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Professor Pamela Foohey’s research centers on bankruptcy, commercial law, and consumer law. Her work primarily involves empirical studies of bankruptcy and related parts of the legal system, combining quantitative and qualitative, interview-based research. She is a co-investigator on the Consumer Bankruptcy Project, a long-term research project studying persons who file bankruptcy. The results of this research have been featured in top media outlets, including The New York Times, Financial Times, NPR, U.S. News & World Report, and The Washington Post. Professor Foohey’s work in business bankruptcy focuses on non-profit entities, with a particular emphasis on how churches and other religious organizations use bankruptcy. The results of this research likewise have been featured in media outlets such as Bloomberg, CBS News Moneywatch, and Reveal. Professor Foohey also is a contributor to the blog Credit Slips, a discussion on credit, finance, and bankruptcy.
Professor Foohey is the current chair of the Real Estate Transactions Section of the Association of American Law Schools (AALS) and is on the executive committees of several other AALS Sections. She serves on the editorial advisory board of the Law & Society Review, and recently completed a three-year appointment to the editorial advisory board of the American Bankruptcy Law Journal, a peer-reviewed academic law review published by the National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges. In 2019, the American Bankruptcy Institute named her a “40 Under 40” Emerging Leader in Insolvency Practice.
Professor Foohey joined the Cardozo School of Law in 2021 from the Indiana University Maurer School of Law. At the Maurer School of Law, she taught bankruptcy, contracts, corporations, and secured transactions, and chaired the Center for Law, Society & Culture’s advisory board. During her time at IU, Professor Foohey received the Gavel Award for outstanding contribution to the graduating class, the IU Trustees’ Teaching Award for excellence in teaching, and the Leon H. Wallace Teaching Award, the highest teaching honor given to Maurer School of Law faculty.
Prior to teaching, Professor Foohey clerked for the Honorable Thomas L. Ambro of the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, worked as an associate in the Bankruptcy and Financial Restructuring Group of Dorsey & Whitney LLP in Minneapolis, and clerked for the Honorable Peter J. Walsh of the Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware.
Featured Scholarship
86 Law and Contemporary Problems (forthcoming 2023) (with Sara Greene)
Portraits of Bankruptcy Filers
56 Georgia Law Review (forthcoming 2022) (with Robert M. Lawless & Deborah Thorne)
Steering Loan Modifications Post-Pandemic
85 Law & Contemporary Problems 201 (2022) (with Dalié Jiménez & Christopher K. Odinet)
106 Minnesota Law Review Headnotes 1 (2021) (with Aaron Ament & Daniel Zibel)
11 California Law Review Online 222 (2020) (with Dalié Jiménez & Christopher K. Odinet)
The Folly of Credit As Pandemic Relief
68 UCLA Law Review Discourse 126 (2020) (with Dalié Jiménez & Christopher K. Odinet)
55 Wake Forest Law Review 287 (2020) (with Robert M. Lawless & Deborah Thorne)
Graying of U.S. Bankruptcy: Fallout from Life in a Risk Society
90 Sociological Inquiry 681 (2020) (with Robert M. Lawless, Katherine Porter & Deborah Thorne)
A New Deal for Debtors: Providing Procedural Justice in Consumer Bankruptcy
60 Boston College Law Review 2297 (2019)
94 Notre Dame Law Review 219 (2018) (with Robert M. Lawless, Katherine Porter & Deborah Thorne)
90 Southern California Law Review 1055 (2017) (with Robert M. Lawless, Katherine Porter & Deborah Thorne)
Lender Discrimination, Black Churches, and Bankruptcy
50 Houston Law Review 101 (2017)
When Faith Falls Short: Bankruptcy Decisions of Churches
76 Ohio State Law Journal 1319 (2015)
78 Missouri Law Review 719 (2013)