The Most Influential People Across History
Find the most influential people in 24 academic disciplines and numerous subdisciplines
Find famous and important people related to your research. This is an excellent tool for research papers, topic papers, and building a bibliography. Using our influence-based algorithm, our rankings synthesize data from Wikipedia, Wikidata, Semantic Scholar, and CrossRef.
Students and researchers now have a fast and reliable way to find influential thinkers from 24 disciplines and 300 sub-disciplines (and growing). If you want to find history’s most influential philsosophers, or the world’s most influential mathematicians currently, now you can.
We also provide custom rankings of people by discipline as well as interviews with influential academics who are currently active.
To use this tool, select the discipline (and optional subdiscipline) relevant to your research, and specify influential academics by history, world, or US. Even results that are counterintuitive are often enlightening (our algorithm always picks up a signal).
Methodology: How and Why We Rank by Influence …
See additional learning tools, study tips, features on campus life and much more at our Student Resources Headquarters.
List of the most influential people in Law,
#351
Wojciech Sadurski
#17032
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (74 years)
Wojciech Sadurski is a Polish and Australian scholar of constitutional law. As of 2023, he is Challis Professor in Jurisprudence at the University of Sydney and Professor in the Centre for Europe in the University of Warsaw.
Go to Profile#352
John F. Duffy
#23411
Overall Influence
1963 - Present (61 years)
John Fitzgerald Duffy is Professor of Law at University of Virginia School of Law in Charlottesville, Virginia. He is a Legal Commentator and Author who has written numerous articles and co-authored a scholarly book on Patent Law . He previously served as law clerk to Antonin Scalia, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, and Stephen F. Williams, Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Between these two assignments, he served as an attorney at the Office of Legal Counsel in the United States Department of Justice. In additi...
Go to Profile#353
Rodolfo Sacco
#17818
Overall Influence
1923 - 2022 (99 years)
Rodolfo Sacco was an Italian legal scholar. Biography Born in Fossano, Italy, he was professor emeritus at the University of Turin, Faculty of Law. He is arguably one of the country's best known legal scholars and one of Europe's most famous comparative lawyers.
Go to Profile#354
Jan Paulsson
#26113
Overall Influence
1949 - Present (75 years)
Jan Paulsson is a Swedish scholar and practitioner in the area of international arbitration. Early life Paulsson received his A.B. from Harvard University in 1971, his J.D. from Yale Law School in 1975, where he was an editor of the Yale Law Journal, and a Diplôme d’etudes supérieurs spécialisées from the University of Paris in 1977.
Go to Profile#355
Hadley Arkes
#8103
Overall Influence
1940 - Present (84 years)
Hadley P. Arkes is an American political scientist and the Edward N. Ney Professor of Jurisprudence and American Institutions emeritus at Amherst College, where he has taught since 1966. He is currently the founder and director of the James Wilson Institute on Natural Rights & the American Founding in Washington, D.C.
Go to Profile#356
Karl Lagerfeld
#210
Overall Influence
1933 - 2019 (86 years)
Karl Otto Lagerfeld was a German fashion designer. Lagerfeld began his career in fashion in the 1950s, working for several top fashion houses including Balmain, Patou, and Chloé before joining Chanel in 1983. As the creative director of Chanel from 1983 until his death, he oversaw every aspect of the fashion house's creative output, from designing collections to overseeing advertising campaigns and store displays. He was instrumental in revitalizing the Chanel brand, helping it regain its position as one of the top fashion houses in the world. He was also creative director of the Italian fur and leather goods fashion house Fendi, as well as his own eponymous fashion label.
Go to Profile#357
Daniel Markovits
#9330
Overall Influence
1969 - Present (55 years)
Daniel Markovits is the Guido Calabresi Professor of Law at the Yale Law School and the founding director of the Yale Center for the Study of Private Law. He is the author of The Meritocracy Trap . Education After earning a B.A. in mathematics, summa cum laude, from Yale University, Markovits received a British Marshall Scholarship to study in England, where he was awarded an M.Sc. in econometrics and mathematical economics from the London School of Economics and a B.Phil. and D.Phil. in philosophy from the University of Oxford. Markovits then returned to Yale to study law and, after clerking...
Go to Profile#358
Luiz Fux
#18390
Overall Influence
1953 - Present (71 years)
Luiz Fux is a Brazilian judge and the former Chief Justice of the Supreme Federal Court. He is of Romanian Jewish descent, and the first Jewish Brazilian member of the Court. He was previously a minister of the Superior Court of Justice before assuming his position at the Supreme Court.
Go to Profile#359
Sayed Hassan Amin
#14157
Overall Influence
1948 - Present (76 years)
Sayed Hassan Amin is an Iranian lawyer, philosopher, scholar, author and pro-democracy political figure. Early life and education Born in Sabzavar, Iran, Amin attended Tehran University at the age of 17 and obtained a bachelor in Law with distinction. After completing his apprenticeship in the Ministry of Justice he qualified as a judge, working in different judicial capacities in Iran while reading for his LLM at the University of Tehran.
Go to Profile#360
Alvin Robert Cornelius
#10517
Overall Influence
1903 - 1991 (88 years)
Alvin Robert Cornelius, HPk was a Pakistani jurist, legal philosopher and judge, serving as the 4th Chief Justice of Pakistan from 1960 until 1968. In addition, he served as Law Minister in the cabinet of Yahya Khan, 1969 – 16 December 1971.
Go to Profile#361
Jody Freeman
#20233
Overall Influence
1964 - Present (60 years)
Jody Freeman is a professor at Harvard Law School in administrative law and environmental law. From 2009 to 2010, she was Counselor for Energy and Climate Change in the Obama White House. In August 2023, she resigned from her position as director of the board of ConocoPhillips, after more than one and a half years of criticism by Harvard students and faculty. She had denied having violated conflict of interest rules. Emails demonstrated she participated in the company's lobbying efforts to convince the Securities and Exchange Commission to weaken its climate risk disclosure rules.
Go to Profile#362
Nate Silver
#1524
Overall Influence
1978 - Present (46 years)
Nathaniel Read Silver is an American statistician, writer, and poker player who analyzes baseball , basketball, and elections . He is the founder of FiveThirtyEight, and held the position of editor-in-chief there, along with being a special correspondent for ABC News, until May 2023.
Go to Profile#363
Ken Starr
#12673
Overall Influence
1946 - 2022 (76 years)
Kenneth Winston Starr was an American lawyer and judge who as independent counsel authored the Starr Report, which served as the basis of the impeachment of Bill Clinton. He headed an investigation of members of the Clinton administration, known as the Whitewater controversy, from 1994 to 1998. Starr previously served as a federal appellate judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit from 1983 to 1989 and as the U.S. solicitor general from 1989 to 1993 during the presidency of George H. W. Bush.
Go to Profile#364
Michael T. Cahill
#19887
Overall Influence
Michael T. Cahill is a law professor, and the Dean and President of Brooklyn Law School. He is also the former co-Dean of Rutgers Law School. Biography Raised in Pompton Plains, New Jersey, Cahill graduated from Pequannock Township High School.
Go to Profile#365
Jim Chen
#20510
Overall Influence
1966 - Present (58 years)
Jim Chen is an American legal scholar known for his expertise in constitutional law. He holds the Justin Smith Morrill Chair in Law at Michigan State University College of Law. From 2007 to 2012, he served as the dean of the University of Louisville Brandeis School of Law.
Go to Profile#366
Orna Lin
#19566
Overall Influence
1956 - Present (68 years)
Orna Lin is the owner of a private law firm, Orna Lin & Co. and a leading labor lawyer in Israel. Biography Orna Lin is the daughter of former Israeli Knesset member Amnon Lin and granddaughter of Haifa's first Jewish mayor, Abba Hushi. She is a graduate of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Go to Profile#367
Kurt Deketelaere
#30617
Overall Influence
1966 - Present (58 years)
Kurt Deketelaere is a Belgian academic and president of the League of European Research Universities . He is a professor of law in environmental law at the KU Leuven. External links Official website Kurt DeketelaereOfficial website LERU
Go to Profile#368
Martti Koskenniemi
#18924
Overall Influence
1953 - Present (71 years)
Martti Antero Koskenniemi is a Finnish international lawyer and former diplomat. Currently he is professor of International Law in the University of Helsinki and Director of the Erik Castrén Institute of International Law and Human Rights, as well as Centennial Professor at the Law Department of the London School of Economics. He is well known for his critical approach to international law. In 2008–2009 he held the seat of distinguished visiting Goodhart Professor at the Faculty of Law, Cambridge University. In 2011 Koskenniemi was Peace of Utrecht professor at Utrecht University. In 2014 he was elected a Corresponding Fellow of the British Academy.
Go to Profile#369
Gérard La Forest
#7503
Overall Influence
1926 - Present (98 years)
Gérard Vincent La Forest is a former puisne justice of the Supreme Court of Canada. He served there from January 16, 1985 to September 30, 1997. He is currently counsel at law firm Stewart McKelvey in Fredericton, New Brunswick.
Go to Profile#370
Roger Fisher
#11481
Overall Influence
1922 - 2012 (90 years)
Roger D. Fisher was Samuel Williston Professor of Law at Harvard Law School and director of the Harvard Negotiation Project. Background Fisher specialized in negotiation and conflict management. He was the co-author of the book Getting to Yes, about "interest-based" negotiation, as well as numerous other publications. After serving in World War II as a weather reconnaissance pilot, Fisher worked on the Marshall Plan in Paris under W. Averell Harriman. After finishing his law degree at Harvard, he worked with the Washington, DC, law firm of Covington & Burling, arguing several cases before the US Supreme Court and advising on several international disputes.
Go to Profile#371
Jamshid Momtaz
#23310
Overall Influence
1942 - Present (82 years)
Jamshid Momtaz is an Iranian jurist and academic. He earned his degree in public law at the Faculty of Law and Economy from University of Paris . In 1968, he graduated from the Institut d'études politiques de Paris and held his PhD in public law at the Faculty of Law, Economics and Social Sciences of Panthéon-Assas University .
Go to Profile#372
Ilya Somin
#5519
Overall Influence
1973 - Present (51 years)
Ilya Somin is a law professor at George Mason University, B. Kenneth Simon Chair in Constitutional Studies at the Cato Institute, a blogger for the Volokh Conspiracy, and a former co-editor of the Supreme Court Economic Review . His research focuses on constitutional law, property law, migration rights, and the study of popular political participation and its implications for constitutional democracy.
Go to Profile#373
Roberto Mangabeira Unger
#5747
Overall Influence
1947 - Present (77 years)
Roberto Mangabeira Unger is a Brazilian philosopher, jurist and politician. His work is in the tradition of classical social theory and pragmatism, and is developed across many fields including legal theory, philosophy and religion, social and political theory, progressive alternatives, and economics. In natural philosophy he is known for The Singular Universe and the Reality of Time. In social theory he is known for Politics: A Work in Constructive Social Theory. In legal theory he was associated with the Critical Legal Studies movement, which helped disrupt the methodological consensus in American law schools.
Go to Profile#374
Faisal Kutty
#10883
Overall Influence
1968 - Present (56 years)
Faisal Kutty is a lawyer, academic, writer, public speaker and human rights activist. He is Visiting Associate Professor of LAWS at Southwestern Law School. He served as an adjunct professor at Osgoode Hall Law School and was an Associate Professor of Law Emeritus at Valparaiso University. He has previously taught at Dwayne O. Andreas School of Law of Barry University and guest lectured at dozens of universities around North America.
Go to Profile#375
Lea Brilmayer
#25438
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (74 years)
Roberta "Lea" Brilmayer is an American legal scholar. She is the Howard M. Holtzmann Professor of International Law at Yale Law School and an expert in conflict of laws, personal jurisdiction, and international law.
Go to Profile#376
Heidi Li Feldman
#19121
Overall Influence
Heidi Li Feldman is an American professor of law at Georgetown Law. Her areas of research are torts, ethics, political philosophy, and legal theory. She is an elected member of the American Law Institute.
Go to Profile#377
Barbara Ann Crancer
#23910
Overall Influence
1938 - Present (86 years)
Barbara Ann Crancer is an American retired lawyer and judge who was a St. Louis County, Missouri Associate Circuit Court Judge. She is the daughter of former Teamsters Union president Jimmy Hoffa and Josephine Hoffa.
Go to Profile#378
A. Raymond Randolph
#11749
Overall Influence
1943 - Present (81 years)
Arthur Raymond Randolph is an American lawyer and jurist serving as a senior United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He was appointed to the Court in 1990 and assumed senior status on November 1, 2008.
Go to Profile#379
Basil Markesinis
#23720
Overall Influence
1944 - 2023 (79 years)
Sir Basil Markesinis, KC, FBA was a Greek-British barrister and legal scholar, who was Jamail Regents Professor at the University of Texas, Austin. He was previously Professor of Common and Civil Law at University College London.
Go to Profile#380
Susan L. Carney
#28207
Overall Influence
1951 - Present (73 years)
Susan Laura Carney is an American lawyer who serves as a senior United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Early life and education Born in Waltham, Massachusetts, Carney grew up attending public schools in Lexington and Weston, Massachusetts. She earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Harvard College, cum laude, in 1973, and a Juris Doctor from Harvard Law School, magna cum laude, in 1977. After graduating from law school, Carney worked as a law clerk for Judge Levin H. Campbell of the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit.
Go to Profile#381
Ninian Stephen
#7689
Overall Influence
1923 - 2017 (94 years)
Sir Ninian Martin Stephen, was an English-born Australian judge who served as the 20th governor-general of Australia, in office from 1982 to 1989. He was previously a justice of the High Court of Australia from 1972 to 1982.
Go to Profile#382
Paul A. Lombardo
#23956
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (74 years)
Paul A. Lombardo is an American legal historian known for his work on the legacy of eugenics and sterilization in the United States. Lombardo’s foundational research corrected the historical record of the 1927 U.S. Supreme Court case of Buck v. Bell. He found Carrie Buck’s school grades and the grades of her child Vivian. He was the last person to interview her, and he discovered the pictures of all three generations of the Buck family. In 2002, he sponsored and paid for a memorial plaque that was installed in Buck’s hometown of Charlottesville, Virginia.
Go to Profile#383
Susan P. Crawford
#6874
Overall Influence
1963 - Present (61 years)
Susan P. Crawford is the John A. Reilly Clinical Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. She served as President Barack Obama's Special Assistant for Science, Technology, and Innovation Policy and is a columnist for WIRED. She is a former Board Member of ICANN, the founder of OneWebDay, and a legal scholar. Her research focuses on telecommunications and information law.
Go to Profile#384
Drucilla Cornell
#8473
Overall Influence
1950 - 2022 (72 years)
Drucilla Cornell , was an American philosopher and feminist theorist, whose work has been influential in political and legal philosophy, ethics, deconstruction, critical theory, and feminism. Cornell was an emerita Professor of Political Science, Comparative Literature and Women's & Gender Studies at Rutgers University the State University of New Jersey; Professor Extraordinaire at the University of Pretoria, South Africa; and a visiting professor at Birkbeck College, University of London. She also taught for many years on the law faculties of the University of Pennsylvania and of Cardozo La...
Go to Profile#385
David Crump
#35679
Overall Influence
1943 - Present (81 years)
David Crump is Newell H. Blakely Professor of Law at the University of Houston Law Center. Crump attended Harvard College and received his Juris Doctor degree from the University of Texas School of Law in 1969. He currently teaches classes on property law, civil procedure, evidence, legal practice strategies, criminal law, among other areas. Crump has been affiliated with the major firms of Johnson & Gibbs and Haynes and Boone, LLP, among others. He is also a ventriloquist, a rocket scientist, a guitarist in a country rock band, a poet, inventor of computer dating, friend of David Ginsburg, an avid seniors amateur baseball player.
Go to Profile#386
David Matas
#4127
Overall Influence
1943 - Present (81 years)
David Matas is the senior legal counsel of B'nai Brith Canada who currently resides in Winnipeg, Manitoba. He has maintained a private practice in refugee, immigration, and human rights law since 1979, and has published various books and manuscripts.
Go to Profile#387
Steven P. Croley
#24403
Overall Influence
Steven Paul Croley is an American lawyer, Chief Policy Officer and General Counsel of Ford Motor Company and the Harry Burns Hutchins Collegiate Professor of Law at the University of Michigan Law School in Ann Arbor . His practice areas include law reform, legal policy, regulation, oversight, and political law, with special emphasis on energy and the environment. His academic research and writing focus on administrative law, civil procedure, good government, and regulatory policy.
Go to Profile#388
Ruth Gavison
#15286
Overall Influence
1945 - 2020 (75 years)
Ruth Gavison was an Israeli expert of human rights, professor of law at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and recipient of the Israel Prize. Biography Ruth Gavison was born in Jerusalem on March 28, 1945 to a Sephardic Jewish family. Her father's ancestors were Moroccan Jews who immigrated from Tetouan to Jerusalem in the 19th century. Her mother's side was Greek Jewish. She grew up in Haifa. She graduated from Hebrew University law school in 1969. In 1970, she was also awarded a B.A. in Philosophy and Economics.
Go to Profile#389
Stephanos Bibas
#18212
Overall Influence
1969 - Present (55 years)
#390
Cormac Cullinan
#26983
Overall Influence
Cormac Cullinan is a practising environmental attorney and author based in Cape Town, South Africa. He is a director of the leading South African environmental law firm, Cullinan & Associates Inc, and director of the Wild Law Institute, a non-profit organisation that advocates for Rights of Nature. A former commercial lawyer, he has practiced, taught and written about environmental law and policy since 1992, and has worked in more than 20 countries.
Go to Profile#391
Judy Clarke
#6360
Overall Influence
1952 - Present (72 years)
Judy Clare Clarke is an American criminal defense attorney who has represented several high-profile defendants such as Ted Kaczynski, Eric Rudolph, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, Joseph Edward Duncan, Zacarias Moussaoui, Jared Lee Loughner, Robert Gregory Bowers, Burford Furrow, Lisa Montgomery and Susan Smith.
Go to Profile#392
David Leebron
#11981
Overall Influence
1956 - Present (68 years)
David W. Leebron is an American attorney and legal scholar who served as the 7th President of Rice University from 2004 to 2022. He was a professor and dean of Columbia Law School, until he was named president of Rice University on July 1, 2004.
Go to Profile#393
Asifa Quraishi
#24749
Overall Influence
1967 - Present (57 years)
Asifa Bano Quraishi is an American educator and legal scholar. She is a professor of law at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where she teaches courses in Islamic law and U.S. constitutional law. She has served as a law clerk in United States federal courts. Her recent publications address issues of Islamic constitutionalism, in the context of separation of legal authority as well as methodologies of textual interpretation. Quraishi has also written articles for news outlets like The Washington Post and Middle East Eye addressing myths and issues associated with Islam.
Go to Profile#394
E. Allan Farnsworth
#20999
Overall Influence
1928 - 2005 (77 years)
Edward Allan Farnsworth was one of America's most renowned legal scholars on contracts. His writings were standard reference in courtrooms and law schools. Biography Born in Providence, Rhode Island, he received a bachelor's degree in applied mathematics from the University of Michigan in 1948 and a master's degree in physics from Yale University in 1949. He earned his law degree from Columbia Law School in 1952. After serving in the U.S. Air Force JAG and briefly working in private practice, he began teaching at Columbia Law. Starting his career as the school's youngest professor, Farnswo...
Go to Profile#395
Ralph Lauren
#216
Overall Influence
1939 - Present (85 years)
Ralph Lauren is an American fashion designer, philanthropist, and billionaire businessman, best known for the Ralph Lauren Corporation, a global multibillion-dollar enterprise. He has become well known for his collection of rare automobiles, some of which have been displayed in museum exhibits. He stepped down as CEO of the company in September 2015 but remains executive chairman and chief creative officer. As of April 2022, his net worth was estimated at US$6.9 billion.
Go to Profile#396
Paul Mahoney
#21200
Overall Influence
1959 - Present (65 years)
Paul G. Mahoney is an American law professor who worked as the dean of the University of Virginia School of Law from July 1, 2008 to July 1, 2016. He succeeded John Calvin Jeffries as Dean, and was succeeded by Risa L. Goluboff.
Go to Profile#397
Charles Alan Wright
#23749
Overall Influence
1927 - 2000 (73 years)
Charles Alan Wright was an American constitutional lawyer widely considered to be the foremost authority in the United States on constitutional law and federal procedure, and was the coauthor of the 54-volume treatise, Federal Practice and Procedure with Arthur R. Miller and Kenneth W. Graham, Jr., among others. He also served as a special legal consultant to President Richard Nixon during the congressional investigations into the Watergate break in and coverup, and for a time was the president's lead lawyer.
Go to Profile#398
Otto Depenheuer
#22674
Overall Influence
1953 - Present (71 years)
Otto Depenheuer is a German law professor and organist. Depenheuer studied law in Bonn, where he attained his doctorate in 1985 and his habilitation in 1992. After teaching law in Münster and Halle/Saale, Depenheuer was appointed to the chair for public law and philosophy of law at the University of Mannheim in 1993. In 1999, he assumed the chair for constitutional law, public law and philosophy of law at the University of Cologne.
Go to Profile#399
Pierre Schlag
#23378
Overall Influence
1954 - Present (70 years)
Pierre Schlag is a legal theorist and the Byron R. White Professor at the University of Colorado Law School. Generally associated with the critical legal studies movement and school of legal thought, his contributions to the modern legal canon have primarily focused on the subjects of aesthetics and the law, Constitutional interpretation, deconstruction, subjectivity, and broader 'meta' critiques of legal institutions, publications, and thought. He is also the author of a work of fiction, American Absurd.
Go to Profile#400
Frank Michelman
#21866
Overall Influence
1936 - Present (88 years)
Frank Isaac Michelman is an American legal scholar and the Robert Walmsley University Professor Emeritus at Harvard Law School. Early life In 1960, Michelman was graduated from Harvard Law School. He clerked for Justice William Brennan of the U.S. Supreme Court during the 1961 Term. In 1962, he joined the Harvard Law School faculty.
Go to Profile