Dr. Marks is the François-Xavier Bagnoud Professor of Health and Human Rights at the Harvard School of Public Health, where he directs the Human Rights in Development Program. He is also the Senior Fellow at the University Committee on Human Rights Studies at Harvard University. He holds academic degrees from Stanford University, the Universities of Paris, Strasbourg, Besançon and Nice, France, as well as the University of Damascus, Syria. His principal fields are international law, human rights, public health, international politics, international organizations, development, peace and conflict. He has also held teaching positions at Columbia University, Princeton University, the University of Phnom Penh Faculty of Law; Cardozo School of Law; the New School for Social Research; Rutgers University School of Law, and City University of Hong Kong School of Law and University of Hong Kong Law School.  He spent 12 years in the service of the United Nations, working for UNESCO in Paris and in various peacekeeping operations. He is currently chair of the UN High Level Task Force on the Implementation of the Right to Development.

He is the author of over 60 articles and book chapters and editor or co-editor of and contributor to The Future of International Human Rights (1999), Health and Human Rights: The Educational Challenge (2002); Perspectives in Health and Human Rights (2005) and Development as a Human Rights (2006). His latest publications relate to human reproductive cloning, universal jurisdiction, cultural rights, human rights education, human rights in development, human rights and bioethics, and the war on terrorism.