Professor of Law

Isaak Dore’s reputation as a world-renowned scholar in international law and the philosophy of law is well earned. He is intensely devoted to his academic pursuits. “Every spare minute I have, when I’m not teaching or working with students, is dedicated to research,” says Professor Dore. “There’s nothing more exciting than engaging the mind and grappling with fundamental questions of knowledge, be they of philosophy in general or any of its branches, such as metaphysics, ethics or law.”

Five books, dozens of scholarly articles, reviews, chapters and presentations across the globe are evidence of his thirst for knowledge and sense of obligation to share what he learns. Initially, much of Dore’s scholarship focused on public international law and on international commercial arbitration. Professor Dore is a member of the Panel of Arbitrators of the International Chamber of Commerce in Paris.

More recently, Professor Dore’s research expanded in the direction of law and philosophy. He recently completed the 1,000-page book, The Epistemological Foundations of Law. His article on the influence of French philosophers on critical legal thought in the United States recently appeared in the premier French journal, Le Archives de Philosophie.

Before coming to the School of Law in 1982, Dore served as a Human Rights Officer, and later as a Special Consultant, to the United Nations Division of Human Rights. One of his principal assignments was to compile a study of U.N.-sponsored laws and treaties on discrimination. Born in Zambia, Professor Dore is fluent in French and speaks four Indian and two African dialects.

He spent about eight years serving as Co-Director of the School’s Center for International and Comparative Law and five years as Editor-in-Chief of the Saint Louis-Warsaw Transatlantic Law Journal. He resigned both posts in 2000 to allow more time for research.

Professor Dore was a distinguished visiting professor in Argentina at the National University of Tucuman in 2000, and the International Biographical Center in Cambridge, England, selected him as one of 2,000 “Outstanding Scholars of the 21st Century.”

“I came to Saint Louis University 20 years ago because of its strong tradition of philosophical studies and its openness to international exchanges,” says Dore. “It’s been a wonderful fit. My curiosity has been able to flourish here and who knows where it will lead me?”