The inaugural Opening of the Academic Year Alumni Lecture took place on Friday, 16 September 2022 with a lecture from Professor Eric J. Miller, Leo J. O’Brien Fellow at Loyola Law School (LLB, 1991) and a response from Professor Lesley McAra, Chair of Penology at Edinburgh Law School (MA Politics, 1981). The lecture was chaired by Jacquelyn MacLennan (LLB, 1983), a Partner at White & Case and the Alumni Co-Chair of the Edinburgh Law School Advancement Committee.

About the lecture

Reparations has become a major means of demanding redress, advanced by different groups identified by race, nationality, and even sexual orientation. There are a variety of different ways of understanding the nature of reparations, and the political movements that use reparations to advance their objective.

In this lecture, Prof Miller recounted how and why someone born and raised in Glasgow, and learning law at Edinburgh Law School, became one of the foremost reparations litigators in the United States, representing the Black victims of a 100 year-old race massacre before US state and federal courts and in the United States Congress.

Prof Miller explained why reparations is such a powerful idea both globally but also nationally and locally, and why it resonates here in Scotland. The lecture was followed by a response from Prof Lesley McAra.

Timestamps

0:00 - 07:23 Introduction by Jacqueline MacLennan

07:23 - 39:59 Reckoning with Reparations by Prof Eric Miller

40:00 - 41:10 Comments by Jacqueline MacLennan

41:11 - 51:20 Response by Prof Lesley McAra

51:21 - 54:33 Concluding Remarks by Jacqueline MacLennan