Susan Silbey

Susan Silbey, a leading Social Science scholar at MIT - Massachusetts Institute of Technology, holds the Leon and Anne Goldberg Chair in Humanities, Anthropology and Sociology, and is Professor of Behavioral and Policy Sciences in the Sloan School of Management, where she teaches in the programs in Work and Organizational Studies and Economic Sociology. She received her Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Chicago in 1978, M.A. from the same institution, and B.A. from Brooklyn College, CUNY. Silbey's academic career spans Wellesley College from 1974 to 2000, rising to William F. Kenan Professor of Sociology, followed by her move to MIT in 2000 as Professor of Sociology and Anthropology, Leon and Anne Goldberg Professor of Humanities in 2008, and Professor of Behavioral and Policy Sciences in 2012. She served as Chair of the MIT Faculty from 2017 to 2019 and was President of the Law & Society Association from 1995 to 1996.

Silbey's research examines governance, regulatory and audit processes in complex organizations, development of management systems to mitigate risks including ethical lapses, environmental, health, and safety hazards, regulation of big tech and AI supply chains, and gender stratification in engineering professions via a longitudinal panel study of engineers. Key publications include The Common Place of Law: Stories From Everyday Life (1998, with Patricia Ewick), In Litigation: Do the Haves Still Come Out Ahead? (2003, with Herbert Kritzer), Law and Science (I): Epistemological, Evidentiary and Relational Engagements (2008), Law and Science (II): Regulation of Property, Practices and Products (2008), “Why do biologists and chemists do safety differently? The Reproduction of Cultural Variation through Pragmatic Regulation” (2021), and “The Dog That Didn’t Bark: Looking for Techno-Libertarian Ideology in a Decade of Public Discourse about Big Tech Regulation” (2022). She has garnered the James R. Killian Jr. Faculty Achievement Award (2019-2020), Compliance Net Lifetime Achievement Award (2023), Harry Kalven Jr. Prize for advancing the sociology of law (2009), John Simon Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship (2009), Doctor Honoris Causa from Ecole Normale Superieure Cachan (2006), and multiple best article prizes from the American Sociological Association. Silbey has edited Studies in Law and Society (1995-2017) and Law & Society Review (1998-2000), contributing significantly to the sociology of law and organizational regulation, evidenced by over 16,000 Google Scholar citations.

Professional Email: ssilbey@mit.edu