Merit Janow

Merit Janow is the ​non-executive independent chair of Mastercard and a law professor at Columbia University’s ​School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA), where she was faculty dean from 2013 to 2021. She is an internationally recognized trade and investment expert with extensive experience in academia, government, international organizations, and business. In addition, she has had a life-long involvement with Asia and is an expert in that region.

Janow has been a Professor of Practice at SIPA and an affiliated faculty member at Columbia Law School since 1995. She teaches graduate courses in international trade/WTO law, comparative antitrust law, and China in the global economy, among others, and launched new programs focusing on cyber security and the digital economy.

Janow is also co-director of the APEC Study Center. She has served as chair of the Faculty Oversight Committee of Columbia’s Global Center East Asia. Previously, Janow was director of the Masters Program in International Affairs and chair of Columbia University’s Advisory Committee on Socially Responsible Investing. She has penned several books and numerous articles, and frequently speaks before business, policy, and academic audiences around the world. In 2023, Forbes named her to their "50 Over 50-Investment" list.

Janow is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission. Previously, she was the first woman to serve as an elected member of the World Trade Organization’s Appellate Body; executive director of the US Justice Department’s first international antitrust advisory committee; and deputy assistant US trade representative for Japan and China.

She serves on the board of directors of several corporations and nonprofit organizations. In 2009, she became a charter member of the International Advisory Council of China’s sovereign wealth fund, China Investment Corporation.

Janow has a J.D. from Columbia Law School, where she was a Stone Scholar, and a B.A. in Asian Studies (with honors) from the University of Michigan.