Dr. David B. Wilkins

Prof. DAVID B. WILKINS

TEACHING AND ACADEMIC ACTIVITY

• Professor of courses such as The Legal Profession, Legal Education for the Twenty-First Century, and Challenges of a General Counsel.
• Co-founder (2007) of the Harvard Law School Executive Education Program, where he teaches courses including Leadership in Law Firms and Leadership in Corporate Counsel.
• Has delivered over 40 keynote lectures at universities around the world.
• Honorary Doctorate in Law, Stockholm University (Sweden, 2012).
• Distinguished Visiting Mentor Award, Australian National University (2012).
• Genest Fellowship, Osgoode Hall Law School (2012).
• Scholar of the Year Award, American Bar Foundation (2010).
• J. Clay Smith Award, Howard University School of Law (2009).
• Order of the Coif Distinguished Visitor Fellowship (2008).
• Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2012).

PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITY

• Lester Kissel Professor of Law at the Harvard Law School.
• Vice Dean for Global Initiatives on the Legal Profession.
• Director of the Center on the Legal Profession, Harvard Law School.
• Senior Research Fellow at the American Bar Foundation.
• Fellow at the Harvard University Edmond J. Safra Foundation Center for Ethics.

PUBLICATIONS

• Author of more than 80 articles on the legal profession in academic and professional journals.
• Co-author, with Andrew Kaufman (Harvard Law School), of one of the most influential casebooks in legal education.
• Current projects: Globalization, Lawyers, and Emerging Economies; After the JD (a longitudinal study of lawyers’ careers in the United States); Harvard Law School Career Study; and The New Social Engineers (on African American lawyers in corporate law).
• Wilkins & Papa, The Rise of the Corporate Legal Elite in the BRICS, 54 B.C. L. Rev. 1149 (2013).
• Wilkins, Team of Rivals? Toward a New Model of the Corporate Attorney-Client Relationship, 78 Fordham L. Rev. 2067 (2010).
• Wilkins & Gulati, Why Are There So Few Black Lawyers in Corporate Law Firms?, 84 Calif. L. Rev. 493 (1996).
• Wilkins, Open up the Door. I’ll Get in Myself!, 91 Tenn. L. Rev. 601 (2024).
• Wilkins, Trubek & Fong, Globalization, Lawyers, and Emerging Economies, in Lawyers in 21st-Century Societies (2022).