Zysman has been a member of the UC Berkeley faculty since 1974, and is Co-Director and Co-Founder of the Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy (BRIE), established in 1982. Zysman completed a Ph.D. in Political Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and has been honored with visiting professorships at universities throughout North America, Europe, and Asia. He has also served as a consultant to, and board member of, a number of governments, firms, and international organizations. He served as a member of the California Council on Science and Technology, 1995-2001.

He has written has extensively on European and Japanese policy and corporate strategy; his interests also include comparative politics, Western European politics, and political economy. Business Week called Manufacturing Matters: The Myth of the Post-Industrial Economy (Basic Books, 1987), co-authored with Stephen Cohen, one of the best books of that year. He co-edited and contributed to Tracking a Transformation: E-Commerce and the Terms of Competition in Industries (Brookings Press, 2001) and Enlarging Europe: The Industrial Foundations of a New Political Reality (Berkeley, IAS Press, 1998). Other publications by Professor Zysman include The Highest Stakes: The Economic Foundations of the Next Security System (Oxford University Press, 1992), and Governments, Markets, and Growth: Finance and the Politics of Industrial Change (Cornell University Press, 1983). His most recent BRIE working paper is entitled "Production in a Digital Era: Commodity or Strategic Weapon?"