In this talk, Arzoo Osanloo will explore how mercy in Iran’s criminal sanctioning laws serves “to season” justice through a forbearance right that the state affords to surviving family members of murder victims.

Full title: "‘When Mercy Seasons Justice’: Forbearance in Iranian Criminal Sanctioning & its Persistent Logic in a Global Era"

Drawing from a discussion of the idea of mercy as a ‘seasoning’ to justice (Derrida 2001), Osanloo will consider the ethico-religious dynamics at play in the scriptural revelations on which the law is based. And finally, she will reflect on the logic of mercy and what its persistence means in our contemporary era.

Arzoo Osanloo is Professor in the Department of Law, Societies, and Justice and the Director of the Middle East Center at the University of Washington. She is a legal anthropologist and previously worked as an immigration and asylum attorney. She is the author of Forgiveness Work: Mercy, Law, and Victims’ Rights in Iran (Princeton University Press, 2020), which won the Herbert Jacob Book Prize for new, outstanding work in law and society scholarship. Forgiveness Work examines Iran’s criminal justice system through its emphasis on victims’ rights, forgiveness, and mercy. She is also the author of The Politics of Women’s Rights in Iran (Princeton University Press, 2009), which analyzes the politicization of women’s “rights talk” there. In addition to her monographs, she has published widely in peer-reviewed journals and collected volumes. She is also a co-PI on the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Sawyer Seminar (2019-22), Humanitarianisms:Migrations and Care through the Global South. She is currently working on a new project that explores the impact of sanctions on Iranians.

Co-sponsored with the Department of Anthropology, Religious Studies Program, Clarke Initiative for Law and Development in the Middle East and North Africa, and  Berger International Legal Studies Program