School of Social Science and Human Services (SSHS)

Assistant Professor of Law & Society

Year Joined RCNJ: 2010

Contact Information:

• Phone: (201) 684-6251
• E-mail: mserban@ramapo.edu
• Office: G-150
• Personal Website

Education:

• Ph.D., New York University, Law and Society, 2010
• S.J.D.,  Central European University, Hungary, Comparative Constitutional   Law, 2000
• LL.M., Central European University, Hungary, Comparative Constitutional   Law, 1996
• Licenta in Stiinte Juridice (Licentiate in Law), University of Bucharest School of Law, 1995  

Convening Group:

Law & Society

Courses Taught:

• Comparative Legal Systems
• Contemporary Issues in Law & Society
• Social Issues
• Comparative Perspectives on Human Rights
• Criminal Law
• Constitutional Law
• Law and Society
• Law and Social Change in Transitional Societies

Research Interests:

Law and society in Eastern Europe, law and culture, constitutional law, human rights, rule of law, transitional justice  

Work in Progress:

"In the Eye of the Beholder: Measuring the Rule of Law in Eastern Europe"

Publications:

• "The Exceptionalism of Houses: Ideology and Politics in Early Communism in Romania" (1945-1965) (under review)
• 2010   "Surviving Property: Resistance against Urban Housing Nationalization during the Transition to Communism (Romania, 1950-1965)," in Special Issue: Interdisciplinary Legal Studies: The Next Generation, Studies in Law, Politics, and Society, Volume 51, 29-66, ed. Austin Sarat.
• 2010   "Law from Below: Women's Human Rights and Social Movements in New York City" (with Peggy Levitt, Sally Merry and Diana H. Yoon),   Law & Society Review 44(1).
• 2009   "'Bringing Coals to Newcastle'? Human Rights Discourses and Social Change in New York City" (with Diana H. Yoon), Global Networks 9(4): 507-528.
• 2003 Constitutionalism in Transition: Africa and Eastern Europe (International Conference on Comparative Constitutionalism, May   17-20, 2001, Warsaw), Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights.
• 2002   "Aspects of Women's Rights in Poland and Romania" (with Mindy Jane Roseman), in International Studies: Interdisciplinary Political   and Cultural Journal, Vol. 4, No.2.
• 2001   "The Romanian Constitutional Court: Law, Politics and Judicial Activism," Romanian Journal of Society and   Politics, Vol. 1, No. 1.
• 2000   "Facing the Past - The Romanian Lustration Law," Journal of East European Law (Columbia University), Vol. 7, Nos. 3-4.