Dominique M. Custos

Professor of Law
Agrégation de Droit Public, France, 1994 
Ph.D., summa cum laude, Panthéon-Sorbonne University, 1989 
Anthropology of Law LLM, magna cum laude, Panthéon-Sorbonne University, 1989
Public Law LLM, cum laude, Panthéon-Sorbonne University, 1984

Professor Custos earned her Doctoral degree, summa cum laude, from Panthéon-Sorbonne University, after having graduated as the valedictorian of her Public Law Master's degree class from the same University. Her first classroom experience took place at her Alma Mater where she served as a teaching and research fellow.  She then taught as an Associate Professor at the University of the (French) Antilles and Guiana and upon successful completion of the prestigious ‘Agrégation de Droit Public’ was appointed Full Professor to the University of Caen (France) in 1994. During the last two years of her appointment in Normandy, she assumed the direction of the Research Center for Fundamental Rights of Caen University and contributed to the launch of a new periodical published by this center (Les Cahiers de la Recherche sur les Droits Fondamentaux). From 1994 to 2002 she regularly lectured at the French Universities of Nanterre (Paris X), Evry Val d’Essonne, and Antilles & Guiana. She completed a Fulbright Fellowship at Columbia Law School in 1997-1998. In 2006, she lectured at the University Institute of Florence. Professor Custos periodically participates in Ph.D. dissertation defenses in France, either as an assessor or as a chair, including at the Panthéon-Sorbonne University.

Professor Custos sits on the Nominations Committee of the American Society of Comparative Law. She serves on the Rulemaking Advisory Group of the ABA Project on European Union Administrative Law. She is a past member of the executive committee of the Comparative Law Section of the AALS. Additionally, she is affiliated with the Société de Législation Comparée, the European Union Studies Association, the Commission pour l'Etude des Communautés Européennes, the Société d'Etudes Nord Américaines, and the Institut Français de Science Administrative.

Professor Custos is fluent in French and proficient in written Spanish.

Professor Custos teaching experience uniquely includes courses falling into both Common Law and Civil Law curricula on each side of the Atlantic: administrative law, comparative law, European Union law, public utilities law, telecommunications law, constitutional law, local government law, and conventional obligations.

Professor Custos’s scholarship reflects her pluridisciplinarity and her dual Common Law - Civil Law experience. A first strand of her research combines administrative law, European Union law and comparative law and focuses on the evolution of regulatory frameworks in a context of liberalization and globalization. In the second strand of her scholarly endeavors, where comparative law, European Union law and French overseas law intersect, she tackles the questions of legal transplant and law and development in a post-colonial era through the study of the French Overseas Departments and the E.U. Outermost Regions.

Email: dcustos@loyno.edu
Office Phone: 504-861-5660
Fax: 504-861-5733

Assistant Information: Marla Bennett
Office Phone: 504-861-5584
Fax: 504-861-5733
Email: mbennett@loyno.edu

Publications

(*Titles translated from original French)

Book

• *"The Federal Communications Commission and the Regulation of the Information Superhighways", L'Harmattan, Coll, Logiques Juridiques; 1999, 411 pages. This scholarship was prepared during her Fulbright fellowship at Columbia University.

Book Chapters

• *"The Revelation of an Overseas European Union Law", in J-Y Faberon, L. Tésoka, J. Ziller : Union Européenne et Outre-Mers, Unis dans leurs Diversités, Forthcoming.
• *"Regulatory Authorities and Metamorphosis of the Procedural Law of Administrative Individual Decisions" in C. Prébissy-Schnall, G. Gugliemi, G. Koubi: "Droit et économie : interférences et interactions. Mélanges en l'honneur du Pr Michel Bazex", LexisNexis, Forthcoming.
  
• *"The Status of French Overseas Departments (E.U. Outermost regions) in European Union Law". Part 2: "Reality of Status" Jurisclasseur Europe (European Union Law Encyclopedia), nº 472, 43 pp. + periodical update. Third edition: March 2008.
• *"The Status of French Overseas Departments (E.U. Outermost regions) in European Union Law". Part 1: "Principles of Status" Jurisclasseur Europe (European Union Law Encyclopedia), nº 471. 18 pp. + periodical update. Third edition: January 2007.
• *"American Regulation" in G. Marcou: "Regulated Industries, Public Service and National Integration", L’Harmattan, Coll, Logiques Juridiques, Vol.1  2005, pp.145-165.
• *"French People and Overseas Populations" in J-Y Faberon: "French Overseas. The New  Institutional Deal", Documentation Française, 2004, pp. 57-66.
• *"The Statute of Orientation: a Method" in J.-Y. Faberon : "La Loi d'Orientation pour  l'Outre-mer. Quelles Singularités en France et en Europe?", Presses Universitaires d'Aix-Marseille, 2001, pp. 93-105.
• *"Freedom of Speech over the Internet in the USA and in France", in Université de Paris I, Ed. "L'Internet et le Droit", Legipresse, 2001, pp. 257-270.
• *"Puerto Rico or the Apparent Dual Sovereignty" in J.-Y. Faberon and G. Agniel, Ed.: "La  Souveraineté partagée en Nouvelle-Calédonie et en Droit Comparé", Documentation Française, 2000, pp. 213-230.
• *"The Strategy of Ultraperiphicity" in P. Grard, Ed.: "Le Droit Communautaire et les Départements d'Outre-Mer", Documentation Française, 1998, pp. 55-67.
• *"Overseas Law : Death, Resurrection or Transfiguration?" in "Mélanges offerts à Georges Dupuis", Librairie Générale du Droit et de la Jurisprudence; 1997. pp. 83-93.
• *"Administrative Democracy in the European Communities" in C. Grewe, Ed.: "Questions pour le Droit Européen", Presses Universitaires de Caen, 1996. pp. 101-129.
• *"The Status of French Overseas Departments (E.U. Outermost regions) in European Union Law". Part 2: "Reality of Status" Jurisclasseur Europe (European Union Law Encyclopedia), nº 472. 1993, 2000 (2nd edition), 21 pp. + periodical update.
• *"The Status of French Overseas Departments (E.U. Outermost regions) in European Union Law". Part 1: "Principles of Status" Jurisclasseur Europe (European Union Law Encyclopedia), nº 471. 1993, 2000 (2nd edition), 15 pp. + periodical update.

Journal Articles

            With one exception all the publications listed below are peer-reviewed articles

•  “The Transformation of French Regulatory Structure and Administrative Procedure: Process and Network” In progress.
•  * “The European Court of First Instance and the Theory of the Shielding Regulation”, Article Solicited by Revue des Affaires Européennes (Bruylant), Forthcoming.
• *“The Administrative Law Case-law during the 2006 Term of the U.S. Supreme Court” Article Solicited by Droit Administratif (French Law Review), 7 (January 2008).
• * “U.S. Administrative Law and French Administrative Law: Sources and Structures”, 2 Revue Internationale de Droit Comparé, 285 (2007).
• “New Caledonia, a Case of Shared Sovereignty Within the French Republic: Appearance or Reality?” 13 (1) European Public Law (U.K. Law Review), 97 (2007).
• “Secularism in French Public Schools: Back to War? The French Statute of March 15, 2004”, 54 American Journal of Comparative Law, 337 (2006).
•  * Statutory Interpretation in the U.S.: the Triumph of Agency Expertise over Stare Decisis”, Article Solicited by Droit Administratif (French Law Review), 13 (October 2006).
• “The Rulemaking Power of American Independent Regulatory Agencies”, U.S. report to the 2006 International Congress of Comparative Law, 54 (Suppl.) American Journal of Comparative Law, 615 (2006).  
• “The Status of Jurisprudence in France and Louisiana”, 51 Loyola Law Review, 73 (2005).
• *"Decentralization in the French Overseas Departments, Between Continuity and Renewal", Revue Française d'Administration Publique, 2002. n. 101, pp. 15-24.
• *"American Independent Regulatory Commissions and French 'Autorités Administratives Indépendantes (Independent Administrative Authorities)'", Politiques et Management Public Vol. 20, 2002, n.1, pp. 66-84.
• *"The French Overseas Departments Constitutional Status", Actualité Juridique du Droit Administratif, 2001, pp. 731-735.
• *"Towards an Autonomization of the Institutional Evolution of Overseas Departments? ", Revue Politique et Parlementaire, nº 1009/1010 : "What Kind of State for Singular Regions?", 2001, pp. 47-60.
• *"The Prefect in the French Overseas Departments over Half a Century", Revue Française de Droit Administratif, 2000, nº 4, pp. 778-789.
• *"The American Telecommunications Universal Service, Past and Future", Juris-PTT, Issue 52. 1998, pp. 1-25 and Computer and Telecoms Law Review; Issues 3 and 4. 1998. This scholarship was prepared during my Fulbright fellowship at Columbia University.
• *"Freedom of Speech of Adults and Protection of Minors on the Net before the U.S. Supreme Court. Reno v. ACLU, June 26 1997", Revue du Droit Public, Issue 6. 1997. pp. 1637-1664. This scholarship was prepared during my Fulbright fellowship at Columbia University.
• *"The U.S. Supreme Court and the Right to Abortion". Revue du Droit Public, 1995, Issue 5. pp. 1119-1156.
• *"The Appellate Jurisdiction of the US Supreme Court in Constitutional Matters". Revue du Droit Public, 1991, Issue 3. pp. 1017-1038.
• *"The Legality of Regulation of Artificial Conception" (Casenote on a Decision by the Conseil d'Etat, July 21, 1989). Actualité Juridique du Droit Administratif, 1991, Issue 6. pp. 469-473.

Professional Presentations

• International Conference of the Law and Society Association on Placing Law, May 29 – June 1, 2008, Montreal, Panel: Regulation beyond North America ; Presentation: “Stakes and Constraints of the Mapping of the World Legal Systems: A Case study of French Administrative Law”.         
• International Conference of the Law and Society Association on Placing Law, May 29 – June 1, 2008, Montreal, Panel: Competing Conceptualizations of Citizenship Across Time and Space ; Presentation: “European Union Outside Continental Europe: A Case of Post-colonial law in an Age of Globalization”.
• International Conference of the Law and Society Association on Law and Society in the 21st Century, July 25-28 July 2007, Humboldt University, Berlin, Panel: Toward a Regulatory Model , or Still Varieties of Regulatory Models; Presentation: “Is there a Process of Americanization via Europeanization of French Regulatory Structure and Administrative Procedure?”.
• European University Institute of Florence, Conference on The E.U. and Overseas territories, United beyond their Diversities, April 12-13, 2007, Keynote Speaker (responsible for the general report of the conference).
• European University Institute of Florence, Seminar on Regulation in Europe and in the US, “Regulation and Law in a comparative perspective: the United States and French approaches”, December, 5, 2006.
• European University Institute of Florence, Seminar on Public law-Private law distinction, “Public law-Private law distinction in Louisiana”, December, 4, 2006.
• International Congress of Comparative Law, International Academy of Comparative Law, Utrecht, July 15-23, 2006, “The Rulemaking Power of American Independent Regulatory Agencies”, (U.S. report).
• Annual Meeting of the American Association of Comparative Law, on Multiple Sovereignties, University of Hawaii, October 27-29, 2005, “New Caledonia, a case of Shared Sovereignty”.
• Conference on The Bicentennial of the French Civil Code, September 8, 2004, Loyola University New Orleans and Louisiana Supreme Court, Co-Organizer and Session Moderator. The Chief Justice of the French Cour de Cassation, Guy Canivet and Justice Alain Lacabarats, who had just been elevated to this court, participated in this historic event.
• Conference on Comparative Regulation, University of Paris I (Panthéon-Sorbonne), April 29-30, 2004, “American Regulation”.
• Conference on Overseas Territories and the 2003 Constitutional Amendment on the Decentralized Organization of the French Republic, University of Montpellier, IDOM, November 28-29 2003, “French People and Overseas Populations”.
• Conference on Public Action Reconfiguration: Big Bang or Reform?, University of Nice-Sophia Antipolis, Public Management Institute, October 4-5, 2001, "American Independent Regulatory Commissions and French 'Autorités Administratives Indépendantes (French Independent Administrative Authorities)' ".
• Conference on The Statute of Orientation for Overseas, University of Montpellier I, IDOM, May 29-31, 2001, " The Statute of Orientation: a Method".
• Conference on the Future of the European Convention of Human Rights, University of Caen, March 22-23, 2001, "European System of Human Rights and Inter-American System of Human Rights".
• Conference on First Assessment of December 13, 2000 Statute, Association Française de Droit Constitutionnel and French Senate, Paris, February 1, 2001, "The French Overseas Departments between art 72 and art 73 of the Constitution".
• Conference on Internet and Law, University of Paris I (Panthéon-Sorbonne), September 25-26, 2000, "Freedom  of  Speech over the Internet in the USA and in France".
• Conference on The Bicentennial of the Prefectoral Institution, University of Caen, February 16, 2000, "The Prefect in the French Overseas Departments over Half a Century".
• Conference on Dual Sovereignty in New Caledonia and in Comparative Law, Nouméa, New    Caledonia, November 17-19, 1999, "Puerto Rico or the Apparent Dual Sovereignty".
• Lecture on "Constitutional Interpretation in France", Columbia University School of Law, New York, February 18, 1997.
• Conference on European Community Law and Overseas Departments, University of Le Havre,             May 10, 1996, "The Strategy of Ultraperiphicity".
• Conference on European Law, University of Caen, February 23, 1996, "Administrative Democracy in European Communities".
• Conference on Decentralization in France, University of French Antilles and Guiana, March 26-27, 1991, "Evaluation of the Regulation Concerning Decentralization and Deconcentration since 1982".

Updated November 30, 2007