John R. Raben/Sullivan & Cromwell Fellow Lectures

John R. Raben The John R. Raben/Sullivan & Cromwell Fellowship brings to the Law School a leading expert in securities law or the accounting for business enterprises, who delivers a public lecture at the School.

John R. Raben ‘39, was a partner of the Sullivan & Cromwell firm. He was counsel to investment banking and accounting firms and associations, including the Financial Accounting Standards Board, and counsel to the industry task force that helped draft the Securities Investor Protection Corporation Legislation. Upon his death in 1975, the fellowship was established in his honor at the Law School by Sullivan & Cromwell, and augmented by his friends.

In remarks for a firm history by John F. Cannon, then a younger partner, the following impression of John Raben was provided:

“No chronicle of any length could capture how potent a figure John’s character, intellect and spirit made him with his clients and those with whom he dealt on behalf of his clients, and with his partners, associates and other co-workers at Sullivan & Cromwell… For all of John’s intensity and rigor as a lawyer, he never confused anyone for very long about what the man was like; warm and thoughtful, generous and forgiving. And in spite of the strength and confidence he projected, there was a boyish element, a shyness in him, a paradox with roots, one judges, in his awareness that his great gifts were, after all, gifts.”

April 8, 2024
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Nicholas Bloom, William D. Eberle Professor of Economics, Stanford University, “The Glorious Future of Working From Home.”

September 19, 2022
Poster for the 2022-2023 Raben Lecture with Joshua D. Rauh, The Ormond Family Professor of Finance, Stanford Graduate School of Business and Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution.
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Joshua D. Rauh, The Ormond Family Professor of Finance, Stanford Graduate School of Business and Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution, “Regulating Investment Management and Retirement Plans in the Age of ESG.”

February 7, 2022
Poster for the 2021-2022 Raben Lecture with Carmen Reinhart, Senior Vice President and Chief Economist, The World Bank Group.
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Carmen Reinhart, Senior Vice President and Chief Economist, The World Bank Group, “Central Banks and the Inflationary Aftermath of COVID-19.”

November 12, 2018
Poster for the 2018-2019 Raben Lecture with Northwestern Prof. Joel Mokyr
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Joel Mokyr, Robert H. Strotz Professor of Arts and Sciences and Professor of Economics and History, Northwestern University, “Is Technological Change a Thing of the Past: Lessons from the Industrial Revolution.”

April 9, 2018
Poster for the 2017-2018 Raben Lecture with MIT Sloan Prof. Robert Gibbons
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Robert Gibbons, Sloan Distinguished Professor of Management, MIT Sloan School of Management and Professor, MIT Department of Economics, “Discord (and Repair?) in Relational Contracts: An introduction to work in progress.”

January 30, 2017
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Simon Levin, James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Princeton University, “Evolutionary Perspectives on Business Strategy.”

February 29, 2016
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Niall Ferguson, Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History, Harvard University, “Risk Management in Finance and Geopolitics: A Tale of Two Silos.”

February 23, 2015
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Sendhil Mullainathan, Professor of Economics, Harvard University, “Against Against Prediction: How Machine Learning Can Improve the Legal System.”
 
April 7, 2014
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Andrew W. Lo, Charles E. and Susan T. Harris Professor, Professor of Finance, and Director of the Laboratory for Financial Engineering, MIT Sloan School of Management, “Big Data, Big Brother, and Financial Regulation.”

October 15, 2012
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Antoinette Schoar, Michael M. Koerner (1949) Professor of Entrepreneurship and Professor of Finance, MIT Sloan School of Management, ”Shaped by Booms and Busts: The Impact of Economic Conditions on Managerial Outcomes.”

March 26, 2012
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H. Rodgin Cohen, Senior Chairman and Partner, Sullivan & Cromwell LLP, “The Financial Crisis and Regulatory Response.”

October 4, 2010
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Richard H. Thaler, Ralph and Dorothy Keller Distinguished Service Professor of Behavioral Science and Economics, University of Chicago Booth School of Business, “The Behavioral Economics of Swindling and Selling: A Lecture in Honor of Arthur Leff.”

February 16, 2009
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Luigi Zingales, Robert C. McCormack Professor of Entrepreneurship and Finance and the David G. Booth Faculty Fellow, University of Chicago Booth School of Business, “The Future of Securities Regulation.”

April 29, 2008
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Raghuram G. Rajan, Eric J. Gleacher Distinguished Service Professor of Finance, the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business, “Landed Interests and Financial Underdevelopment in the United States.”

February 19, 2007
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Bengt Holmstrom, Paul A. Samuelson Professor, MIT Department of Economics, “Corporate Governance in Context.”
April 24, 2006
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Oliver Hart, Andrew E. Furer Professor of Economics, Harvard University, “Partial Contracts.”

November 15, 2005
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Lucian Bebchuk, William J. Friedman and Alicia Townsend Friedman Professor of Law, Economics, and Finance, Harvard Law School, “The Myth of the Shareholder Franchise.”

March 30, 2004
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J. Mark Ramseyer, Mitsubishi Professor of Japanese Legal Studies, Harvard Law School, “Who Appoints Them, What Do they Do? Evidence on Outside Directors from Japan.”

May 7, 2003
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Paul G. Mahoney ‘84, Brokaw Professor of Corporate Law and Albert C. BeVier Research Professor, University of Virginia School of Law, “Searching for Market Manipulation in the Pre-SEC Era.”
February 28, 2002
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Ronald J. Gilson ‘71, Charles J. Meyers Professor of Law and Business, Stanford Law School and Marc and Eva Stern Professor of Law and Business, Columbia University School of Law, “Venture Capital Markets.”

November 27, 2000
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John C. Coffee, Jr. ‘69, Adolf A. Berle Professor of Law, Columbia University School of Law, “The Rise of Dispersed Ownership: The Role of Law in The Separation of Ownership and Control.”