Jack M. Balkin
Knight Professor of Constitutional Law and First Amendment
Founder and Director, Information Society Project
Department: Law School
Colleges / Universities: Yale University
Contact
P.O. Box 208215
New Haven, CT 06520
Email: jack.balkin@yale.edu
Website: Yale Law School faculty profile
Blog: Balkinization
Jack M. Balkin is Knight Professor of Constitutional Law and the First Amendment at Yale Law School and the founder and director of Yale's Information Society Project, an interdisciplinary center that studies law and new information technologies, as well as the director of the Knight Law and Media Program and the Abrams Institute for Free Expression at Yale.
Professor Balkin's work ranges over many different fields, including constitutional theory, telecommunications and Internet law, reproductive rights, freedom of speech, rhetoric, jurisprudence and legal reasoning, cultural evolution, the theory of ideology, and musical and legal interpretation. He is the author of over one hundred articles and the author or editor of eleven books. His most recent books are Living Originalism (Harvard, Belknap Press, 2011), and Constitutional Redemption: Political Faith in an Unjust World (Harvard University Press 2011).
He is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Professor Balkin has also founded and edits the group blog, Balkinization.
Degrees
Ph.D. (Philosophy) Cambridge, 1995
J.D. Harvard, 1981
A.B. Harvard, 1978
Recent Academic Article Summaries
The First Amendment in the Second Gilded Age
Social media firms give users freedom of speech in exchange for access to personal data. The digital public sphere depends on the business models of firms like Google and Twitter.
Digital companies should be treated as information fiduciaries. These firms should act in good faith and avoid manipulating users of digital services.
Free Speech is a Triangle
Increasingly, nation-states censor speakers by co-opting the expertise of internet-based businesses like Google. Defending free speech means resisting this type of censorship, and protecting users from manipulative uses of data.
Some types of regulation do not increase the threat of censorship. Lawmakers should require digital media firms to safeguard users’ privacy.
Free Speech in the Algorithmic Society: Big Data, Private Governance, and New School Speech Regulation
Traditional free speech doctrines protect speakers from state censorship. The rise of big data, algorithmic decision-making, and digital media companies alters the nature of free speech concerns.
Governments still threaten free speech. However, courts should not stop policymakers from regulating digital media companies.
The Three Laws of Robotics in the Age of Big Data
Robots are set in motion by human beings. Laws governing robots should bind the firms and governments that use robots. Those that use robots, big data, and artificial intelligence should act in good faith and take care not to harm the public.
Policymakers should emphasize transparency and fairness in making ground rules for the use of robots, big data, and artificial intelligence.
A Grand Bargain to Make Tech Companies Trustworthy?
Doctors and lawyers are barred from using client information for their own interests. This article asks if similar rules should apply to firms like Google and Facebook. Lawmakers could give such firms a safe harbor from regulation if they agree to safeguard consumers.
Google and Facebook could agree to become “information fiduciaries” in exchange for immunity from state privacy law.
Blog Posts
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