Peter J. Spiro holds the Charles Weiner Chair in international law. Before joining Temple’s faculty in 2006, Professor Spiro was Rusk Professor of Law at the University of Georgia Law School. A former law clerk to Justice David H. Souter of the U.S. Supreme Court, Spiro specializes in international, immigration, and constitutional law. Spiro is the author of Beyond Citizenship: American Identity After Globalization (Oxford University Press 2008), At Home in Two Countries: The Past and Future of Dual Citizenship (NYU Press 2016), and Citizenship: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford University Press 2019). He has contributed commentary to such publications as The New York Times, Foreign Affairs, The Wall Street Journal, and The New Republic, and is frequently quoted in the media on international and immigration law issues.
Spiro has held fellowships at the European University Institute, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the Open Society Institute. In the fall 2018, Spiro was the William and Patricia Kleh Visiting Professor in International Law at Boston University Law School. He has also held visiting appointments and residencies at the University of Texas, the Australian National University, the WZB Berlin Social Science Center, and Sungkyunkwan University. Spiro is a member of the International Mobility Treaty Commission and the Investment Migration Council, and a former member of the U.S. Department of State’s Historical Advisory Committee. He has delivered recent keynote lectures at the University of Sydney, Erasmus University, and Princeton University. In 2016, he co-organized a workshop on global migration law at the Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio Study Center. In 2007 and 2016 surveys, Professor Spiro ranked in the top 25 nationally among international law scholars on the basis of academic citation frequency.
In addition to his 1990-91 Supreme Court clerkship, Spiro served as a law clerk to Judge Stephen F. Williams of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. He has also served as director for democracy on the staff of the National Security Council, as an attorney-adviser in the U.S. Department of State’s Office of the Legal Adviser and as a resident associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Spiro holds a B.A. from Harvard College and a J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law.
Education
Research & Teaching Areas
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Selected Publications
Publications and Media AppearancesLeadership
- Robert Schuman Fellow, European University Institute, Florence (spring 2016)
- Member, Advisory Committee on Historical Diplomatic Documentation, U.S. Department of State (2008-12) (ASIL designate)
- Project Scholar, Citizenship in the 21st Century, American Bar Association-American Library Association Public Education Program (2013-14)
- Co-founder and Co-Chair, Migration Law Interest Group, American Society of International Law (2015- )
- Member, Investment Migration Council (2014- )
- Editorial Advisory Board, Citizenship and Migration in the Americas series, NYU Press (2010- )
- Chair, AALS Section on Immigration Law (2006-07)