Biography

Directs Masters Program in International Economic Law, Business and Policy; Senior Fellow (by courtesy), Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research and Stanford Center for International Development

A leading expert on the application of economics to legal problems, Alan O. Sykes has focused his research on international economic relations. His writing and teaching have encompassed international trade, torts, contracts, insurance, antitrust, and economic analysis of law. He has been a member of the executive committee and the board of the American Law and Economics Association, and he currently serves as reporter for the American Law Institute Project on Principles of Trade Law: The World Trade Organization. Professor Sykes is associate editor of the Journal of International Economic Law and a member of the board of editors of the World Trade Review. He formerly served as editor of the Journal of Legal Studies and the Journal of Law and Economics.

Before joining the Stanford Law School faculty in 2006, Professor Sykes was the Frank and Bernice J. Greenberg Professor of Law at the University of Chicago Law School, where he also served as faculty director of curriculum. He is a former National Science Foundation graduate fellow in the Department of Economics at Yale University. He is a senior fellow (by courtesy) with the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research and the Stanford Center for International Development.

Key Works

• John H. Jackson, William J. Davey and Alan O. Sykes, Legal Problems of International Economic Relations : Cases, Materials, and Text on the National and International Regulation of Transnational Economic Relations, 4th ed., St. Paul, MN: West Group, 2002.
• Daniel R. Fischel and Alan O. Sykes, Corporate Crime, 25 Journal of Legal Studies 319 (1996). Reprinted in Milestones in Management, v. 10: Management and Law, Felix Ehrat and Eric Stupp, eds., Basel: Helbing and Lichtenhan, 2003.
• Alan O. Sykes, Product Standards for Internationally Integrated Goods Markets, Washington, D.C. : Brookings Institution, 1995.
• Alan O. Sykes, Protectionism as a "Safeguard": A Positive Analysis of the GATT "Escape Clause" with Normative Speculations, 58 University of Chicago Law Review 255 (1991).
• Alan O. Sykes, The Economics of Vicarious Liability, 93 Yale Law Journal 1231 (1984).

Courses & Programs

Courses

• International Trade Regulation
• Law, Economics and Politics of International Trade
• Social Science and International Institutions
• Torts

Programs

• John M. Olin Program in Law and Economics, Professor of Law

Publications & Cases

Recent Publications View All

• Alan Sykes, Corporate Liability for Extraterritorial Torts Under the Alien Tort Statute and Beyond: An Economic Analysis, Georgetown Law Journal, (forthcoming 2012). (Also in the Law & Economics Research Paper Series Working Paper no. 420 on SSRN)
• Alan O. Sykes, The Dispute Settlement Mechanism--Ensuring Compliance?, in Oxford Handbook on the WTO, Oxford: Oxford University Press (forthcoming 2012).
• Eric A. Posner, Alan O. Sykes, Efficient Breach of International Law: Optimal Remedies, "Legalized Noncompliance," and Related Issues, 110 Michigan Law Review 243 (2011).
• Gene M. Grossman and Alan O. Sykes, A Preference for Development: The Law and Economics of GSP, in WTO Law and Developing Countries, George A. Bermann and Petros C. Mavroidis, editors, New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 2007, paperback edition, 2011.
• Gene M. Grossman & Alan O. Sykes, "Optimal" Retaliation in the WTO--A Commentary on the Upland Cotton Arbitration,, 10 World Trade Review 133 (2011).
• Robert W. Staiger and Alan O. Sykes, International Trade and Domestic Regulation, 40 Journal of Legal Studies 149 (2011).
• Alan O. Stykes. Public Versus Private Enforcement of International Economic Law: Standing and Remedy, in Economics Of Public International Law, Eric A. Posner, editor, Cheltenham, Glos, UK: Edward Elgar Publishing, 2010.
• Eric A. Posner and Alan O. Sykes, Economic Foundations of the Law of the Sea, 104 American Journal of International Law 569 (2010)
• Alan O. Sykes, The Law, Economics and Politics of Preferential Trading Arrangements: An Introduction, 46 Stanford Journal of International Law 171 (2010)
• Robert W. Staiger and Alan O. Sykes, Currency ‘Manipulation’ and World Trade: A Caution, in The US-Sino Currency Dispute, Simon J. Evenett, ed., London: VoxEU.org, 2010.