Jenny S. Martinez

- Provost
- Professor of Law
- Senior Fellow, by courtesy, Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
Expertise
- Civil Procedure & Litigation
- Comparative Law
- Constitutional History
- Constitutional Law
- Federal Courts & Federal Jurisdiction
- Human Rights
- Human Rights International Law
- International Conflict Resolution
- International Criminal Law
- International Dispute Resolution
- International Justice
- International Law & National Security
- International Trade & Investment
- Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS)
- Law of Armed Conflict
- Legal History
- Military Trials
- National Security Law
- Protection of Civil Liberties
- Public Interest Law
- Public Interest Practice
- Separation of Powers
- Supreme Court
- Trade Regulation
- Transnational Justice
- Transnational Litigation & Arbitration
Biography
Jenny S. Martinez is the provost at Stanford University, formerly the Richard E. Lang Professor of Law and Dean of Stanford Law School and the law school’s 14th dean. Professor Martinez is a leading expert on international law and constitutional law, including comparative constitutional law. She is the author of The Slave Trade and the Origins of International Human Rights Law (Oxford University Press, 2012) and numerous articles in leading academic journals. She teaches courses on constitutional law, civil procedure, international law, and international business transactions. She is a Senior Fellow (by courtesy) of Stanford’s Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and a faculty affiliate of Stanford’s Center on International Security and Cooperation and Stanford’s Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law.
An experienced litigator, she has worked on numerous cases involving international law and constitutional law issues. She served as a member of the U.S. State Department’s Advisory Committee on International Law. She is also a member of the American Law Institute.
Before joining the Stanford faculty in 2003, Professor Martinez clerked for Justice Stephen Breyer (BA ’59) of the U.S. Supreme Court and Judge Guido Calabresi of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit; she was also an associate legal officer for Judge Patricia Wald of the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague, where she worked on trials involving genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.
Education
- BA Yale University 1993
- JD Harvard Law School 1997
Related Organizations
Affiliations & Honors
- Member, American Academy of Arts and Sciences
- Member, American Society of International Law
- Member, American Law Institute
- Member, American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Speeches and Writings
Stanford Law Emphasizes the Importance of Community
The World Needs You… and You Are Up to the Challenge
News

Stanford Law School Community Celebrates the Start of the 2023-24 Academic Year
At Stanford Law School’s (SLS) fifth annual convocation, held September 26 on the lawn in front of the school, one theme dominated the ceremony marking the beginning of the 2023-24 academic year: Lawyers—and law students—have a critical role to play in promoting democracy, the rule of law, and stable, productive…
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