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History of the Hague Domestic Violence Project

Sudha Shetty, Assistant Dean for International Partnerships and Alliances at the Goldman School of Public Policy at UC Berkeley, and Jeffrey Edleson, Harry and Riva Specht Chair in Publicly Supported Social Services in the Berkeley School of Social Welfare, worked together years ago on a Hague Convention case where domestic violence was an issue. The myriad issues that arose of that experience inspired Sudha to create the Hague Domestic Violence Project. Since 2003, the goal of the Hague Domestic Violence Project has been to clearly establish child exposure to domestic violence as an exception to the otherwise required return to her or his country of habitual residence under the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction. First started in Seattle University School of Law’s Access to Justice Institute, the project moved to the University of Minnesota in collaboration with colleagues at the University of Washington, and then to Berkeley’s Goldman School of Public Policy. The project continues its work at the American Bar Association Commission on Domestic & Sexual Violence.