DETROIT – Lance Gable, associate dean of Wayne State University Law School and an internationally known expert on public health law and bioethics, will serve as the law school’s interim dean.
Gable, a member of the law school faculty since 2006, was named associate dean in June 2014, after serving as interim associate dean since June 2013.
“I look forward to working with Lance to continue to build on Wayne Law’s impressive period of growth and success,” said Wayne State Provost Keith E. Whitfield. “We are proud of our students who make such a difference in the community and graduate ready to be effective advocates and counselors, our faculty who are internationally recognized scholars and our alumni who lead in numerous fields.”
Gable succeeds Jocelyn Benson, who last week announced she will step down as dean this month to serve as CEO of the Ross Initiative in Sports for Equality, a venture led by professional sports organizations and networks, including the NFL, NBA and ESPN, to improve race relations in America. Benson also will serve as a special advisor on philanthropic investments to RISE founder Stephen M. Ross, Wayne Law class of 1965.
Benson will continue her affiliation with Wayne Law as director of the Levin Center at Wayne Law and co-teaching a course on Legislation with former U.S. Sen. Carl Levin. Benson was appointed interim dean in December 2012 and named dean in June 2014 after a national search.
The university will launch a national search to identify the next law school dean.
Gable has taught Public Health Law, Bioethics and the Law, Torts and other health law subjects at Wayne Law. His research addresses the overlap among law, policy, ethics, health and science. He has published journal articles on a diverse array of topics, including public health law, ethics and policy; international human rights; bioterrorism and emergency preparedness; mental health; research ethics; and information privacy. He is also co-editor and co-author respectively of two books: Research with High Risk Populations: Balancing Science, Ethics and the Law and Legal Aspects of HIV/AIDS: A Guide for Policy and Law Reform.
Gable has helped the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services develop ethical guidelines for the allocation of scarce medical resources during public health emergencies. He has helped develop course materials for the World Health Organization Diploma in International Human Rights and Mental Health and has worked as a human rights consultant for the Pan American Health Organization.
In addition, he is co-chair of the university’s Stem Cell Research Oversight Committee. He has served as co-chair of the university’s Clinical and Transnational Research Ethics Workgroup and received the 2010 WSU Academy of Scholars Junior Faculty Award for the Humanities and Social Sciences.
Prior to joining the Wayne Law faculty, Gable served as a senior fellow at the Centers for Law and the Public’s Health: A Collaborative at Georgetown and Johns Hopkins universities, affiliated with the World Health Organization and U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He continued his affiliation with the centers as a scholar from 2006 to 2012.
He previously was project director for the Emergency System for Advance Registration of Volunteer Health Professionals Legal and Regulatory Issues Project, administered by the Health Resources and Services Administration. He was also the Alfred P. Sloan Fellow in Bioterrorism Law and Policy at the Centers for Law and the Public’s Health and practiced as a health care law attorney at a major international firm in Washington, D.C.
“We have something special here at Wayne Law,” Gable said. “Our students, faculty, staff and alumni come together as advocates who take pride in a commitment to serving the community. And as an urban law school, we recognize our important role in the continued revitalization of Detroit.”
Gable holds a bachelor of arts degree in political science from Johns Hopkins University and master of public health degree from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. He earned his law degree from Georgetown University Law Center.