Ambassador David Scheffer

David Scheffer is the former Mayer Brown/Robert A. Helman Professor of Law at Northwestern Pritzker School of Law (2006-2020) and is Director Emeritus of its Center for International Human Rights. He was the U.S. Ambassador at Large for War Crimes Issues (1997-2001) and the U.N. Secretary-General’s Special Expert on U.N. Assistance to the Khmer Rouge Trials (2012-2018).  He was Vice President of the American Society of International Law, International Francqui Professor at KU Leuven (Belgium), and is currently Professor of Practice at Arizona State University and a Senior Fellow of the Council on Foreign Relations.  He received  the American Bar Association’s 2024 Eleanor Roosevelt Prize for Global Human Rights Advancement. His latest book is The UN Charter: Five Pillars for Humankind (Springer 2025, with co-author Mark S. Ellis).