Law Commons^™

Implicit Bias And Immigration Courts, Fatma Marouf

Scholarly Works

This Article highlights the importance of implicit bias in immigration adjudication. After tracing the evolution of prejudice in our immigration laws from explicit "old-fashioned" prejudice to more subtle forms of "modem" and "aversive" prejudice, the Article argues that the specific conditions under which immigration judges decide cases render them especially prone to the influence of implicit bias. Specifically, it examines how factors such as immigration judges' lack of independence, limited opportunity for deliberate thinking, low motivation, and the low risk of judicial review all allow implicit bias to drive decisionmaking. The Article then recommends certain reforms, both simple and complex, …

The Anti-Empathic Turn, Robin West

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Justice, according to a broad consensus of our greatest twentieth century judges, requires a particular kind of moral judgment, and that moral judgment requires, among much else, empathy–the ability to understand not just the situation but also the perspective of litigants on warring sides of a lawsuit.

Excellent judging requires empathic excellence. Empathic understanding is, in some measure, an acquired skill as well as, in part, a natural ability. Some people do it well; some, not so well. Again, this has long been understood, and has been long argued, particularly, although not exclusively, by some of our most admired judges …