- Jackson Eli Reynolds Professor of Law
- Faculty Director, Stanford Center for Racial Justice
- Room N331, Neukom Building
Expertise
- Children & the Law
- Civil Rights
- Constitutional Law
- Distributive Justice
- Equal Protection
- Family Law
- Inequality
- Race & the Criminal Justice System
Biography
Ralph Richard Banks (BA ’87, MA ’87) is the Jackson Eli Reynolds Professor of Law at Stanford Law School, the co-founder and Faculty Director of the Stanford Center for Racial Justice, and Professor, by courtesy, at the School of Education. A native of Cleveland, Ohio and a graduate of Stanford University and Harvard Law School (JD 1994), Banks has been a member of the Stanford faculty since 1998. Prior to joining the law school, he practiced law at O’Melveny & Myers, was the Reginald F. Lewis Fellow at Harvard Law School and clerked for a federal judge, the Honorable Barrington D. Parker, Jr. (then of the Southern District of New York). Professor Banks teaches and writes about family law, employment discrimination law and race and the law. He is the author of Is Marriage for White People? How the African American Marriage Decline Affects Everyone. At Stanford, he is affiliated with the Michelle R. Clayman Institute for Gender Research, the Center for Comparative Studies in Race and the Ethnicity, the Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education and the Center for the Study of Poverty and Inequality. His writings have appeared in a wide range of popular and scholarly publications, including the Stanford Law Review, the Yale Law Journal, The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times. He has been interviewed and quoted by numerous print and broadcast media, including ABC News/Nightline, National Public Radio, The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times, among others.
Education
- BA Stanford University 1987
- MA Stanford University 1987
- JD Harvard Law School 1994
Courses
Affiliations & Honors
- Member, Faculty Advisory Board for the Michelle R. Clayman Institute for Gender Research
- Faculty Associate, Research Institute for Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity
Faculty on Point | Prof. Ralph Richard Banks on Racial Justice Beyond Constitutional Law
Policy Practicums
Is Marriage for White People?
During the past half century, marriage has declined throughout American society. Among those who do marry, the wife is more likely than ever to outearn or be better educated than her husband. Why have these changes occurred? How have they shaped intimate relationships?
Is Marriage for White People? answers these questions through an exploration of the lives of the black middle class.