Scott Hirst, PhD

Scott Hirst is a Professor of Law and researches corporate law, securities regulation, mergers and acquisitions, and other related areas to explain phenomena and inform policymaking. His work combines empirical methods and conceptual analyses from finance, accounting, and economics, with close attention to the institutional environment within which corporations and investors make decisions. He has written 15 scholarly articles on corporate law and regulations and has testified before the Federal Trade Commission about competition and consumer protection. He is a cofounder and organizer of the Corporate Law Academic Webinar Series and was the program committee cochair for the 2023 American Law & Economics Association Annual Meeting. Last year, he was selected by the BU School of Law graduating class to receive the Mark Pettit Award for Teaching.

Hirst’s recent scholarship has appeared in the Columbia Law Review, the Boston University Law Review, the Yale Journal on Regulation, the Harvard Business Law Review, the Journal of Corporation Law and the Journal of Economic Perspectives. It has been referred to by the Securities and Exchange Commission in its rule making and discussed in the Wall Street Journal, among other places.

Before joining BU Law, Hirst served as research director of the Program on Institutional Investors at Harvard Law School and practiced for seven years in the mergers and acquisitions group of Shearman & Sterling LLP in New York. Hirst received Doctor of Juridical Science (SJD) and Master of Laws (LLM) degrees from Harvard Law School, and Bachelor of Laws and Bachelor of Commerce degrees from the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia.

Research Interests: corporate law; securities regulation; corporate governance; shareholder voting; institutional investors; mergers & acquisitions

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