Professor Hannah Buxbaum, who joined the Indiana University Maurer School of Law in 1997, has had an internationally focused career both academically and professionally. After obtaining her J.D. from Cornell Law School, she studied at the Ruprechts-Karls-Universität in Heidelberg, Germany, receiving an LL.M. degree. Subsequently, she joined the New-York based law firm of Davis Polk & Wardwell, where she practiced primarily in the area of global capital-market transactions, spending two years at the firm’s Frankfurt office. These opportunities abroad have helped shape Buxbaum’s research interests: German/US Comparative Law, International Law, and the private enforcement of competition law in both the United States and the European Union. Within these fields, Buxbaum focuses primarily on conflicts of regulatory jurisdiction, comparative civil procedure, and the private litigation of antitrust claims. “I was originally interested in legal developments in post-World War II Germany,” Buxbaum explains. “During the occupation period, the US and its allies implemented new competition laws in Germany. It was interesting to study the country’s transition from a pro-cartel system to an anti-cartel system, and later the development of private enforcement of competition law.”

Professor Buxbaum serves as Professor of Law and Associate Dean for Research at the Indiana University Maurer School of Law. There, Professor Buxbaum teaches courses on Comparative Law, Contracts, International Business Transactions, International Litigation, and Secured Transactions. Her many experiences working, living and studying in Western Europe have greatly enriched her understanding of law in Germany, the United States, and the European Union, and language acquisition of both German and French has opened many doors to employment and research. Buxbaum has had the opportunity to teach at many different universities in the United States and Germany: International Commercial Law Seminar, University of California at Davis/University of Cologne, Germany (2006, 2008, 2009); University of San Diego Institute on International and Comparative Law, London, England (2003); Universität zu Köln, Germany (2002); Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, Germany (2001); and the Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Germany (2000).

Contemporary developments in Buxbaum’s field include ongoing conflict within the European Union over attempts to develop mechanisms that will strengthen the private enforcement of regulatory law. “In the past,” Buxbaum explains, “the EU depended on public administrative regulation in areas like competition law and consumer protection. Now the EU is turning more to private litigation. There is resistance by many member states, including Germany, to what is perceived to be a move toward a more American form of private litigation, which may bring with it the more entrepreneurial form of lawyering that we have here.”

Buxbaum has authored more than twenty publications and scholarly articles. Here are a few of the most recent titles:

Territory, Territoriality, and the Resolution of Jurisdictional Conflict, _AMERICAN JOURNAL OF COMPARATIVE LAW_ (2009 forthcoming)

Competition in the Private Enforcement of Regulaotry Law, in ECONOMIC LAW AS AN ECONOMIC GOOD; ITS RULE FUNCTION AND ITS TOOL FUNCTION IN THE COMPETITION OF SYSTEMS (Karl M. Meesen, ed.) (Sellier, 2009 forthcoming)

Culture and Conflict in the Enforcement of Competition Law, in GLOBAL COMPETITION AND NATIONAL COMPETITION POLICIES: PROCEEDINGS OF THE 41ST FIW SYMPOSIUM (Carl Heyman, 2009 Forthcoming).

Incentives to Promote the Private Enforcement of Law: A View From the United States, in ZUGANG ZUM RECHT: EUROPÄICHE UN US-AMERIKANISHE WEGE DER PRIVATEN RECHTDURCHSETZUNG 91 (H.-P. Mansel et al., eds 2008)

Professor Buxbaum is also the recipient of a number of awards, including the following titles: CIC Academic Leadership Program Award (2007-2008); the Indiana University Leadership Development Program (2007); Alexander von Humboldt Foundation Research Fellow (2005-2006); Louis F. Niezer Faculty Fellow, (2007-2008); the Trustees Teaching Award (2007-2008); and many others. In addition to her positions as Professor of Law and Associate Dean of Research at the Maurer School of Law, Professor Buxbaum also sits on the Advisory Committee for West European Studies at Indiana University.

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