Senior Advisor for Governance and Law

Professor Jensen has for the last 28 years taught, written, and practiced in the field of law and development in 30 countries, as a Fulbright scholar, as a Country Representative and Senior Advisor for Governance and Law to The Asia Foundation, as an advisor to the Asian Development Bank, the World Bank, and the African Development Bank, as Professor of the Practice of Law and Co-Director of the Rule of Law Program at Stanford Law School, and as a Senior Research Scholar and Associated Faculty at the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law at Stanford University. He lived for 14 years in Asia.

Jensen’s scholarship and fieldwork focuses on bridging theory and practice, and examines the relationship between law and political, economic and social development. Illustrative publications include: Erik G. Jensen and William Cole, “Democracy, Governance and the Rule of Law in Asia,” in Order and Institutional Architecture in Asia, edited by Bates Gill and Michael Green (Columbia University Press: 2009); Erik G. Jensen, “Justice and the Rule of Law,” in Charles Call with Vanessa Wyeth, eds., Building States to Build Peace (Lynne Reinner: 2008); Erik G. Jensen, “Confronting Misconceptions And Acknowledging Imperfections:  A Response To Khaled Abou El Fadl’s ‘Islam And Democracy’” 27 Fordham International Law Review 81 (2003); and Erik G. Jensen and Thomas C. Heller, eds., Beyond Common Knowledge: Empirical Approaches to the Rule of Law (Stanford University Press: 2003).

Education: B.A. in political science from Augustana College, South Dakota; J.D. from the William Mitchell College of Law in St. Paul, Minnesota; and a LL.M. from the London School of Economics.