Dr Regina Jefferies
Post-Doc Fellow
Law & Justice
School of Global & Public Law
Dr Jefferies is a lawyer and Laureate Postdoctoral Fellow at the Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law, ARC Laureate Evacuations Research Hub at the University of New South Wales. She is also an affiliate of the Border Policy Research Institute at Western Washington University. Dr Jefferies specialises in international human rights law and international refugee law, with a focus on transnational legal theory, socio-legal studies, and the application of international legal norms in transboundary and multi-jurisdictional settings. Her research publications have examined the role of street-level bureaucrats, sub-state entities, and international organisations in the implementation and contestation of international legal norms.
Her current work as part of the ARC Laureate Evacuations Research Hub critically explores international law in relation to the concept of 'evacuations' in a variety of transboundary contexts, including disasters and climate change.
Dr Jefferies has extensive experience in the practice of asylum and refugee law before United States administrative agencies and the United States federal courts. She holds a PhD from the University of New South Wales; a Master of Studies from the University of Oxford in International Human Rights Law; a Juris Doctorate from Arizona State University; and a Bachelor of Arts in International Affairs from The George Washington University.
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Australian and New Zealand Society of International Law ECR Article & Book Chapter Prize (2026)
John S. Lancy Distinguished Alumni Award, Arizona State University Law Journal (2021)
PLuS Alliance International Interdisciplinary Researcher (2018-2019)
National Advocate of the Year, Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota (2018)
Special Recognition Award, Advocates for Human Rights (2017)
My research interests lie at the intersection of administrative law, public international law (including refugee, disaster and human rights law), and socio-legal studies. I am drawn to the interaction between authoritative sources of law and their practical application by state and non-state officials, particularly where that application influences whether and how people move across or within borders. My research tackles a variety of questions along these lines, including the role of street-level bureaucrats in the contestation of norms and development of international law, particularly in spaces where legal infrastructures overlap.
My scholarly approach blends doctrinal, empirical and social science research methods to document, visualise, and compare how international law norms flow through, and are contested in their application. My current research agenda consists of two distinct, but related projects: (1) developing a socio-legal approach to international legal theory by documenting, visualising, and comparing how international legal norms flow through, and are contested within, wider transnational legal processes; and (2) a comparative, interdisciplinary exploration of 'evacuations' as a relational form of forced movement in Australia, the United States and Fiji.