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Tom Ginsburg focuses on comparative and international law from an interdisciplinary perspective. His work considers constitutional bargains: where they come from, how long they last, and under what conditions they are actually effective. His current projects focus on territorial cleavages, the role of law in rebel regimes, and the spread of rights in national constitutions. He is codirector of the Comparative Constitutions Project, an effort funded by the National Science Foundation to gather and analyze the constitutions of all independent nation-states since 1789.

Ginsburg’s books include Judicial Review in New Democracies (2003), which won the C. Herman Pritchett Award from the American Political Science Association; The Endurance of National Constitutions (2009), which also won a best book prize from APSA; Constitutions in Authoritarian Regimes (2014); and Law and Development in Middle-Income Countries (2014). He also writes about and teaches international law, including law relevant to armed conflict.

Before teaching law, Ginsburg served as a legal advisor at the Iran-US Claims Tribunal, The Hague, Netherlands, and he continues to work with numerous international development agencies and foreign governments on legal and constitutional reform. He is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Ginsburg holds BA, JD, and PhD degrees from the University of California, Berkeley.