John C.P. Goldberg, interim dean of Harvard Law School since March 2024, has been named dean of HLS. The Carter professor of general jurisprudence—and now Chu Dean and professor of law at HLS—is an expert in tort law.
In a statement, Goldberg said he is “deeply grateful for this opportunity to serve the students, faculty, staff, and graduates of Harvard Law School, particularly at a moment in which law and legal education are so salient. “Working together,” he added, “we will continue to advance our understanding of the law, and to explore how it can best serve constitutional democracy, the rule of law, and the bedrock American principle of liberty and equal justice for all.”
After joining the HLS faculty in 2008, Goldberg served as deputy dean from 2017 to 2022 and chaired HLS committees including the Lateral Appointments Committee. He has also served on the Provost’s Advisory Committee and the University Discrimination and Harassment Policy Steering Committee, and chaired the Electronic Communications Policy Oversight Committee.
Before coming to Harvard, Goldberg taught at Vanderbilt University Law School, where he served as associate dean for research from 2005 to 2008. Earlier in his career, he clerked for Supreme Court Justice Byron R. White and Judge Jack B. Weinstein in the Eastern District of New York, and was an associate at the Boston firm Hill and Barlow.
Goldberg holds his J.D. from New York University School of Law, where he was editor in chief of the New York University Law Review. He attended Wesleyan University as an undergraduate, graduating with high honors., and also earned an M.Phil. in politics from Oxford and an M.A. in politics from Princeton.
Goldberg, the winner of several awards in the field of tort law and legal philosophy, serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Tort Law, where he was editor in chief from 2009 to 2015. He is also co-author of the leading casebook “Tort Law: Responsibilities and Redress” and “The Oxford Introductions to U.S. Law: Torts.” He is currently co-editor-in-chief of the Journal of Legal Analysis and is also a member of the editorial board of the journal Legal Theory.
President Alan M. Garber said in a statement that Goldberg “has an unwavering belief in excellence and inclusion, and the essential role that academic freedom plays in nurturing both of those aims.” Garber said, “We are delighted that he will continue to lead and serve Harvard Law School.”
Provost John F. Manning, who preceded Goldberg as HLS dean, added that Goldberg “cares deeply about the legal profession and about Harvard Law School, and he approaches everything he does with integrity, humility, and wisdom. It has been an honor to work closely with him over many years, and I know that he will be a superb dean.”
