Thiago de Souza Amparo defended his doctoral (S.J.D.) dissertation entitled Harming Constitutional Change: The Role of Countermovements in Constitutional Equality Litigation in the United States, Brazil and South Africa on December 7, 2018.
Thiago’s doctoral project investigated how countermovements responding to or anticipating the steps of social movements affect non-textual constitutional change. His research focused on the meaning of equality in race and sexual orientation cases in the United States, Brazil and South Africa. The dissertation found that the constitutional meaning of equality is shaped by contestation of the meaning of harm as addressed through equality claims. The dissertation also demonstrated that the judiciary shapes the terms of this contestation inside as well as outside courts, and called for greater judicial awareness of the side-effects of judgments in equality cases.
At the public defense the committee was comprised of Professor Mathias Möschel (associate professor at Legal Studies and director of the Doctoral Program), Professor Eloisa Machado de Almeida (professor at the Fundação Getúlio Vargas' Sao Paulo Law School) and Professor Renata Uitz (professor and head of department at Legal Studies). Professor Uitz was the supervisor of the work.
The committee unanimously awarded the dissertation the highest grade, summa cum laude.
Congratulations to Thiago and very best wishes for his future work!