Erika George Joins BU Law as Associate Dean for Equity, Justice & Engagement
George shares her love of learning with students and a passion for social justice and inclusion in her scholarship.

Erika George Joins BU Law as Associate Dean for Equity, Justice & Engagement
George shares her love of learning with students and a passion for social justice and inclusion in her scholarship.
Drawing lines between environmental justice, technology, and corporate social responsibility, Erika George is a leading scholar in the field of business and human rights. Her research, including her book Incorporating Rights: Strategies to Advance Corporate Accountability (Oxford University Press 2021), examines the growing demands for business enterprises to respect international human rights. This fall, George joined Boston University School of Law as associate dean for equity, justice, and engagement; professor of law; and Ernest Haddad faculty scholar. She continues to apply her scholarship to the greater umbrella of social justice and inclusion.
George began to witness issues at the intersection of business rights, human rights, and environmental justice early in life. Her mother’s cancer diagnosis, combined with the knowledge that she had grown up in Louisiana’s “Cancer Alley,” an 85-mile stretch of land between New Orleans and Baton Rouge known for extreme pollution from local fossil fuel and petrochemical operations, was a contributing factor that inspired George to start asking questions.
“As my mom was battling her cancer–which was kind of the defining feature of my whole childhood–I started to better understand the environmental impacts that could have led to so many people having these challenges,” says George. “But that isn’t necessarily what drew me to law school.”
George was initially inspired to study law through popular culture depictions of attorneys and witnessing her mother, an elementary public schoolteacher committed to social change, advocate for civil and political rights. George grew up as a Black girl in a majority white neighborhood outside of Chicago, and experienced moments of exclusion that prompted a deep concern for unfairness and inequality. She was drawn to legal role models like Thurgood Marshall and Barbara Jordan (’59), who represented the activism and societal change that can be made with a law degree.
This made it clear that exclusion anywhere is a risk to human rights for everyone, everywhere.
After earning her bachelors at the University of Chicago, she continued her studies at the school and earned a masters in International Relations and Affairs. George proceeded to earn her JD from Harvard Law School and while there, served as an articles editor of the Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review. During her years of higher education, George developed an understanding of the relationship between business, human rights, and environmental justice that would cause her to want to investigate further.
Following law school, George clerked for Judge Hart in the United States District Court, Northern District of Illinois. From there, she joined Human Rights Watch, conducting research to document violations of social and economic rights and publishing a report about the human right to education and gender discrimination in South Africa.
After releasing her findings, George met with the South African Ministry of Education, learning that these problems did not stop in schools. “This made it clear that exclusion anywhere is a risk to human rights for everyone, everywhere,” she says.
N. Browen Manby, a mentor of George’s while at Human Rights Watch, released a report titled, “The Price of Oil,” which George notes, “provided a foundation for efforts to link causation and liability for human rights violations to the company, not just the country’s failures.”
Pulling from her experience with Human Rights Watch and her first-hand understanding of the human health impact from environmental injustice, George’s scholarship ties the relationship between corporate social responsibility and environmental business practices.
“I made the connection to the petrochemical oil industry and Cancer Alley in Louisiana, to the Niger Delta and environmental injustices there,” she says. “They’re basically the same kinds of companies, though in different subsidiary structures, but the playbook is pretty much the same: you are in a resource rich area with people who don’t have the kind of political power to resist what’s happening to their environment.”
George, who contributed comments on the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights and now serves on the board of Shift, the leading center of expertise on the UN Guiding Principles, looks for ways to codify the notion that businesses not only have a responsibility to their shareholders, but a responsibility to respect human rights as well.
Her future research will focus on realizing the human right to a clean, healthy, sustainable environment. George is a proud member of the Board of Trustees of Earthjustice, a leading non-profit public interest environmental law organization, and was recently appointed to the State Department’s subcommittee on Responsible Business Conduct.

She was motivated by the opportunity to join the BU Law faculty because of the clear commitment to social progress and inclusion. “I was attracted to it because the leadership of the law school was doing dynamic things,” says George. “I was attracted to this place because it’s a place on the move.” She follows Professor Jasmine Gonzales Rose, a leading critical race theorist, who served as associate dean last year.
“We are incredibly fortunate to have Erika join us as the new associate dean for equity, justice, and engagement. She is a brilliant scholar whose work touches upon the most important aspects of the human dimension: compassion, understanding, a willingness to engage and learn,” says Dean Angela Onwuachi-Willig. “She also has an incredible gift of personally connecting with everyone she meets—and hearing, really hearing, those with whom she speaks. The combination of those exceptional talents has made her an incredibly effective leader in facilitating community and learning across difference.”
As part of the associate dean role, Professor George is running workshops to fulfill the ABA Standard 303, which requires professional identity formation by orienting students on their social identity, structural forms of bias, and civility and the profession.
“Erika will be thorough in her approach to thinking through, creating, and providing the lessons that enable our students to become culturally competent and humble,” Dean Onwuachi-Willig notes. “Her direction will help our faculty cultivate inclusive classrooms and excellence.”
Professor George is also teaching a course on public international law, formatting her classes to enable the students to drive their own educational experience. “A lot of the first year of law school, you don’t have much agency, right?” says George. “Your classes are picked for you. Your faculty are picked for you. So, when there are ways to increase a student’s level of agency over how they interact with material in class, I look for ways to do that.”
My mom, as a teacher, always said that, “you learn to read, and then you read to learn–and what you want to create are people who love learning.”
In the classroom, George tends to use a soft Socratic method to allow students to address the problems presented and comprehend the material, while utilizing their unique backgrounds and disciplinary areas. “I will expect you to be prepared, and I will ask you questions,” says George. “But a lot of the work in my class will be done in a ‘think-share-pair’ [students respond to a problem first by collaborating to think it through, then sharing in a pair, and finally presenting their insights to the full class or to other pairs] or in a small group ‘law firm’ of fellow students.”
Professor George sees her responsibility as “being able to listen to [the students] and hear what their experiences are and then help them navigate how to create a better environment.” Looking for ways to improve the student experience and facilitate a more inclusive learning environment, George aims to create a greater sense of authenticity, representation, and belonging within the law school community.
“My mom, as a teacher, always said that, ‘you learn to read, and then you read to learn,’” says George. “‘And what you want to create are people who love learning.’”