Elizabeth A. Clark
Associate Director of the International Center for Law and Religion Studies at Brigham Young University
Elizabeth A. Clark is Associate Director of the International Center for Law and Religion Studies at Brigham Young University. She has written over 40 chapters and articles and co-written/co-edited several books and journal issues on topics including gender equality and freedom of religion or belief, law and religion in the Russo-Ukraine War, and law and religion in the United States.
Professor Clark has written and spoken extensively on religious freedom in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, on religion and security, on comparative law and religion, and on other aspects of religious liberty over the past 26 years. She has served on an advisory board on freedom of religion or belief (FORB) and is serving on one on FORB and security for the Office for Democratic Initiatives and Human Rights of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE)(the world’s largest regional security organization).
In her work with the Center, Professor Clark has spoken at U.N. and OSCE forums and has briefed the U.S. State Department, E.U. offices, and other foreign affairs offices on religious liberty developments. She has been featured on radio and public television shows in the U.S. and internationally and has written for The National Review, the McCain Institute, and SCOTUSBlog, among others.
Professor Clark has also testified before the U.S. Congress, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, and the U.K. and Uzbek parliaments and has written amicus briefs in the U.S. Supreme Court. At the request of the U.S. State Department, USAID, national governments, and international NGOs, Professor Clark has analyzed legislation and draft legislation on religion from over a dozen countries. She has been awarded the presidential human rights award from the government of Uzbekistan for her assistance in their law reform process.
In addition to her work at the BYU International Center for Law and Religion Studies, Professor Clark has taught Professional Responsibility and co-taught classes on Comparative Law, Comparative Constitutional Law, International Human Rights, and European Union law at the J. Reuben Clark School of Law at Brigham Young University. Professor Clark has a professional working knowledge of Russian and Czech and has reading ability in French and German.
Prior to joining the BYU Law School, Professor Clark was an associate in the Washington, D.C., office of Mayer, Brown & Platt, where she was a member of the Appellate and Supreme Court Litigation Group. Professor Clark also clerked for Judge J. Clifford Wallace on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. She graduated summa cum laude from BYU’s law school, where she served as Editor-in-Chief of the BYU Law Review.