Courtney Cox

Courtney Cox is a legal philosopher who focuses on technology, deception, and risk. Her current research has two main strains: The first explores the theoretical and practical implications of normative uncertainty in judicial decision making. The second analyzes the law’s actual and potential responses to lies.  Both strains of work have received national recognition: Her article,The Uncertain Judge, published in the University of Chicago Law Review, was named 2024 Article of the Year by the AALS Jurisprudence Section. Her article, Legitimizing Lies, published in the George Washington Law Review, was selected for the 2020 Harvard/Yale/Stanford Junior Faculty Forum and received honorable mention in the 2022 AALS Scholarly Papers Competition.

Cox’s theoretical work is informed by legal practice.  She joined the Fordham faculty directly from Ropes & Gray LLP, where she represented clients in complex appeals and intellectual property disputes. Cox clerked for then-Chief Judge Sandra L. Lynch of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit. Cox has also been recognized for her pro bono practice, receiving Ropes & Gray’s Pro Bono Innovation Award for her appellate work, and the University of Chicago Law School’s Edwin F. Mandel Award for her work with unaccompanied minors from China.

Cox graduated with highest honors from the University of Chicago Law School, where she was a Rubenstein Scholar. She holds a doctorate in philosophy from Oxford, where she studied as a Clarendon Scholar; and was a dual major in Engineering Sciences (Electrical) and Ethics, Politics, & Economics at Yale.  She previously taught philosophy as a lecturer at Oxford’s Hertford College and served as a Yale Fox Fellow at Fudan University in Shanghai.

Education

J.D., highest honors, University of Chicago Law School

D.Phil., B.Phil. (with distinction), University of Oxford

B.A., magna cum laude with distinction, Yale University

Representative Publications

This Is a Chapter About Deception, in Samuel L. Bray, John C.P. Goldberg, Paul B. Miller, & Henry E. Smith, eds., INTERSTITIAL PRIVATE LAW (Oxford forthcoming)

The Uncertain Judge, 90 U. CHI. L. REV. 739 (2023)

Legitimizing Lies, 90 GEO. WASH. L. REV. 297 (2022)

Risky Standing: Deciding on Injury, 8 NE. U. L.J. 75 (2016)

Review of Bruce Ackerman’s The Civil Rights Revolution, 125 ETHICS 1178 (2015)

Only Time Can Tell: Unethical Research & the Passage of Time, APA Newsl. Phil. & L. (2005)

Media Appearances

Confronting Normative Uncertainty, THE PRIVATE LAW PODCAST, Season 2, Episode 1 (Felipe Jiménez ed., Sept. 22, 2021)

Legitimizing Lies, IPSE DIXIT PODCAST #688 (Brian L. Frye ed., Mar. 8, 2021)