Melissa Lane is an American academic and professor at Princeton University, where she holds the Class of 1943 professorship in the Department of Politics.
[2] She graduated summa cum laude from Harvard University with a degree in Social Studies in 1989.
[2] She briefly worked as an aide and speechwriter for President Oscar Arias Sanchez of Costa Rica after college who she met after he gave the Harvard graduation speech.
[3] She then studied at Cambridge University as a Marshall, Truman, and Phi Beta Kappa scholar, graduating with a M.Phil in 1992 and Ph.D. in Philosophy in 1995.
In 2009, she joined Princeton University as a professor; in 2014, she was endowed the Class of 1943 professorship in the Department of Politics.