Professor Weiner, now emeritus, holds a J.D. from Yale Law School and a Ph.D. in American Studies from Yale University. He received an A.B. in American Studies from Stanford University, where he graduated with honors and distinction and was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. At Rutgers, he has received a Board of Trustees Fellowship for Scholarly Excellence, and in 2009-10 he was the Chancellor’s Distinguished Research Scholar. He is the author of four award-winning books recognized for their contributions to scholarship and their accessible style. In 2020-21, he received a fellowship from the Botstiber Institute for Austrian-American Studies, which is supporting his investigation of the social and philosophical significance of the Austrian mountain rescue service (see here and here or listen to a podcast here [the first few minutes of the podcast are in German]). 

Professor Weiner's first book, Black Trials: Citizenship From the Beginnings of Slavery to the End of Caste (Alfred A. Knopf, 2004), received a Silver Gavel Award from the American Bar Association for its impact on the public understanding of law. The book was supported by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. His second book, Americans without Law: The Racial Boundaries of Citizenship (NYU Press, 2006), received the President’s Book Award of the Social Science History Association. His third book, The Rule of the Clan: What an Ancient Form of Social Organization Reveals about the Future of Individual Freedom (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2013), received the Grawemeyer Award for Ideas Improving World Order. His fourth book, Law's Picture Books (Talbot Publishing, 2017), a co-authored and co-edited exhibition catalogue, received the Joseph L. Andrews Legal Literature Award from the American Association of Law Libraries.

Professor Weiner has been a visiting professor at Cardozo School of Law and the University of Connecticut School of Law. In the fall of 2009, he was a Fulbright Scholar at the University of Akureyri, Iceland, where he studied the history of Icelandic law and its relation to the Germanic legal tradition. In the spring of 2015, he was a Fulbright Scholar in the Department of Legal Philosophy at the University of Salzburg, Austria, where he examined the relation between Austrian conceptions of law and the Austrian experience of landscape. During the 2018-19 academic year, he was the the Fulbright Uppsala University Distinguished Chair in American Studies in Uppsala, Sweden (read a blog post about his work here, and watch his Fulbright annual lecture, "Understanding Trumpism: American Politics and Culture in an Age of Globalization," here). He has lectured and taught extensively about U.S. constitutional law throughout Germany. 

Professor Weiner co-curated the critically-acclaimed exhibition "Law’s Picture Books: The Yale Law Library Collection" at the Grolier Club in New York, the nation's oldest bibliographic society. The exhibit was hailed as "fascinating" by The New Yorker, "eye-opening" by the Wall Street Journal, "courageous" by the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, and "exceptional" by The New Criterion. The exhibit was accompanied by five of Professor Weiner's short solo films, including "A Philosophical Question" and "The Dialogue of Text and Image," and a 220-page catalogue with co-curator and co-author Michael Widener, the rare book librarian at the Yale Law Library. 

The executive director of the Telos-Paul Piccone Institute and the founder and president of Hidden Cabinet Films, Weiner lives in Connecticut with his wife, Stephanie Kuduk Weiner, a professor of nineteenth-century British literature at Wesleyan University. In his spare time, he enjoys hiking, doing home repair and watching women's college basketball.

Books

Law’s Picture Books: The Yale Law Library Collection, Michael Widener and Mark S. Weiner (Clark, New Jersey: Talbott Publishing, 2017). 220 pages, full color. Recipient of the Joseph L. Andrews Legal Literature Award from the American Association of Law Libraries. Contributors: Michael Widener (“Collecting Yale Law Library’s Picture Books), Mark S. Weiner (“Reflections on an Exhibition”), Jolande Goldberg (“Ars Memoria in Early Law Books: Looking Beneath the Picture”), and Erin C. Blake (“Law’s Picture Books and the History of Book Illustration”).

The Rule of the Clan: What an Ancient Form of Social Organization Reveals about the Future of Individual Freedom (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2013; Picador paperback, 2014), 258 pages. Recipient of Grawemeyer Award for Ideas Improving World Order, 2015. Swedish translation, Klanvälde: Från stamsamhälle till rättsstat, Dualis Förlags (2015).

Americans Without Law: The Racial Boundaries of Citizenship (New York: New York University Press, 2006; paperback, 2009), 224 pages. Recipient of President’s Book Award, Social Science History Association, 2000.

Black Trials: Citizenship from the Beginnings of Slavery to the End of Caste (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2004; Vintage Paperback, 2006), 421 pages. Recipient of Silver Gavel Award, American Bar Association, 2005. Finalist, Connecticut Book Award, 2005.

Recent books chapters, articles, and web publications

"Mountain Rescue in Translation: Neuzeitliche Bergrettungstechnik and the Cultural Resignification of Alpinism," Journal of Austrian-American History 7(2) (2023), 138-168.

“Mountain Rescue in Translation,” Botstiber Institute blog, August 2022: https://botstiberbiaas.org/mountain-rescue-in-translation/

“Within an American Grain,” review of Timothy W. Luke, The Travails of Trumpification (Candor, NY: Telos Publishing, 2021), Telos 199 (Summer 2022), 175-79.

“Zwischen Frankreich und Indien: Amerika und ‘rassenbasierte’Affirmative Action,” in Vom richtigen Umgang mit den “Anderen”: Diskriminierung, Rassismus und Recht heute, ed. Eric Hilgendorf and Enis Tiz (Baden-Baden: Ergon Verlag, Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft, 2022), 99-120.

“Toward a Democratic Theory of Emergency Medical Services: Solidarity, Sovereignty, Temporality,” Telos 198 (Spring 2022), 43-66.

“In Search of the Political,” review of Fred Siegel, The Crisis of Liberalism: Prelude to Trump (Candor, NY: Telos Press Publishing, 2020), Telos 193 (Winter 2020), 185-89.

“Cross-cultural encounters in prehospital care: an analysis of interviews with Swedish ambulance nurse specialists about their experience with ethnic minority patients,” with Veronica Vicente (Karolinska Institute), Ronja Josefsson, RN, and Helena Rentzhog, RN, International Emergency Nursing, 50 (May 2020).

“Foreword,” in Bengt Nilsson, Israel och hennes fiender [Israel and Her Enemies] (Falun, Sweden: EthnoPress, 2020).

“Understanding Trumpism: American Politics and Culture in an Age of Globalization” (2019 Fulbright Distinguished Chair Lecture, Uppsala University), Revista de Direitos e Garantias Fundamentais, 21 (2) (maio/ago. 2020), ed. João Maurício Adeodato, 77-96; Swedish translation (adapted, condensed version), Sans Magasin, spring 2019.  

“EMS for Democracy, Part II: ambulance volunteers as cultural agents of solidarity,” Ambulance Today (Winter 2019), 9-29. Essay includes four accompanying interviews with representatives of EMS from the United States (Virginia Beach Volunteer Rescue Squad), Sweden (Center for Prehospital Research, University of Borås), Austria (Mountain Rescue Service), and Israel (United Hatzalah).

"EMS for Democracy,” Ambulance Today (Autumn 2019) (cover story), 9-15.

"Email from a Country in Denial," Kvartal (July 2019).

"Talking Animals and the Internationalist Liberal Imagination: The Case of E. B. White," Juridisk Publikation (Sweden) (June 2019).

“The Attractions of the Clan—an Interview with Mark Weiner,” Paulina Neuding, Quillette, 20 March 2019,

“Intervju: När Staten Försvagas Växer det Postmoderna Klansamhället [Interview: When the State Grows Weak, Postmodern Clan Society Grows,” with Johannes Heuman, Respons [Sweden], March (1) 2019, pp. 9-11

“Multicultural Outreach: Swedish EMS Rises to the Challenge,” Journal of Emergency Medical Services, with three accompanying videos.

"Därför behöver Sverige ett medborgarskapstest [Why Sweden needs a civics test]," Expressen (19 January 2018) (public in Swedish translation from English).

“Donald Trumps mur bäddar för författningsstrid om nationellt nödläge” [Donald Trump’s wall sets constitutional battle over national emergency], Dagens Nyeter (14 January 2018) (published in Swedish translation from English).

"Därför har amerikanerna så svårt att införa strängare vapenlagar” [This is why it’s so hard for Americans to introduce gun control], Dagens Nyheter (12 November 2018) (published in Swedish translation from English).

“SD-framgången är del av en revolution som liberaler nu måste ta på allvar” [SD success is part of a revolution that liberals now need to take seriously], Dagens Nyheter (16 September 2018) (published in Swedish translation from English).

“Liberal Societies and the Rule of the Clan: A Socio-Legal Framework of Analysis,” in Per Brinkemo and Johann Lundberg, eds., Klanen (Stockholm: Timbro, 2018).

“Trumpism and the Philosophy of World Order," Project Syndicate (23 July 2018), http://prosyn.org/E5REMa1. Translated into Spanish, Neuva Sociedad (July), http://bit.ly/2NRKrIj; Chinese, UP Media (31 July), http://bit.ly/2LXYKJV; Dutch, Financieele Dagblad (3 August), http://bit.ly/2vBicWF; Swedish, Dagens Nyheter (8 August), http://bit.ly/2NjWNMm; French, Le’Orient/LeJour (11 August), http://bit.ly/2wKlXt9; German, Praefaktisch (September 4), http://bit.ly/2MRFtza; Macedonian, Respublica (October 5), http://bit.ly/2LNX0V3; and Norwegian, NYTID (November 1), http://bit.ly/2yVIXr3.

“Climate Change Denial as the Historical Consciousness of Trumpism: Lessons from Carl Schmitt,” Open Society series, Niskanen Center, 10 November 2017.

“A Virtual Tour of ‘Law’s Picture Books,’” ten posts on Concurring Opinions, beginning 16 October 2017, with Michael Widener.

“Filming Law’s Picture Books,” Fine Books and Collections, 30 October 2017.

“Trumpism and the Philosophy of History,” Project Syndicate (12 August 2017). Translated into Swedish, Dagens Nyheter (23 August 2017), http://bit.ly/2MZQlL6.

“Individual Liberty and the Foreign Affairs Power,” 1,500-word essay, Niskanen Center, February 2017.

“Narrative and Counterterrorism in the Digital Age,” 3,300-word review essay, The Bridge, February 2017.

“Die Amerikanische Bürgerrechtsbewegung und die Kulturgeschichte des Rechts [The American Civil Rights Movement and the Cultural History of Law],” in Michael Anderheiden and Stephen Kirste, eds., Interdisziplinarität in den Rechtswissenschaften – Innen- und Außenperspektiven (Interdisciplinarity in Legal Studies: Inside and Outside Perspectives) (Berlin: Duncker & Humbolt, 2016).

“Nation to Nation: Treaties Between the United States and American Indian Nations,” review of exhibition at National Museum of the American Indian, Journal of American History(2016).

Invited guest blogger, Environment, Law, and History: “A River Runs Through It,” March 2016; “A Video Project about Austrian Law and Landscape,” January 2016.

“Denn Wir Wissen Nicht, Wer Wir Sind: Liberale Identität in Europa [We Don’t Know Who We Are: Liberal Identity in Europe],” with Ulrich Haltern, EUtopia Magazine, original in German, trans. Keith Tribe, published also in English, June 2015.

“The Legal Foundations of Individualism,” TELOSscope, April 2014.

“Love’s Empire,” review of Paul W. Kahn, Political Theology: Four New Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty and Finding Ourselves at the Movies: Philosophy for a New Generation, Telos (Spring 2014), 181-87.

“The State, the Clan, and Individual Liberty,” month-long symposium about The Rule of the Clan in Cato Unbound (online magazine of the Cato Institute), March 2014. Dedicated respondents: Arnold Kling, Daniel McCarthy (The American Conservative), John Fabian Witt (Yale Law School).

“The Rule of the Clan,” week-long symposium, Concurring Opinions, July 2013. Participants: Prof. Deven Desai (Thomas Jefferson School of Law), Prof. Mark Fenster (University of Florida School of Law), Prof. Lucas Grosman (University of San Andrés, Buenos Aires, Argentina), Dr. Jan-Christoph Marschelke (University of Würzburg, Germany), Prof. Tim Murphy (University of Northern Malaysia), Dr. Doyle Quiggle, Prof. Jeanne Schroeder (Cardozo School of Law), Prof. Sudha Setty (Western New England College of Law), Prof. Stephen Utz (University of Connecticut School of Law).

“Bright Ideas: Mark Weiner on his new book The Rule of the Clan,” interview on Concurring Opinions with Deven Desai (Thomas Jefferson School of Law), March 2013.

“Imagining the Rule of Law in Nineteenth-Century Britain: The Story of the Clan,” Erasmus Law Review (The Netherlands) 6 (3-4) (2013) (special issue on legal pluralism, eds. Sanne Taekema and Wibo van Rossum), 158-166.

“The Call of the Clan: Why Ancient Kinship Matters in a World of Global Geopolitics,” Foreign Policy, 15 May 2013.

“Individualism’s Paradox,” The Chronicle of Higher Education, March 29, 2013.

“Verbraucherkulture und die Amerikanische Bürgerrechstbewegung: Rasse, Rechstwissenschaft und die bürgerliche Bedeutung der Nahrung” (Consumer Culture and the American Civil Rights Movement: Race, Jurisprudence, and the Civic Meaning of Food) (Johanna Timm, trans.), in Verfassungsvoraussetzungen: Gedaechtnisschrift für Winfried Brugger (Prerequisites of Constitutional Law and Constitutional Theory: Commemorative Studies for Winfried Brugger), Heidelberger Rechtswissenschaftliche Abhandlungen 9, eds. Michael Anderheiden, Rainer Keil, and Stephan Kirste, and Jan Phillip Schaefer (Tübingen, Germany: Mohr-Siebeck, 2013), 63-85.

Recent radio and televised appearances, videos of lectures

"Bergrettung [Mountain Rescue Service]," podcast, Scientists for Future, Hamburg, March 2022. 47 minutes (first few minutes in German).

"A Social Theory of Emergency Medical Services," 2020 annual Telos-Paul Piccone Institute Conference, New York, February 2020. 15 minutes.

"Understanding Trumpism: American Politics and Culture in an Age of Glogalization," 2019 Fulbright Distinguished Chair Lecture, Uppsala University. 1 hour.

“Friday Interviews: Mark Weiner,” podcast interview with Kvartal, December 2018. 1 hour.

“Is Sweden more Vulnerable to Populism than the United States?,” podcast interview with Fri Tanke Press (Free Thought), October 2018. 37 minutes.

Interview about Fulbright video project “Wood, Water, Stone, Sky, Milk” on “Salzburg Aktuell,” radio ORF, Austria, August 2015 (in German).

“The Individual, the State, and the Clan,” televised luncheon seminar, Axess Magasin, Stockholm, Sweden, May 2015, moderated by P.J. Anders Linder.

“The Rule of the Clan,” Your Weekly Constitutional, produced in partnership with James Madison’s Montpelier, with Stewart Harris, February, 2015.

“The Rule of the Clan in Foreign Policy,” Saturday Extra, with Geraldine Doogue, ABC Radio National (Australia), August 2014.

“Trading Fours with Mark Weiner,” Trading Fours with Drs. Modeste and Wes, BlogtalkRadio, March 2014.

“Individualism vs. Society,” Central Standard, with Susan Wilson, KCUR (Kansas City, Kansas), April 2013.

Kathleen Dunn Show, WPR (Madison, Wisconsin), April 2013.

“Think,” with Krys Boyd, KERA (Dallas, Texas), “Freedom’s Roots,” March 2013.

The Brian Lehrer Show, WNYC (New York, New York), “Clans and Individuals,” March 2013.d

American Bar Association, ABA Journal podcast, “Want to Protect Individual Freedom? Have a Strong Central Government, Says ‘Rule of the Clan’ Author,” March 2013.

• Comparative Law
• Constitutional Law
• First Amendment
• Jurisprudence
• Legal History