Lee Epstein is the Provost Professor of Law and Political Science and the Rader Family Trustee Chair in Law at the University of Southern California. She is also a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Academy of Political and Social Science. Before moving to USC, she held the Henry Wade Rogers Professorship, a University-wide chair, at Northwestern University and was the Edward Mallinckrodt Distinguished University Professor of Political Science and Professor of Law at Washington University in St. Louis.

A recipient of twelve grants from the National Science Foundation for her work on law and legal institutions, Epstein has authored or co-authored over 100 articles and essays, as well as 15 books, including The Choices Justices Make (co-authored with Jack Knight), which won the Pritchett Award for the Best Book on Law and Courts and, more recently, the Lasting Contribution Award "for a book or journal article, 10 years or older, that has made a lasting impression on the field of law and courts." The Constitutional Law for a Changing America series (co-authored with Thomas Walker) received the Teaching and Mentoring Award from the Law and Courts Section of the American Political Science Association. Her most recent book, The Behavior of Federal Judges, with William M. Landes and Richard A. Posner, was published by Harvard University Press in January 2013.

Professor Epstein is a Co-Editor of the Journal of Law, Economics & Organization; President of the International Society for New Institutional Economics; a member of the Board of Directors of the American Academy of Political and Social Science; chair of the Law School Admission Council’s Grants Subcommittee; Principal Investigator of the National Science Foundation funded project on the U.S. Supreme Court Database; and a member of the editorial/advisory boards of American Politics Research, Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science,GreenBag Almanac & Reader, Judicature, Law & Policy, Oxford Handbooks Online, Politics and Governance, and Social Science Quarterly. She is a former chair of the Law and Courts Section of the American Political Science Association and a past President of the Midwest Political Science Association.