Anita Bernstein


Anita Nancy Bernstein is an American tort law scholar with expertise in feminist jurisprudence and legal ethics. She is the Anita and Stuart Subotnick Professor of Law at Brooklyn Law School.

Biography

Bernstein graduated from Queens College with a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science and then earned a Juris Doctor from Yale Law School, where she served as an article and book review editor of the Yale Law Journal.
Following law school, she clerked for Jack B. Weinstein, who was then Chief Judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York. She then worked for Debevoise & Plimpton. Bernstein was the first law professor to receive the Fulbright Scholarship in European Union affairs.
Bernstein was the first holder of an ethics chair at Emory University School of Law. She blogs occasionally on legal ethics and professional responsibility.
Bernstein is the author of The Common Law Inside the Female Body, published by Cambridge University Press. In this book, Bernstein argues that traditional common law principles justify the right and liberty to refuse sexual penetration and pregnancy when those experiences are unwanted.

Recognition

Willam L. Prosser Award, Section on Torts and Compensation Systems, American Association of Law Schools
Fulbright Program Law Research Scholar
Jean Monnet fellow at the European University Institute
Associate Member of the Common Room and an Honorary Member of the Table of Christ Church College at the University of Oxford.

Notable publications

How Can a Product Be Liable?, 45 Duke Law Journal 1-83
Muss Es Sein? Not Necessarily, Says Tort Law, 67 Law and Contemporary Problems 7-26
Keep It Simple: An Explanation of the Rule of No Recovery for Pure Economic Loss, Arizona Law Review 773
What’s Wrong with Stereotyping?, Arizona Law Review 655
Common Law Fundamentals of the Right to Abortion, 63 Buffalo Law Review
Pitfalls Ahead: A Manifesto for the Training of Lawyers, 94 Cornell Law Review 479
Treating Sexual Harassment with Respect, 111 Harvard Law Review 445
The Trouble with Regulating Microfinance, 35 U. Hawai’i Law Review 1
Whatever Happened to Law and Economics?, 64 Maryland Law Review 303
For and Against Marriage: A Revision, 102 Michigan Law Review 129
Toward More Parsimony and Transparency for "the Essentials of Marriage," 2011 Michigan State Law Review 83
Real Remedies for Virtual Injuries, 90 North Carolina Law Review 1457
Abuse and Harassment Diminish Free Speech, 35 Pace Law Review 1

Poetry

Poetry is among Bernstein's interests. Atlanta Review, Oxford Poetry, Minnesota Review, The New Renaissance, Orbis, and Bird's Thumb have published her poems. In 2016 she taught a poetry workshop at Brooklyn Lifelong Learning.