Professor Todd J. Zywicki

TODD J. ZYWICKI is George Mason University Foundation Professor of Law at George Mason University School of Law, Senior Scholar of the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, and Senior Fellow at the F.A. Hayek Program for Advanced Study in Philosophy, Politics and Economics.  In 2009, Professor Zywicki was the recipient of the Institute for Humane Studies 2009 Charles G. Koch Outstanding IHS Alum Award.  In 2012, he was awarded the Society for the Development of Austrian Economics prize for "Best Article in Austrian Economics" for his  article "Hayekian Anarchism" (co-authored with Edward Peter Stringham).  He has served as Co-Editor of the Supreme Court Economic Review since 2006 and as Editor from 2001-2002.  From 2003-2004, Professor Zywicki served as the Director of the Office of Policy Planning at the Federal Trade Commission.  He teaches in the area of Bankruptcy, Contracts, Commercial Law, Business Associations, Law & Economics, and Public Choice and the Law.  He has also taught at Vanderbilt University Law School, Georgetown University Law Center, Boston College Law School, and Mississippi College School of Law.

Professor Zywicki clerked for Judge Jerry E. Smith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and worked as an associate at Alston & Bird in Atlanta, Georgia, where he practiced bankruptcy and commercial law. He received his J.D. from the University of Virginia, where he was executive editor of the Virginia Tax Review and John M. Olin Scholar in Law and Economics.   Professor Zywicki also received an M.A. in Economics from Clemson University and an A.B. cum Laude with high honors in his major from Dartmouth College.

Professor Zywicki is a Senior Scholar of the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, Senior Fellow of the James Buchanan Center for Political Economy Program on Philosophy, Politics, and Economics, at George Mason University, a Senior Fellow of the Goldwater Institute, and a Fellow of the International Centre for Economic Research in Turin, Italy, and a Lone Mountain Fellow of the Property and Environment Research Center.  During the Fall 2008 Semester Professor Zywicki was the Searle Fellow of the George Mason University School of Law and was a 2008-09 W. Glenn Campbell and Rita Ricardo-Campbell National Fellow and the Arch W. Shaw National Fellow at the the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace at Stanford University.  He has lectured and consulted with government officials around the world, including Iceland, Italy, Japan, Canada, and Guatemala.  In 2006 Professor Zywicki served as a Member of the United States Department of Justice Study Group on "Identifying Fraud, Abuse and Errors in the United States Bankruptcy System."  In 2011 Professor Zywicki delivered the Dean Lindsey Cowen Lecture in Business Law and Regulation at Case Western Reserve School of Law on the mortgage crisis and regulation.  In 2013 he delivered a Vision Series Lecture at George Mason University.

Professor Zywicki is the author of more than 70 articles in leading law reviews and peer-reviewed economics journals.  He is one of the Top 50 Most Downloaded Law Authors at the Social Science Research Network, both All Time and during the Past 12 Months.  From 2005-2009 was the eleventh most-frequently cited law professor in the fields of Commercial Law and Bankruptcy and the most frequently cited under the age of 45 (at that time).  He has testified several times before Congress on issues of consumer bankruptcy law and consumer credit and is a frequent commentator on legal issues in the print and broadcast media, including the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Washington Times, Forbes, Nightline, National Review, NBC Nightly News, The Newshour with Jim Lehrer, Fox and Friends, Fox Business, CNN, CNBC, Bloomberg News, BBC, ABC Radio, The Diane Rehm Show, Lou Dobbs Radio Show, Neil Cavuto Show, John Batchelor Show, and The Laura Ingraham Show.  He is a contributor to the popular legal weblog The Volokh Conspiracy and The Atlantic magazine's The Atlantic Business Channel.

Professor Zywicki is a member of the the board of trustees or advisory board of numerous nonprofit and educational organizations, including the Board of Directors of the Institute for Humane Studies, the Governing Board and the Advisory Council for the Financial Services Research Program at George Washington University School of Business, the Board of Directors of  the The Bill of Rights Institute, the Executive Committee for the Federalist Society's Financial Institutions and E-Commerce Practice Group, the Advisory Council of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, the Board of Trustees and Program Advisory Board of the Foundation for Research on Economics and the Environment (FREE), the Board of Trustees of the Center for Excellence in Higher Education, and the Advisory Council of the Centro para el Analisis de las Decisiones Publicas, Universidad de Francisco Marroquin, Guatemala City, Guatemala (Public Choice Center at University of Francisco Marroquin).  He is currently the Chair of the Academic Advisory Council for the following organizations: The Bill of Rights Institute, the film “We the People in IMAX,” and the McCormick-Tribune Foundation “Freedom Museum” in Chicago, Illinois.  From 2005-2009 he served as an elected Alumni Trustee of the Dartmouth College Board of Trustees.  He is a member of the Board of Trustees of Yorktown University and Ralston College.

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