Adam Chilton Becomes 15th Dean of the University of Chicago Law School
One might say it was fate that Adam Chilton found his way to the Law School more than a decade ago, when he was a JD and PhD student at Harvard considering his next move. Already a serious scholar, he had his sights set on academia. He had plans to head to DC, where his then girlfriend, now wife, Britt, had launched her own career as a lawyer. But UChicago beckoned.
“Many of the people who ended up being my most critical mentors at that time in my life were people who had UChicago connections,” recalled Chilton. In fact, it was one of those mentors who recognized that Chilton would thrive in a place like UChicago and encouraged him to apply to the Harry A. Bigelow Teaching Fellowship, a leading program for training future law professors.
Hesitant to derail his DC plans but curious, Chilton, a Phoenix, Arizona, native, took a flight to meet the minds of UChicago Law. The interview for the Bigelow Fellowship was “just a meeting,” he told himself. He had never lived in the Midwest and had only briefly passed through before.
“After I left that meeting, I called Britt and said: ‘We have to move to Chicago,’” recalled Chilton. “That experience made me strongly convinced that the Law School was the right place for me.”
Reflecting on that day, Chilton said it was the way in which the faculty members had dissected his ideas. He had shared his dissertation and “they were getting into the weeds of my paper in a very intense way. It was unlike anything I had ever experienced,” he said. “That sort of intensity and genuine curiosity was really appealing to me, and the more I learned about the Law School and the work being done there by its faculty, the more I wanted to be a part of that kind of community that cares deeply about thinking seriously about ideas.”
Chilton did not go to DC. He became a Bigelow Fellow in 2013 and one year later—rather unconventionally, since the Bigelow Fellowship is a two-year program—joined the faculty as an assistant professor. In 2017, he was named the Walter Mander Research Scholar, and in 2019, he became a full professor. In 2024, Chilton became the Howard G. Krane Professor of Law, and finally, in July 2025, he became dean of the Law School, as Thomas J. Miles, the Clifton R. Musser Professor of Law and Economics, stepped down and rejoined the full-time faculty after a decade of leadership.
Anthony J. Casey, ’02, the Donald M. Ephraim Professor of Law and Economics, who first met Chilton on a phone interview, recalled: “I knew immediately he was a Chicago person. It was clear from the way he was discussing his ideas and even giving me feedback on my own— that he was one of us.”
“I love the University of Chicago and what it stands for in a really deep way. We are the best law school in the world because of our unique culture and values. Our commitment to these values—to free inquiry and expression, institutional neutrality, rigorous thought and debate, ideological diversity—has set us up for success in these challenging times we’re facing in higher education and the practice of law.” Dean Adam Chilton
A Data-Driven Scholar of Many Ideas
In his 11 years on the faculty, Chilton has emerged as a widely recognized empirical scholar of law and economics. He’s particularly interested in comparative law, international law, and studying the legal profession and legal education. On the latter he has written papers on law school grading systems, tenure practices for academic faculty, and other topics that have an eye toward improving the landscape of legal training and practice.
Chilton’s body of work reflects a wide reach of ideas—all unified by the feature of using data. In fact, he has built groundbreaking new datasets, such as the comparative competition law dataset and the bilateral labor agreements dataset, which have become valuable sources for other scholars working on related topics.
During his academic career, Chilton has worked with a long list of collaborators.
“My favorite thing about being an academic is getting to talk and debate ideas with others,” he said. “This engagement piece, which is a huge part of our UChicago culture and a big reason why I’ve stayed here all these years, is thrilling for me and what draws me to want to collaborate so much in my research.”
One repeat coauthor, UC Berkeley Law Professor Katerina Linos, noted: “Adam has such a good reputation that colleagues who have not yet written with him are rushing to change this.”
Another frequent coauthor, Boston University School of Law Associate Professor Weijia Rao, LLM ’15, JSD ’19, said: “He always pushes us to explore alternative explanations and run additional robustness checks to make sure we get the answer right. At the same time, he has a question-driven mindset and a genuine interest in understanding foundational research questions. His own research often challenges conventional wisdoms in the field.”
Scholarly Work and the Deanship
To date, Chilton has coauthored two books (with another one in the works), written more than 60 articles, and convened more than 15 conferences and workshops at the Law School to cultivate the gathering of minds.
The book he’s currently working on is a follow-up to How Constitutional Rights Matter, which he wrote with University of Virginia Law Associate Professor Mila Versteeg, published in 2020 by Oxford University Press. Their current project focuses on why constitutions fail.
“When we encounter a problem,” said Versteeg, “he is not the type to sit around and talk about it; he rolls up his sleeves and fixes it. I suspect he’ll be like that as a dean.”
Versteeg said that Chilton as a scholar is not just interested in ideas, but also in how they play out in the real world. “He’s always keen to hop on a plane to go talk to constitution-makers in Chile and Tunisia, among other places—and these travels then inform our research.”
“He always pushes us to explore alternative explanations and run additional robustness checks to make sure we get the answer right.” Weijia Rao, LLM ’15, JSD, ’19
Chilton admits that he loves to travel, a passion that started many years ago. After earning his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Yale, he took a year to backpack around the world (he’s now traveled to more than 80 countries). The more he saw, he said, the more he began to be curious about the role laws or rules could play in improving the world. This ultimately sparked his interest in comparative and international law.
While he acknowledges (and mildly laments) that the deanship will mean he will have less time for travel and research, Chilton remains committed to continuing at least one of these endeavors seriously: his scholarship. That load will be lighter, but he looks forward to using his scholarly lens in his new role.
William H. J. Hubbard, ’00, the Harry N. Wyatt Professor of Law and the Law School’s deputy dean, said that Chilton’s fearlessness as a scholar will serve him well as dean.
“I think that willingness to follow the facts and base decisions on evidence is a great trait for someone in a leadership position,” Hubbard said. “And his success in collaborating with so many people demonstrates his willingness to listen to others but also his understanding of the need to move deliberately and act. Striking that balance is quite difficult.”
Jonathan Masur, the John P. Wilson Professor of Law and the chair of the faculty committee that led the dean’s search, agreed. “Adam is a brilliant strategic thinker who really understands every kind of issue facing this institution, inside and out,” he said. “As an empirical economist, he can think about complex problems quantitatively and from multiple angles, but he also understands people and has a way of connecting with them. That is incredibly important as well.”
“Adam is a brilliant strategic thinker who really understands every kind of issue facing this institution, inside and out.” Prof. Jonathan Masur
“The Best Law School in the World”
As a faculty member, Chilton has played an important role in advancing the Law School’s excellence. He has served on several key committees, including the Faculty Appointments Committee, the Dean Review Committee, and the International Programs Committee. He also spent a few years codirecting the Bigelow Fellowship Program, and, until becoming dean, served as coeditor of UChicago’s Journal of Law and Economics. Beyond the Law School, he serves on the board of the American Law and Economics Association and is a fellow of the Society for Empirical Legal Studies.
Masur reflected on Chilton’s approach in cochairing the Faculty Appointments Committee.
“He always brought forward a wonderfully varied group of people who were different in background, different in the type of work that they did, in their approaches to law, and in the methodologies they used,” said Masur. “It was clear that all he wanted to seek was excellence in whatever form that it might come. It was both valuable and telling that he understood that there are different versions of excellence out there, and that the Law School can be a home for more than just law and economics scholars or empirical scholars like himself.”
Drawing diversity of thought to the Law School is what Chilton believes gives UChicago Law its strength. “We are at our best,” he said, “and the legal academy is at its best—when we are training scholars who think differently about legal problems.”
Another strength of the Law School that Chilton deeply believes in and views as most important is its core set of values.
“I love the University of Chicago and what it stands for in a really deep way,” Chilton said. “We are the best law school in the world because of our unique culture and values. Our commitment to these values—to free inquiry and expression, institutional neutrality, rigorous thought and debate, ideological diversity—has set us up for success in these challenging times we’re facing in higher education and the practice of law. While many schools are rethinking their values, we are doubling down on our commitments that we have held throughout history. We have the best set of values for this moment.”
Keeping the Law School anchored to its values is an important goal for Chilton as dean. At the same time, he views the current environment as an opportunity for growth and innovation. Adapting to change while preserving our excellence, Chilton said, is imperative for the Law School’s next chapter.
“Our law school is determined to produce the best lawyers,” he said. “This requires ensuring that we provide students with the education they need to meet the new technologies and developments we are seeing in the field. From AI use to new hiring timelines and practices—the legal landscape is shifting, and we must prepare our students accordingly.”
Leading the Law School into a New Era
Chilton was drawn to UChicago over a decade ago because of what makes the Law School distinctive. As a teacher and scholar, he grew to embody those distinctive traits, and today, as dean, he intends to make sure that the Law School stands firmly on everything that makes it unique.
Chilton also hopes that students will come to love and embody the Law School’s culture and values and keep them alive in their own careers, long after they’ve walked out of their last class.
“I think Adam is going to remind people of the best experiences they had when they were students here,” Masur said. “Whatever it was that you enjoyed—whether it was walking into torts knowing your professor was going to ask tough questions, engaging with professors doing cutting-edge research, or being in a rigorous academic environment that valued free expression—you’ll find that Adam cares deeply about that aspect of UChicago Law.”
Daniel Abebe, who currently serves as dean of Columbia Law School, was one of the UChicago Law professors Chilton met with during that fateful first visit.
In hearing the news about Chilton, Abebe said: “The University of Chicago Law School has appointed a dean who truly exemplifies the core values of the institution. He is an ambitious, pathbreaking scholar whose work is deeply rigorous and innovative, and he is a principled leader, open to a wide range of ideas and perspectives in the pursuit of knowledge. I am delighted for Adam and the entire Law School community.”
William Baude, the Harry Kalven, Jr., Professor of Law, joined the Law School when Chilton did—they were in the same cohort of junior faculty together. Having gotten to know Chilton closely over the years, he said that at first, he was a little surprised to learn that Chilton was pursuing the deanship, primarily because of how dedicated a scholar he has been. At the same time, however, he said he understood, and it was actually not surprising at all, that Chilton’s love for the institution would inspire him to step up to the plate to lead it now.
“In a world where we don’t know what’s going to happen next and where there are a lot of challenges, Adam’s the perfect person to put at the frontier,” said Baude. “He’s so devoted to mastering any new challenge, to learning any new field, and to understanding how something works and how to make it better.”
Baude added another reason to celebrate. “For those of us who are on the faculty and around his seniority level, the one other exciting thing about Adam becoming dean is now the rest of us finally have a chance to catch up to him as a scholar,” he quipped.
Adam Chilton
Dean, Howard G. Krane Professor of Law, Walter Mander Research Scholar
Anthony J. Casey
Donald M. Ephraim Professor of Law and Economics, Faculty Director, Center on Law and Finance
Jonathan S. Masur
John P. Wilson Professor of Law, Director of the Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz Program in Behavioral Law, Finance and Economics, David and Celia Hilliard Research Scholar
William H. J. Hubbard
Deputy Dean, Harry N. Wyatt Professor of Law
