Faculty Director
Kristen Eichensehr
Balthrop Cassidy Professor of Law, Harvard Law School
Kristen Eichensehr writes and teaches about foreign relations, national security, cybersecurity, and international law. Her recent work addresses national security screening of investments, separation of powers and federalism in the national security state, the attribution of state-sponsored cyberattacks, and the interaction of the Supreme Court’s major questions doctrine with U.S. international agreements.
Eichensehr is a member of the U.S. State Department’s Advisory Committee on International Law, and she serves as an adviser on the Restatement (Fourth) of the Foreign Relations Law of the United States. She also serves on the editorial boards of Just Security and the Journal of National Security Law & Policy. Eichensehr received the 2018 Mike Lewis Prize for National Security Law Scholarship for her article “Courts, Congress, and the Conduct of Foreign Relations,” and her article on “National Security Creep in Corporate Transactions” (with Cathy Hwang) was selected as one of the best corporate and securities articles of 2023 by Corporate Practice Commentator.
Prior to entering academia, Eichensehr clerked for Justices Sandra Day O’Connor and Sonia Sotomayor of the Supreme Court of the United States and for then-Judge Merrick B. Garland of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. She also served as special assistant to the legal adviser of the U.S. Department of State and practiced at Covington & Burling in Washington, D.C.
Faculty Affiliates
William Alford
Jerome A. and Joan L. Cohen Professor of Law, Harvard Law School
Read Professor Alford’s biography
Gabriella Blum
Rita E. Hauser Professor of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law, Harvard Law School
Read Professor Blum’s biography
Jack Goldsmith
Learned Hand Professor of Law, Harvard Law School
Read Professor Goldsmith’s biography
Naz Modirzadeh
Professor of Practice, Harvard Law School
Read Professor Modirzadeh’s biography
Samantha Power
William D. Zabel ’61 Professor of Practice in Human Rights, Harvard Law School
Read Professor Power’s biography
Alex Whiting
Professor of Practice, Harvard Law School
Read Professor Whiting’s biography
Mark Wu
Henry L. Stimson Professor of Law, Harvard Law School
Visiting Fellow
Margaret Taylor
Inaugural NSLPI Visiting Fellow and Lecturer in Law (Spring 2027)
Margaret L. Taylor has served in senior roles in the United States Senate and the Executive Branch. She is a member of the New York State Bar, the American Law Institute, and the United States National Group of the Permanent Court of Arbitration.
Ms. Taylor was confirmed as the 25th Legal Adviser for the United States Department of State in September 2024 and served in that role through January 19, 2025. She was the General Counsel for the U.S. Agency for International Development from January 2021-September 2024. Prior to that, Ms. Taylor was a Fellow in Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution and a Senior Editor at Lawfare. She served in a number of roles on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in the 2013-2018 timeframe, including as Democratic Chief Counsel and Deputy Staff Director, and as Senior Counsel from April-October of 2025. Earlier in her career, as a staff attorney in the Office of the Legal Adviser, she advised on the legal aspects of foreign assistance programs, international economic sanctions, anti-trafficking in persons efforts, and other international law enforcement matters. She was a Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellow with the Center for Strategic & International Studies. Ms. Taylor received her AB from Princeton University and JD from Columbia Law School, where she was the Editor-in-Chief of the Columbia Law Review.