Mark Kleiman was Professor of Public Policy at the NYU Marron Institute of Urban Management and Affiliated Faculty at NYU Wagner. At Marron, he was the founding director of the Crime and Justice program. Throughout his life, Professor Kleiman made foundational contributions on methods for accommodating imperfect rational decision-making in policy, designing deterrent regimes that take advantage of positive-feedback effects, and the substitution of swiftness and predictability for severity in the criminal justice system.

Prior to joining NYU, he served as a Professor of Public Policy at UCLA’s Luskin School of Public Affairs. Previously, he taught at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, and served as a Visiting Professor at the University of Virginia Batten School and as the first Thomas C. Schelling Professor at the University of Maryland. Kleiman was also an adjunct scholar at the Center for American Progress, and was a visiting professor at Harvard Law School. Kleiman was a legislative aide to Congressman Les Aspin (1974-1975) and a special assistant to Polaroid CEO Edwin Land (1975-1976). From 1977 to 1979, he was Deputy Director for Management and Director of Program Analysis for the Office of Management and Budget of the City of Boston. Between 1979 and 1983, Kleiman worked for the Office of Policy and Management Analysis in the Criminal Division of the U.S. Department of Justice, and from 1982-1983 he was the director of the same office, and a member of the National Organized Crime Planning Council.

Professor Kleiman attended Haverford College, graduating with a B.A. Economics (honors), Philosophy (honors), and Political Science (high honors). For his graduate education, Kleiman attended John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, earning an M.P.P. in Public Policy in 1974 and a Ph.D. in Public Policy in 1983.