, this conference convened almost 400 participants from 60 countries worldwide at Fordham Law School to discuss and study ethics in the practice of law.

The December 2017 Regulation of Legal and Judicial Services: Comparative and International Perspectives Conference built on ILEC VII and laid the groundwork for ILEC VIII (December 2018 in Australia).  Papers produced in conjunction with the conference are published in the Fordham International Law Journal, Volume 42, Issue 2.

In March 2023, the Stein Center co-sponsored the Fordham Urban Law Journal’s 50^th anniversary symposium, The Future of Prosecution.  Papers produced in conjunction with the conference are published in the Fordham Urban Law Journal, Volume 50, Issue 5.

On February 9, 2024, the Stein Center joined with the National Center for Access to Justice (NCAJ) and the Fordham Urban Law Journal to host a symposium, With People Struggling and the Law Failing, What are the Solutions to the Access to Justice Crisis in America?  The symposium examined practical solutions for increasing access to justice for people contending with life challenges that implicate the law.  Papers produced in conjunction with the conference are published in the Fordham Urban Law Journal, Volume 51, Issue 5.

The Stein Center entered into a collaboration to organize the International Access to Justice Forum 2025, which will be hosted at NYU Law School and Fordham Law School on September 26-27, 2025.  This annual conference, which rotates among venues, invites a diverse group of scholars, researchers, practitioners, reformers, court and dispute resolution experts, and others who are committed to increasing access to justice to discuss new research, theory, and policy developments in the global movement for civil justice.