Jerome Cohen

Jerome A. Cohen served as Professor of Law Emeritus at New York University School of Law, joining the faculty in 1990 and retiring in 2020 after more than three decades of teaching. Renowned as the leading American expert on Chinese law and a pioneer in East Asian legal studies, he founded the U.S.-Asia Law Institute at NYU Law in 2006 alongside Professor Frank K. Upham and served as its Faculty Director Emeritus. Cohen earned a B.A. from Yale College in 1951 as a Phi Beta Kappa graduate, spent 1951-1952 as a Fulbright Scholar in France, and received his J.D. from Yale Law School in 1955, where he was Editor-in-Chief of the Yale Law Journal. Following graduation, he clerked for U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice Earl Warren in 1955 and Justice Felix Frankfurter in 1956. He practiced law with Covington & Burling LLP, served as an assistant U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, and consulted for the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations before launching his academic career at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law in 1959. In 1964, Cohen joined Harvard Law School as the Jeremiah Smith Professor of Law, associate dean, and founder and director of East Asian Legal Studies, which introduced East Asian legal systems into American legal education. There, he taught notable students including future Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou (LLM 1976) and Vice President Annette Hsiu-Lien Lu.

Cohen authored foundational publications such as The Criminal Process in the People’s Republic of China, 1949–1963: An Introduction (1968), People’s China and International Law (1974, with Hungdah Chiu), Contract Laws of the People’s Republic of China, Investment Law and Practice in Vietnam, and Challenge to China: How Taiwan Abolished its Version of Re-education Through Labor (2013, with Margaret K. Lewis). His memoir, Eastward, Westward: A Life in Law, was published in 2025. Among his honors are the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Neck Ribbon from Japan (2018), the Order of Brilliant Star with Grand Cordon from Taiwan (2020), the American Foreign Law Association Lifetime Achievement Award in International Law (2021), and an honorary doctorate from Yale University (2020). Cohen resided in Beijing from 1979 to 1981 as a consultant for Coudert Brothers, becoming the first Western lawyer to practice under communist rule, and later served as of counsel at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison until 2000, advising on China investments. He held leadership roles with the Asia Society, China Institute in America, Human Rights Watch–Asia, and Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, while teaching courses on Chinese law and society, comparative international law, and business contracts with East Asia. Cohen mentored generations of lawyers and scholars, advocated for rule of law reforms in China, and facilitated high-profile cases like the refuge of activist Chen Guangcheng at NYU.

Professional Email: jerome.cohen@nyu.edu