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Online PhD in International Law and Treaty Law

Quick access, program type, school / institute.

Online (Asynchonous)

USD 169 per credit hour

Scholarships

Full (officials of PS); 15% off (ECOWAS and IGOs)

This highly specialized PhD program offers in-depth and comprehensive coursework in international law.

It is one of the world’s only two doctoral programs in this field offered by an intergovernmental organization constituted under international law (the other being offered by the European University Institute and it is a PhD in Law more generally, with a European emphasis).

EUCLID (Pôle Universitaire Euclide | Euclid University), an international intergovernmental organization with a university mandate, offers to select students from the general public an external (distance or online) degree program called the EUCLID DILT which is a full PhD in International Law and Treaty Law.

In terms of academic progression, EUCLID’s intention is to offer a credible path leading from the LLM (24 credits) to the MSc (additional 12 credits) and finally to the PhD (another 25 credits of coursework or directed studies, followed by the dissertation).

As a public non-profit institution, EUCLID is able to offer affordable, low-tuition programs.

Ambassador Hanna (EUCLID graduate and now faculty member) with the UNESCO Director-General.

Academic Presentation

This specialized PhD in international law program focuses on the actual practice of States and intergovernmental organizations, rather than the advancement of academic knowledge for its own sake.

It has primarily been designed to be used by professional diplomats working for EUCLID Participating States and can be considered an excellent route to pursue a career within governmental bodies, international law firms, academia, iNGOs and international organizations.

Thanks to its low tuition and institutional relationships, it is designed to be of special interest to African and Small States students.

Within certain parameters, the curriculum is customizable, with elective courses focusing on:

  • Law of International organizations
  • European law
  • Human rights law
  • Treaty drafting and case studies.

phd in private international law

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Note: to consult the current and official curriculum/list of courses from the EUCLID CMS database, please visit: EUCLID Available Degree Programs and follow the program link.

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phd in private international law

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EUCLID is the only intergovernmental, treaty-based university with a UN registered charter and recognized expertise in diplomacy. Join the alma mater of ambassadors and senior officials globally.

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EUCLID AT WORK: RECENT NEWS AND ARTICLES

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phd in private international law

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  • Our PhD programme

PhD in international law

  • Designed for outstanding students with a strong commitment to international law and a proven ability to carry out independent research.
  • A highly stimulating, intellectual environment.
  • Research supervision covers a wide range of topics.
  • Students receive extensive intellectual support throughout their research, via formal supervision, specialised doctoral seminars and a wide range of events.

Curriculum overview

  • 2 compulsory courses (12 credits)
  • 3 elective courses in the discipline of specialisation (18 credits)
  • Preliminary thesis dissertation (30 credits)
  • Option to choose minor in another discipline (18 credits)
  • Dissertation Total of 60 credits or 78 (with minor)

MPT Guidelines IL

PhD Guidelines for Drafting the MPT

  • Anthropology and Sociology
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DIGITAL SKILLS FOR PHD STUDENTS

The P8 programme, initiated by Swissuniversities in 2019, aims to enhance digital skills in education. Specifically focused on supporting universities, the programme offers workshops for PhD students from the Geneva Graduate Institute.  These workshops combine traditional presentations with practical exercises to impart knowledge and skills, creating new learning opportunities. While these workshops do not provide academic credits, students who attend and complete a workshop will receive a certificate.  Further information regarding upcoming workshops and our previous workshops can be found on the Libguide . 

phd in private international law

Private International Law

Private International Law is one of the most exciting and intellectually stimulating disciplines in law. Its global significance is particularly evident as our world is more and more interconnected and interdependent.

We need to make sure that conflicts of different national laws can be resolved fairly by having globally agreed rules on how to deal with these conflicts. It is unrealistic and often inappropriate to resolve these problems by creating uniform global laws as this poses a threat to legitimate national and regional diversity and to democratic accountability. Conflicts of laws can arise in all areas of law, e.g. contractual disputes at the heart of international trade and disputes over which parent should have the primary care of a child when the parents are living in different countries. Private international law regulates the rules on jurisdiction (the courts of which country or countries can resolve the case), the applicable law to govern cross-border situations and whether a judgment of a court in one country will be recognised and enforced in another country. Private international law accommodates legitimate differences in the fundamental values of different countries through such mechanisms as public policy and mandatory rules.

Private international law has a dedicated international institution with a single purpose - to “work for the progressive unification of the rules of private international law” – the Hague Conference on Private International Law (HCCH). HCCH has made impressive leaps forward in achieving its purpose in certain fields (notably adoption, child abduction, service of court documents abroad and taking of evidence abroad) and has provided an excellent framework to achieve its purpose in other areas (notably choice of court agreements and choice of law agreements in contracts, recognition and enforcement of judgments, child custody, maintenance, divorce, incapacitated adults, formal validity of wills, and trusts) but many areas remain to be harmonised satisfactorily (e.g. tort/delict, companies, family agreements, competition, intellectual property, conflicts of jurisdiction, succession, parentage/surrogacy, marriage, property (including matrimonial and registered partnership property issues), etc).

The Stirling research cluster is engaged in efforts to try to enhance the achievement of the HCCH’s purpose. We are doing this by taking the lead in the AHRC funded workshops on Private International Law in the UK after Brexit and by pulling together a highly distinguished, world leading group of contributors to the first ever attempt to comprehensively set out what unified global private international law should look like in Paul Beaumont and Jayne Holliday (eds), Guide to Global Private International Law (Hart, 2021). We are also doing it by promoting the development of private international law in Africa, the continent least affected by HCCH global private international law, e.g. by Pontian Okoli, Promoting Foreign Judgments: Lessons in Legal Convergence from South Africa and Nigeria (Wolters Kluwer, 2019). Two areas where HCCH has failed to achieve successful harmonisation are succession and property law (apart from formal validity of wills) and Jayne Holliday offers a global solution to one of their most controversial issues in Clawback Law in the Context of Succession (Hart, 2020).

Learn more about our Private International Law research

Related staff

Professor Paul Beaumont

Dr Jayne Holliday

Dr Pontian Okoli

PhD students

Mr Kaso Kardonya

Related outputs

The HCCH's Development in Africa

Richard Frimpong Oppong and Pontian N. Okoli, ‘The HCCH's Development in Africa’ in Thomas John, Rishi Gulati and Ben Köhler (Eds)The Elgar Companion to the Hague Conference (Elgar, 2021).

Judgments Convention: Application to Governments

Beaumont PR (2020) Judgments Convention: Application to Governments. Netherlands International Law Review , 67 (1), p. 121–137. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40802-020-00163-6

Clawback Law in the Context of Succession

Holliday J (2020) Clawback Law in the Context of Succession . Studies in Private International Law. London: Hart. https://www.bloomsburyprofessional.com/uk/clawback-law-in-the-context-of-succession-9781509932337/

Promoting Foreign Judgments: Lessons in Legal Convergence from South Africa and Nigeria

Okoli P (2019) Promoting Foreign Judgments: Lessons in Legal Convergence from South Africa and Nigeria . Alphen aan den Rijn, Netherlands: Kluwer Law International. https://lrus.wolterskluwer.com/store/product/promoting-foreign-judgments-lessons-in-legal-convergence-from-south-africa-and-nigeria/

Conflicts of EU courts on child abduction: the reality of Article 11(6)-(8) Brussels IIa proceedings across the EU

Beaumont P, Walker L & Holliday J (2016) Conflicts of EU courts on child abduction: the reality of Article 11(6)-(8) Brussels IIa proceedings across the EU. Journal of Private International Law , 12 (2), pp. 211-260. https://doi.org/10.1080/17441048.2016.1206708

Child Abduction: Recent Jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights

Paul Beaumont, Katarina Trimmings, Lara Walker and Jayne Holliday, ‘Child Abduction: Recent Jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights’ (2015) 64(1) International and Comparative Law Quarterly 39-63.

Anton’s Private International Law

Paul Beaumont and Peter McEleavy, Anton’s Private International Law , (W Green, 3rd edn, 2011)

The Hague Convention on International Child Abduction

Paul Beaumont and Peter McEleavy, The Hague Convention on International Child Abduction , (OUP, 1999)

EAPIL

PhD Studentship in Private International Law at University College London

Ugljesa Grusic

We particularly welcome applications with research proposals that fall within our areas of interest, which are broad and include the following sub-topics within private international law: protection of weaker parties; environmental protection; business and human rights; sustainable development; digital technology; party autonomy; the relationship between public and private international law; private international law theory and/or methodology; colonialism; and private international law issues in arbitration and foreign relations law.

More information about UCL Faculty of Laws, our PhD programme, the process of applying and the scholarship is available here , here and here . Applicants should apply through the normal UCL Faculty of Laws PhD application process. All applicants within the relevant subject areas will be considered, but we recommend that applicants also specify in their application that they wish to be considered for these scholarships. The deadline date for applications for the 2024/25 academic year is 16 November 2023.

Prospective students are welcome to get in touch with either myself at [email protected] or Professor Mills at [email protected] .

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phd in private international law

CONTACT US Association Européenne de droit international privé European Association of Private International Law 4 Rue Alphonse Weicker, L-2721 Luxembourg

THE SECRETARY GENERAL [email protected]

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phd in private international law

University of Luxembourg

Doctoral researcher (phd) in private international law.

The University of Luxembourg aspires to be one of Europe's most highly regarded universities with a distinctly international and interdisciplinary character . It fosters the cross-fertilisation of research and teaching , is relevant to its country, is known worldwide for its research and teaching in targeted areas, and is establishing itself as an innovative model for contemporary European Higher Education. The University`s core asset is its well-connected world-class academic staff which will attract the most motivated, talented and creative students and young researchers who will learn to enjoy taking up challenges and develop into visionary thinkers able to shape society.

Your Role...

The Department of Law of the Faculty of Law, Economics and Finance of the University of Luxembourg is looking for a PhD candidate to conduct research in Private International Law.

The doctoral researcher will be working under the supervision of Professor Gilles Cuniberti. The doctoral researcher's main task will be to prepare a doctoral thesis in the field of private international law or international commercial law. The thesis work will be undertaken at the University of Luxembourg but can also be jointly-supervised with another university. The doctoral candidate will contribute to the teaching of classes ranging from one to three hours per week, of small group teachings and tutorials.

The topic of the PhD can be a traditional doctrinal topic addressing novel issues of choice of law, jurisdiction or foreign judgments. Professor Cuniberti is also interested in supervising a thesis at the crossroad of law and economics or psychology, on topics related to jurisdictional/regulatory competition and negotiation of international contracts.

Qualifications...

We are looking for a candidate with demonstrated interest in private international law. In particular, the following requirements apply:

  • A Master's Degree in private international law, international commercial law or international commercial arbitration; a background in economics or psychology would be important for pursuing research on a pluridisciplinary topic
  • Have the linguistic skills to evolve in a multilingual environment: fluency in English, good understanding of a second language and possibly a third language. Ability to teach in French will be considered an advantage
  • Excellent communication and writing skills

In particular, we offer:

  • An exciting international and multilingual research environment and the possibility to work within a research team focused on enforcement in multi-level regulatory systems
  • Personal workspace
  • Travel opportunities for training and learning
  • The University offers highly competitive salaries based on the candidate's experience and is an equal opportunity employer

About us...

The Faculty of Law, Economics and Finance offers four Bachelor programmes, fourteen Master programmes, as well as several continuing education courses. It also includes the Doctoral School in Law and the Doctoral School in Economics and Finance. Around 1,600 students from 97 different nationalities are enrolled at the Faculty. Academic staff from different nationalities teach at the Faculty, supported by practitioners from the field, visiting scholars and guest professors. Rooted in Luxembourg but with a European and international outlook , the Faculty counts three departments:

  • Department of Law
  • Department of Economics and Management (DEM)
  • Department of Finance

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University of Luxembourg

The University of Luxembourg, a small-sized institution with an international reach, aims at excellence in research and education.

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University of Aberdeen

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PAX Moot Court Half-Day Conference: Dispute Resolution in Private International Law

PAX Moot Court Half-Day Conference: Dispute Resolution in Private International Law

Half-Day Conference organised by the Centre for Private International Law at the School of Law, University of Aberdeen, in collaboration with the Faculty of Law, University of Ljubljana.

Centre for Private International Law Newsletter 2024

Centre for Private International Law Newsletter 2024

The latest edition of our Centre for Private International Law Newsletter has now been published.

Dr Francesca Farrington

Dr Francesca Farrington

Dr Francesca Farrington has been awarded the prestigious Yorke Prize from the University of Cambridge

Dr Poesen and Dr Živković appointed as the new Co-Convenors of the Conflict of Laws of the SLS

Dr Poesen and Dr Živković appointed as the new Co-Convenors of the Conflict of Laws of the SLS

The Centre for Private International Law is delighted to announce the appointment of Dr Poesen and Dr Živković as the new Co-Convenors of the Conflict of of Laws Section by the SLS

Private International Law Blog Posts

Private International Law Blog Posts

Members of the Private International Law Centre publish blog posts discussing contemporary issues and research.

Anti-SLAPP Research Hub

Anti-SLAPP Research Hub

Members of the Centre have been instrumental in the work of the Anti-SLAPP Research Hub

Private International Law

Private International Law (sometimes also called ‘International Private Law’ or ‘Conflict of Laws’) provides the methods with which lawyers can anticipate, tackle and solve many of the issues that arise if and when foreign private laws interact with the laws of the forum, in matters of civil law, commercial law or family law. The legal discipline addresses questions concerning which courts may exercise jurisdiction, which laws apply to a case, and whether judgments of the courts of one state can be recognised elsewhere.

This may sound abstract but it could hardly be less so.  Private international law issues arise in each of the following scenarios, for example: a) drafting a contract which has a foreign aspect; b) advising a client who has not been paid for the goods he supplied and who now wishes to sue the foreign buyer; c) advising a client who having married abroad now wishes for a UK divorce; d) advising a client who has recently moved to the UK wishes to receive maintenance from her former spouse who has remained abroad. Lawyers are frequently confronted with private law issues that increasingly have a foreign element that therefore brings issues of private international law into consideration.

If private international law is understood, the way to reduce the uncertainties is also understood; it follows that in a world of unprecedented globalisation, Private International Law is a vital aspect of legal practice and education. 

Founded on long-standing tradition of excellence in teaching and researching private international law, the Centre for Private International Law of the University of Aberdeen’s Law School was established in 2012. It seeks to promote the development of private international law, and to provide platforms for the discussion of current issues in the subject. The Centre advances this mission through high quality research and publications, teaching across all levels of instruction, and through a busy calendar of events.

The Centre prides itself on a well-established level of involvement in private international law reform. Its past and present members have helped to shape several international legislative initiatives, as well as judicial innovations across the range of EU private international law competence.

The Centre has grown from a long and distinguished tradition of private international law scholarship at the Law School, first established by Professor AE (Sandy) Anton FBA FRSE in the 1950s and later fostered by him over the late 1970s and 80s. Today, the Centre is a research-intensive grouping of private international law specialists drawn from a range of international jurisdictions. Our work contributes to the development of the traditional core of private international law, to the attempts to Europeanise or Globalise aspects of the subject and also to specific contemporary challenges ranging from international surrogacy arrangements to the potential for blockchain technology to contribute to the context of cross-border dispute resolution.

The Centre has an extensive network of Associate Members , and welcomes visiting scholars to exchange ideas on research and teaching and extend further opportunities for collaboration. The Centre also invites guest speakers, whether prominent practitioners or academics, to its events and also to the Law School seminar series . 

Objectives of the Centre

  • To advance the study of private international law through top quality research and publication
  • To carry out major research projects in the field of private international law, building on the Centre’s tradition of excellence in private international law reform
  • To provide a platform for discussion of current issues in private international law through conferences, workshops and research seminars
  • To provide high quality teaching in the field of private international law at all levels. 

Call For Papers: Second Postgraduate Law Conference of the Centre for Private International Law

European parliament publishes study on slapps by anti-slapp research hub, protection of international families post-brexit through the conventions of the hague conference, dr onyója momoh publishes handbook on international child abduction, professor trimmings and dr momoh to attend experts' meeting on the 1980 hague convention.

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International and Comparative Law Research Scholars

 Exterior view of the Reading Room windows in the fall

Each year we welcome 15 to 25 scholars from around the globe into our community as non-degree International and Comparative Law Research Scholars to conduct research and engage fully in the intellectual and social life of Michigan Law School. Visits vary in length from a few weeks to one year.

As you can imagine, we receive many more excellent applications than we could ever accept, so those chosen are senior scholars with impressive accomplishments, mid-career intellectuals who are beginning to make their mark, or early-career researchers who show special promise for the future. While they may come from many walks of life—junior or senior faculty members in law or related fields, doctoral or postdoctoral students, and public service practitioners—in all cases, they are exploring areas of law that intrigue our faculty members and for which we can provide meaningful academic support.

International and Comparative Law Research Scholars pay a fee of $2,500 for each semester or $5,000 for each full academic year in residence, prorated for stays of less than a semester.  Requests for fee reductions or waivers are considered on a case-by-case basis.

Research Scholar Program Privileges 

With the intention of ensuring that all our Research Scholars have productive, lively and satisfying experiences while they are with us, our program includes the following privileges:

  • Assigned personal workspace (private office or individual workstation) within a large suite that is dedicated solely to Research Scholars and SJD  students.
  • Attend JD classes with the permission of the professor.
  • Access the Law School’s extensive library collections and first-rate research facilities, including Westlaw and Lexis/Nexis.
  • Access the library resources of the larger University.
  • Participate in a weekly colloquium of Michigan Research Scholars and SJD students to discuss works in progress.
  • Assist in organizing the Michigan Law School Junior Scholars Conference.
  • Attend workshops, lectures, and other events.
  • Engage with the broader University campus, including other schools, departments and centers.

Program Participants

Most recently, our research scholar program has included faculty members from Kyoto University in Japan, the University of Osnabrueck in Germany, Peking and Renmin universities in Beijing, the University of the Philippines and of Aix-Marseille in France, as well as the University of St. Gallen in Switzerland; a counsel to the Slovenian Ministry of Justice, the former chairperson of the Irish Society for European Law; staff members of the Japanese and Korean Ministries of Justice; a consultant to the UNHCR office in Morocco and a policy adviser to the Danish Refugee Council; counsel to the Brazilian legislature; a deputy chief at the Supreme Commercial Court of the Russian Federation; and doctoral students from major universities all over the world. Their research interests have encompassed a broad array of legal and interdisciplinary subjects.

How to Apply

You will need a Google account to access, save, and submit applications.

Next, please complete the online Michigan Law Research Scholar application form. The application form asks for biographical data, educational and work history, proposed dates of stay, and the names of the University of Michigan Law faculty with whom you would like to confer during your stay.

Please note that you are not expected to contact Michigan Law professors in advance of your application. We will notify the appropriate faculty on your behalf as part of the admission process to gauge their level of interest.

You will also be asked to upload the following materials with your application:

  • CV or resume
  • Description of your intended research project and its purpose (e.g. doctoral thesis, journal publication), as well as a description of how a research scholar visit will be of value
  • Two letters of reference from academics familiar with your work
  • Level of English fluency, in particular speaking and listening comprehension, and a description of your training and experience in EnglishTOEFL or IELTS score and/or academic records may be requested on a case by case basis.

Apply Now

International and Comparative Law Research Fellowships 

Applicants to the Law School’s research scholar program may be eligible for very limited supplemental funding, which is granted on a competitive basis and considerate of need. 

After submission of the applicant’s International and Comparative Law Research Scholar application, those interested in being considered for these fellowships will be asked to submit a separate fellowship application. 

International and Comparative Law Research Fellowships are intended to assist with living expenses while researchers are in full-time residence. Most research scholars are supported by funds from other sources, such as Fulbright or sabbatical leave salary from their home university. Because of stiff competition for Michigan Law funding, applicants are encouraged to seek alternate sources of support. 

Due to funding limitations, we are not in a position to provide support for accompanying family members. 

Deadline: January 15 

The application deadline for the International and Comparative Law Research Scholar Program and for International and Comparative Law Research Fellowships is January 15 for visits proposed in the following summer, fall, or winter terms (June through May). 

Applicants are encouraged to apply to multiple institutions as the selection process is competitive. Although applications are welcome at any time during the year, those who apply after January 15 risk that space and funding may no longer be available.​​

Research Scholars

Maxim Bönnemann (Germany)

Bio:  Maxim Bönnemann is a research fellow at Humboldt University Berlin and the Kassel Institute for Sustainability. In 2022 he defended his PhD in the law and politics of Special Economic Zones at Humboldt University for which he was awarded the Law School Prize for Best Dissertation in Public Law. Since 2021, he has also been a permanent editor of the Verfassungsblog, covering comparative constitutional and environmental law. Maxim has been a visiting researcher at the National Law University, Delhi, and at the Centre for Policy Research ( CPR ). Before his legal studies, he worked for a human rights NGO in Moscow. Maxim has authored several papers and book chapters on comparative legal theory and has edited a book on “The Global South and Comparative Constitutional Law” ( OUP , 2020).

Research Focus:  Maxim’s main research interests lie in comparative legal theory, political institutions and international economic law. During his stay at Michigan he will pursue a project on the role of non-majoritarian institutions in environmental and climate governance, in addition to a comparative project on the evolution of national Special Economic Zone laws.

Languages : German (native), Russian (proficient), French (elementary)

Jonathan Bonnitcha (Australia)

Bio:  Jonathan Bonnitcha is an Associate Professor, in Law at the University of New South Wales. He holds the degrees of DP hil, MP hil and BCL from the University of Oxford, where he studied as a Rhodes scholar, and the degrees of LLB and BE c from the University of Sydney.

Jonathan’s research examines international and domestic legal regimes governing foreign investment. He is the author of two books on investment treaties, including (with Lauge Poulsen and Michael Waibel) The Political Economy of the Investment Treaty Regime.

Much of Jonathan’s research is inter-disciplinary. His article (with Emma Aisbett) ‘A Pareto Improving Compensation Rule for Investment Treaties’ won the John Jackson prize for the best article published in the Journal of International Economic Law in 2021. A forthcoming article (with Zoe Phillips Williams) in Law & Policy empirically examines the impact of investment treaties on domestic governance in developing countries, through cross-country quantitative analysis and a detailed qualitative case-study on Myanmar.

Research:  Jonathan is currently working on two research projects. The first (with Taylor St John) is a comparative study of domestic investment laws. The project seeks to identify and explain shifts in the functions and content of national investment laws over time and space. The second (with Zhenyu Xiao) uses a series of case studies from across the Belt and Road Initiative to explore the legal and political dynamics in renegotiation of infrastructure contracts between Chinese foreign investors and host governments.

Languages:  Spanish (intermediate); Burmese (basic)

Mireille Fournier (Canada)

Bio:  Mireille is a doctoral student in legal history and civil law at Université Laval’s Faculty of Law in cotutelle with the Sciences Po Law School in Paris. She is a member of the Groupe de recherche sur les humanités juridiques. Mireille holds a bachelor’s degree in civil law and common law from the McGill Faculty of Law (2016) and a master’s degree in law and society from the University of Victoria (2018). Her master’s thesis focused on the intellectual contexts of the 1900 Comparative Law Congress in Paris. A member of the Quebec Bar since 2018, she worked as a law clerk at the Quebec Court of Appeal from 2018 to 2020. 

Research Focus:  Mireille’s research focuses on the contributions of civil society to the development of the civil law in the controversy over the nature and origins of legal personality in 19th-century France. In particular she looks at the way legal arguments published by lawyers and non-lawyers in the public press contribute to transforming the formal legal landscape in caslaw and doctrinal works. She is interested in developing a law and humanities research framework that can be applied in civil law countries, by mobilizing existing French-language theoretical resources and translating some English theoretical pieces to French.

Languages : French, Spanish

Jiwon Jheong (South Korea)

Bio : Jiwon Jheong has been a presiding judge of Geochang Branch of Changwon District Court of the Republic of Korea since 2020. She served as an associate judge of Seoul Central District Court from 2018 to 2020, and served as an associate judge of Ansan Branch of Suwon District Court from 2015 to 2018. She worked as a law clerk at Seoul High Court from 2014 to 2015. Before entering her profession, from 2012 to 2013, she was assigned to the two-year program at the Supreme Court of Korea’s Judicial Research and Training Institute. As a judge and a former law clerk, she has dealt with a wide range of labor cases as well as civil and criminal cases. She won 2020, 2021 Outstanding Judge of the Year by Gyeongsangnam-province Bar Association. 

Jiwon is also a member of the Labor Law Community of the Supreme Court of Korea. She is one of the co-authors of the revised edition of “The Commentary on the Trade Unions and Labor Relations Adjustment Act ( TULRAA )”, a notable legal commentary in Korea.

She obtained a Bachelor of Arts degree from Seoul National University College of Humanities in 2012 and a Master of Laws degree in administrative law from Seoul National University School of Law in 2018. 

Research Focus : Jiwon’s research first focuses on the criteria for deciding an appropriate bargaining unit in the U.S. legal system. Korea’s collective bargaining system is unique in that the TULRAA defines the bargaining unit as a business or workplace. However, the Labor Relations Commission ( LRC ) may divide the bargaining unit if there is any considerable disparity in working conditions, employment status, and bargaining practices. As there is a scarcity of precedents on the separation criteria of bargaining units, she hopes to deepen her understanding of the concrete criteria for determining an appropriate bargaining unit in the U.S. 

The second part of her research focuses on the legal principle of joint employment in the U.S. A segment of Korean legal society argues that the adoption of the U.S. approach will represent an expansion of the nature of employers as a party to collective bargaining compared to the currently dominant interpretation under TULRAA . Scrutinizing the legal principle of joint employment in the U.S. will provide an additional perspective on the concept of an employer in a collective bargaining setting and determining whether it is possible to expand the concept of a client company in an in-house subcontracting relationship. 

Languages : Korean (native), Chinese (intermediary), Japanese elementary)

Muhammad Asif Khan (Pakistan)

Bio:  Dr. Muhammad Asif Khan is an Associate Professor at the Department of Law at the School of Social Sciences and Humanities in the National University of Science and Technology Islamabad, Pakistan. He is also the Head of the Department of Law. He holds an LL .B. from University of Peshawar (Pakistan), and an LL .M. from the University of Liverpool ( UK ) in Public International Law. He defended his PhD thesis “Adjusting Business Entities in a Globalized World: The Concept of an International Treaty Regulating Transnational Corporations against Violations of International Law” at the University of Salzburg (Austria) in May 2015. He has vast experience in teaching Public International Law and has served in different public sector universities in Pakistan. He has worked as a consultant with the International Committee of the Red Cross ( ICRC ) in Pakistan. He has also worked as a Business and Human Rights Specialist with the United Nations Development Program ( UNDP ) in the Decentralisation, Human Rights and Local Governance Project ( DHL ) in Pakistan. He has remained a member of the governance committee of teaching business and human rights forum for one year (2021-2022). He is an associate editor of the  Manchester Journal of Transnational Islamic Law and Practice  and the  NUST Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities . His teaching activities include undergraduate and postgraduate courses on Public International Law, International Humanitarian Law, Business and Human Rights, Human Rights Law and Jurisprudence.

Research Focus:  Dr. Khan’s research activities focus on Business and Human Rights along with issues related with International Humanitarian Law including cyber warfare. Previously, his research has focussed on the regulation of transnational corporations and other business entities through an international treaty. At Michigan he will be focussing on human rights protection through international investment law. The major outcome will be to explore the possibility of including human rights protection clauses in bilateral investment treaties and international investment agreements from the perspectives of South Asian states. 

Languages:  Pashto (native), Urdu and English

Kana Koyasu (Japan)

Bio:  Kana Koyasu is a public prosecutor in Japan. She graduated from Waseda Law School with a Juris Doctor degree. After she passed the Japanese Bar Exam, she was appointed Public Prosecutor in December 2017 and has been working at the Sapporo District Public Prosecutors Office since 2023. She has been working in both the criminal and trial division of a number of District Public Prosecutors Offices for six years, gaining experience as a public prosecutor.

As a practicing lawyer, she has handled a number of difficult and complex criminal cases and has successfully prosecuted and argued a number of them. She was recommended by the Public Prosecutors Office in Japan and is currently beginning studies and research at the University of Michigan Law School as a research scholar.

Research Focus:  Kana’s research focuses on recent developments in the legislation and practice of the criminal justice system in the U.S. In general, the U.S. is much quicker than other countries in reflecting changes in socioeconomic conditions in its legal systems and practice. There are many lessons that Japan should learn in order to timely catch socioeconomic changes and expeditiously take legislative and other actions in line with such changes. A general study of such recent legislation and its practice will be indispensable for the future development of the criminal justice system in Japan.

Languages:  Japanese (native)

Isola Clara Macchia (Italy)

Bio:  Isola Clara Macchia is a Ph.D. Researcher at the European University Institute in Florence, Italy. Her Ph.D. project investigates how the European Union enforces sustainable development clauses in its Free Trade Agreements, and whether variations in enforcement can be detected. She holds a Law degree from the University of Bologna and an MS c in European and International Public Policy from the London School of Economics. Isola Clara is a member of the Jean Monnet Module “Reforming the Global Economic Governance: The EU for SDG s in International Economic Law” research team at the University of Bologna, funded by the European Union. Before her Ph.D., she worked at the European Commission in the Directorate-General for Employment as a trainee on Directives’ implementation and infringement proceedings. She also served as a researcher at the Attorney General’s Office in Bologna working on regional cooperation in law enforcement and as a research assistant in international law at the University of Bologna. 

Research Focus:  At Michigan Law School, Isola Clara’s research will focus on the comparison between the EU ’s and U.S.’ approaches to enforcing international law, specifically in the area of trade and sustainable development. The choice to compare these two legal systems stems from the recurrent juxtaposition of the EU ’s cooperation-based model with the U.S.’ sanction-based one. The doctoral project investigates the mutual supportiveness of these two different approaches and whether their combination can help in ensuring a more consistent enforcement.

Languages:  Italian (native), Spanish (intermediate), French (elementary)

Csongor István Nagy (Hungary)

Bio:  Csongor István Nagy is professor of law at the University of Szeged and research professor at the Center for Social Sciences of the Hungarian Research Network. He is a recurrent visiting professor at the Central European University (Budapest/New York/Vienna) and the Sapientia University of Transylvania (Romania), and an associate member at the Center for Private International Law at the University of Aberdeen, Scotland. 

Csongor graduated at the Eötvös Loránd University of Sciences (dr. jur.), where he also earned a Ph.D. He received master ( LL .M.) and S.J.D. degrees from the Central European University and a D.Sc. degree from the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. He pursued graduate studies in Rotterdam, Heidelberg and Ithaca (New York) and had visiting appointments in the Hague, Munich, Brno, Hamburg, Edinburgh, London, Riga, Bloomington (Indiana), Brisbane, Beijing, Taipei and Rome. 

He has more than 260 publications in English, French, German, Hungarian, Romanian and (in translation) in Croatian and Spanish. 

Research Focus:  The purpose of Csongor Nagy’s research in Ann Arbor is to put the current European rule-of-law debate in the context of comparative federalism and to provide a normative analysis through the lens of US constitutional ideas. Benchmarking Europe’s idiosyncratic “federalism” should be an important facet of the social discourse on the “European project”, and comparative federalism could contribute significantly to the resolution of the EU ’s current constitutional crisis. The path the EU is walking in the direction of an “ever closer Union” is far from unprecedented and, as far as multilevel constitutionalism is concerned, EU law may draw on the experiences of various regimes where centralized human rights protection and state constitutional identities coexist.

Languages : German (fluent), Hungarian (native), Romanian (fluent), French (working knowledge), Spanish (basic)

Orlando Scarcello (Italy)

Bio : Since November 2021, Orlando has been a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute for European Law, KU Leuven. He obtained his master’s degree in law from the University of Pisa and his LL .M. in European, Comparative and International Law from the European University Institute. He holds an Honors Degree and a PhD in Law from Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies in Pisa. He was a visiting graduate student at the University of Toronto. After his PhD, Orlando was an Emile Noël Global fellow at NYU School of Law and a postdoctoral researcher at LUISS Guido Carli in Rome. He is admitted to the Italian Bar and is author of  Radical Constitutional Pluralism in Europe  (Routledge, 2023).

Research   Focus:  At Michigan, Orlando will be working on the incorporation of federal rights and on the subsequent emergence of New Judicial Federalism in the United States. This study of the American system is part of a broader research project on the incorporation of rights and on the reaction at the level of the constituent units in federal and quasi-federal systems. Part of the broader ERC RESHUFFLE at the KU Leuven, the project aims at comparing the twofold dynamic of incorporation and subsequent contestation in the United States, Canada, and the European Union.

Languages : Italian (native), French (advanced).

Johannes Thierer (Germany)

Bio:  Johannes Thierer is a PhD student at the Chair of Constitutional Law (Professor Johannes Masing) at the University of Freiburg (Germany) where he also worked as a research assistant from 2020 till 2023. He studied law at the University of Freiburg and the School of Business, Economics and Law, University of Gothenburg (Sweden) and graduated in 2020. In his position as research assistant, he taught first and second semester students in constitutional law and European law. 

He currently works on his thesis about the European and American single market. His doctoral research is funded the German National Academic Foundation.

Johannes’ interests include European law, constitutional law and comparative law.

Research Focus:  Johannes’ PhD-project explores constitutional constraints against economic regulation of single member states in federal systems. It compares the fundamental freedoms of the European Union with the dormant Commerce Clause of the American Constitution. Whereas the doctrines and tests of the European Court of Justice and the US Supreme Court seem strikingly similar at first glance, Johannes’ aim is to examine the different notions and concepts behind the norms. Building on this, the project intends to rethink the EU ’s fundamental freedoms.

Languages:  German (native), Swedish (intermediate), French (elementary)

Justin Vanderschuren

Bio:  Holding a Master’s Degree in Law  magna cum laude , Justin started his career as a researcher at KUL euven (Belgium). After completing this first professional experience, he wanted to gain practical experience and help disadvantaged groups. Therefore, Justin worked as a legal counsel in an association helping young people. After this first practical experience, he undertook the bar traineeship. Justin was fully admitted to the bar after successfully passing the bar exam in 2016. While doing his bar traineeship, he also started working at UCL ouvain (Belgium) in 2012. Justin has been lecturing various courses as a teaching assistant and, since 2020, as a lecturer. In 2021, he defended his Ph.D. thesis dealing with distressed sovereign debts. Justin will conduct postdoctoral research at the University of Michigan Law School as a B.A.E.F.  Fellow.

Research Focus:  In his Ph.D. thesis, Justin analyzed the regulation of the so-called “vulture funds” and proposed a new judicial approach in order to better address their speculation on sovereign debts. He wishes to expand the scope of his research findings and undertake a deeper comparative analysis during a one-year postdoctoral research stay at the University of Michigan Law School. The goal of this research project is to outline a legislative proposal concerned with profiteering in sovereign debts. Such a proposal appears to be of paramount importance given the boom in borrowing following the pandemic crisis.

Languages : French (native) and Dutch (proficient)

Headshot of Eva-Maria Wettstein (Germany)

Bio : Eva-Maria Wettstein is a PhD student at the University of Cologne in Germany. She completed her state exam in law in 2022, which included a specialization on private international law, civil litigation, and economic law. Wettstein currently works as a trainee lawyer at Osborne Clarke’s Dispute and Risk Team in Cologne, where she is involved in an investor state arbitration proceeding. Additionally, she is a research fellow with the International Investment Law Centre Cologne ( IILCC , University of Cologne). In this capacity, Wettstein contributes to research and teaching in international investment law, arbitration law and public international law. As speaker of the German doctoral researchers’ network for international investment law, Wettstein regularly organizes events and encourages interaction between practitioners and academics.

Research Focus : Wettstein’s research focuses on the enforcement of investor-state arbitration awards between European investors and European Union member states (“intra- EU arbitration awards”) in the USA . The heart of the research question – whether intra- EU arbitration awards are enforceable in the USA – lies in the relationship of public international law, EU law and US law. Against this background, the research project aims to explore the interaction between courts of both sovereign EU member states and the USA as well as the interaction between their laws from an international legal perspective.

Languages : German (native), French (intermediate), Portuguese (elementary)

Xiaodan Zhu

Bio:  Ms.Xiaodan ZHU is a Chinese professor specialized in International Tax Law. In this capacity, Xiaodan works at the Law School, Dalian Ocean University, where she also is the director of both Bachelor and Master Degree programs in Law. Prof. Zhu obtained a Ph.D. in International Tax Law from Xiamen University of China in 2013. She has been a Grotius Research Scholar of the University of Michigan Law School during 2015 and 2016. Her teaching activities include courses on international economic law, China’s tax law, and international tax law. Her wiritings (including journal articles and monographs) have appeared in many Chinese and English academic publications. Moreover, Professor Zhu is also a brilliant practical expert in tax law. She has been seconded to the Department of Tax Policy, Ministry of Finance of China in 2020, and she has been a part-time tax lawyer for almost six years in China.

Research Focus:  Professor Zhu’s research is titled “ Interaction Between the OECD ’s Global Minimum Tax Proposal and Tax Competition Rules: From the Perspective of China”, and the project addresses the following key issues: (1) What is the impact of OECD ’s Global Minimum Tax 

Proposal (Pillar 2) on China’s tax competition rules and domestic tax law? (2)Is there any legal experience in US tax law relating to minimum income tax which is valuable for China? (3) How would China figure out the tax reforms conflict between international “Global Minimum Tax ” and domestic “Tax and Fee Reduction Policy”? 

Languages:  Mandarin Chinese (native)

Niklas Burkart

Bio: Niklas Burkart is a research assistant at the Institute for Public Law, Department of Constitutional Law at University of Freiburg. He currently works on his thesis about the conflict between Freedom of Art und Copyright. Burkart studied Law at Freiburg and Speyer. He was a research assistant at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Crime, Security and Law. During his legal clerkship he worked at a law firm specialized in administrative law and at the German Federal Foreign Office, Department of Human Rights, in Berlin. Burkart coordinates the DFG (German Research Council) project “Handbook of Constitutional Law – German Constitutional Law from a Transnational Perspective”. In his position as research assistant, he teaches first and second semester students in constitutional law. 

Research Focus:  Burkart’s PhD-project explores the relationship between Freedom of Art and Copyright from a fundamental law perspective. The thesis is driven by the idea of strengthening Art without threatening Copyright. This requires to reveal the parts of Copyright that are not based on Freedom of Property but on Personality Rights. Given the fact that German Copyright Law is regulated by European Law, the thesis has to address not only German but also European Fundamental Rights. To contrast the results, the conflict between Freedom of Art and Copyright shall also be examined under US  Law. 

Languages:  German (native), French (elementary)

Andrew Cecchinato

Bio:  Andrew Cecchinato is a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Global Fellow at the University of Michigan Law School and the School of History at the University of St Andrews. He is PI of the Horizon 2020 project on  John Selden’s Harmonic Jurisprudence. A European Interpretation of English Legal History . Previously, he was a postdoc in St Andrews, working on the ERC project  Civil Law, Common Law, Customary Law: Consonance Divergence and Transformation in Western Europe from the late eleventh to the thirteenth centuries . 

Andrew is book review editor for the American Journal of Legal History. He has received scholarships from the Max-Planck-Institute für europäische Rechtsgeschichte and the Robert H. Smith International Center for Jefferson Studies. He has also been a visiting researcher at the Robbins Collection in Civil and Religious Law, the Georgetown University Law Center, and the Library of Congress. He studied law at the University of Trento, where his PhD on  The Legal Education of Thomas Jefferson  won the faculty prize. 

Research Focus:  Andrew’s main research aims to repurpose the idea of Europe by studying how the seventeenth-century jurist, historian, and Hebraist John Selden harmonized the history of English law and the authority of the European legal tradition. His project will center on Selden’s effort to preserve and harmonize the history of English law within the inclusive order of nations recognized by a distinct reading of medieval and modern European jurisprudence. The research will thus focus on the cogent yet overlooked reasoning by which Selden proved that no law, however discrete, can rightfully be understood if isolated from the continuum of legal experience. 

Languages:  English and Italian (native), French and German (elementary)

Fabian Eichberger (Germany)

Bio:  Fabian is a PhD Candidate in public international law at Gonville & Caius College, University of Cambridge. His doctoral research is funded by a W.M. Tapp Studentship and the German National Academic Foundation. Previously, Fabian was a Research Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law, Heidelberg, and read law in Hamburg (Dipl. Jur.) and Oxford (M.Jur.).

At the University of Cambridge, Fabian has supervised undergraduates and conducted workshops for Cambridge LL .M. students in International Investment Law and International Law as a Legal System. He is currently an Associate Editor at International Law in Domestic Courts ( OUP ) and an Assistant Editor for Investment Arbitration at Kluwer Arbitration Blog.

In recent years, Fabian has worked as a research assistant for Professor Campbell McLachlan, Professor Eyal Benvenisti and Sir Christopher Greenwood. In 2022, his article on informal communications to the ICJ was awarded the Rosalyn Higgins Prize of The Law & Practice of International Courts and Tribunals.  

Research Focus:  Fabian’s research interests lie in the areas of general international law, international dispute settlement, international investment law and German public law. His PhD project (“Self-Judgment in International Law”) investigates to what extent states can authoritatively auto-interpret international law. It traces the evolution of self-judgment throughout the history of international law, unearths links between self-judgment and the concept of obligation in international law, and assesses the approach of international courts and tribunals. Against this background, the project develops a theoretical and doctrinal framework to accommodate self-judgment in international law. 

Languages: German (native), French (proficient, C1 ), Spanish (advanced, B1 / B2 ), Hindi (Basic), Italian (Basic)

Hijratullah Ekhtyar

Bio : Hijratullah Ekhtyar is an International & Comparative Law Research Scholar of the University of Michigan Law School. He served as a lecturer at the Nangarhar University Faculty of Law and Political Science since 2012 to 2021, and also was provincial director for the Independent Administrative Reform and Civil Services Commission of Afghanistan in Nangarhar province since 2018 to 2021. Ekhtyar also worked as a local coordinator and journalist for the Institute for War and Peace Reporting ( IWPR ) in eastern provinces (Laghman, Nangarhar, Kunar, and Noristan) from 2011 to 2014. He served as a Lawyer and Provincial Commissioner for the Independent Electoral Compliant Commission ( IECC ) of Afghanistan in Nangarhar province from 2009 to 2011. Moreover, he served as an administrative clerk for the Economic Committee of the House of Representatives of the National Assembly of Afghanistan from 2008 to 2009. He also worked for Mediothek Afghanistan, a German based NGO as an in-charge of Academic and Cultural Affairs from 2007 to 2008.

He obtained LL .M degree in Sustainable International Development ( SID ) program from the University of Washington Law School in 2017, and completed his undergraduate studies in the Nangarhar University Faculty of Law and Political Science in 2008.

Ekhtyar participated in the University of Washington School of Law visiting scholar program in 2015, and attended the International Visitor Leadership Program ( IVLP ) of the State Department of the United States in 2013.

Ekhtyar also run Ekhtyar Legal Services ( ELS ), a non-profit legal assistance provider organization in Nangarhar province from 2009 to 2015. He was a certified defense lawyer under the Afghanistan Independent Bar Association during 2009-2015.

After completion of his graduate studies in the University of Washington Law School, he served as a Legal Research Intern in the Library of Congress in 2017.

During his tenure with IWPR , Ekhtyar wrote about 30 articles for  www.iwpr.net . He also published an article about combating corruption in Afghanistan in  https://nsuworks.nova.edu/ilsajournal/vol24/iss1/4/  and  https://www.ijlsr.in/ijlsr_special_issue_june_2018 . Furthermore, he wrote/ translated more than 20 books and numerous articles that are published in national language, Pashto.

Ekhtyar received a Medal of Excellence from Zhwand Group of Companies and Green Motion for his writings in 2014. 

Research Focus : Ekhtyar’s research focus is on International Law of Armed Conflicts, Good Governance, Corruption, and Constitutional Law. He recently completed his research project on the Hiring Process of lecturers in Afghanistan universities. He is currently working on another research project focusing on Constitutionalism in Afghanistan. The main theme of his research is how to adopt a comprehensive constitution for Afghanistan to end up the long-lasting crises and war in that country.

Languages : Pashto and Dari (native), English (excellent), and Urdu (elementary).

Giulia Giusy Cusenza (Italy)

Bio: Giulia Giusy Cusenza is a postdoctoral researcher at the Faculty of Law at the University of Udine in Italy, where she is also an adjunct professor of administrative law at the Engineering Faculty. She earned her Ph.D. in administrative law from the University of Trento in 2020, and in 2018 she obtained an Intensive International Master of Laws ( I.I.LL.M. ) held by the European Public Law Organization in Athens. In recent years she has been lecturing various courses as a teaching assistant and as a lecturer. Moreover, she became a lawyer in 2018, and she was awarded the title of lawyer specialized in administrative law in June 2022 by the Italian National Bar Council.

Research Focus: Giulia’s research investigates the implications of the digitalization process and the application of artificial intelligence on public administrations and judicial activities. She is conducting comparative research on assessment procedures for developing algorithmic systems within the public administration. Her current project aims at studying the benefits of prioritizing stakeholders’ welfare in algorithm design for public administrations by implementing democratic and participatory processes. Her research interests revolve around administrative law and comparative administrative law.

Languages: Italian (native)

Maria Haag

Bio:  Maria Haag is a lecturer of European law at Tilburg University Law School (Netherlands). She holds an LL .B. from Durham University (United Kingdom), and an LL .M. from the European University Institute (Italy). She defended her PhD thesis “A Sense of Responsibility: The Shifting Roles of the Member States for the Union Citizen” at the European University Institute in October 2019. She has previously worked as a trainee at the Legal Service of the European Commission and a research assistant at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advance Studies (Italy). From August to December 2016, Maria visited Michigan Law School for the first time as a Grotius Research Scholar. She is an editor for the European Law Blog and an external editor for the European Journal of Legal Studies. Her teaching activities include undergraduate and postgraduate courses on EU constitutional law, internal market and free movement law, judicial protection, and migration law.

Research Focus:  Maria previously developed the concept of responsibility as a prism to re-evaluate the case law of the Court of Justice of the European Union, and to differentiate between the roles that the home and the host Member States play for EU citizens. Building on this, she now wishes to examine further aspects of the concept of responsibility: the responsibilities of citizens in EU law, on the one hand, and the responsibility of the Union as whole for its citizens, on the other.

Languages : German (native), French, Dutch

Lucas Hartmann

Bio:  Lucas Hartmann is a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Legal Theory at the University of Freiburg, Germany. Prior to that, he conducted research at the Institute for German and European Administrative Law at the University of Heidelberg. Lucas’ research interests focus on legal theory, on comparative law studies, and on European Union Law.

Lucas defended his PhD entitled “The Codification of EU Administrative Law” (“Die Kodifikation des Europäischen Verwaltungsrechts”) at the University of Heidelberg in 2019. He was also a visiting researcher at Université Paris 1, Panthéon-Sorbonne (France) in 2021 and was awarded a three-year full-time Senior Researcher Fellowship (“Eigene Stelle”) from the German Research Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft – DFG ) in 2020. 

Research Focus:  At Michigan, Lucas will focus on his comparative research project on judicial lawmaking. The aim of this research project is to compare German concepts of dynamic interpretation with similar understandings concerning the role of judicial lawmaking in the USA , France, and the EU that allow or forbid courts to develop the constitution, statutes, or “the law” in general. In particular, he intends to learn about the American practice and literature on constitutional and statutory construction, common law reasoning, and judicial activism/restraint.

Languages:  German, English and French

Moshe Jaffe

Bio:  Moshe Jaffe is a JSD candidate at Bar Ilan University, and an LLM Graduate from Columbia Law School. Jaffe is a constitutional law Adjunct Professor at the Academic Center of Law and Science in Israel, and an Adjunct Professor at Cardozo School of Law. As an Israeli lawyer, Jaffe represented dozens of cases before the Israeli Supreme Court with emphasis on Religion and State, Human Rights, and National Security. Simultaneously, Jaffe serves as a legal advisor for the Counter-Terrorism section in the IDF ’s Department of the Legal Advisor to Judea and Samaria. Jaffe also serves as an administrative judge on the Confiscation of Funds Committee of the Money Laundering Headquarters tribunal.

Research Focus:  Jaffe’s research comparatively addresses the constitutionality and the use of proportionality tests in judicial review of tax legislation. The research focuses on three different judicial systems — Israel, the U.S, and Jewish Law. Alongside the main issue, the research addresses the questions of tax definitions and equality in tax law. The research’s main argument is that the Israeli proportionality doctrine is the most effective and correct instrument for applying judicial review to tax legislation. This stands in contrast to the use of the scrutiny doctrine, which struggles to adapt itself to the flexibility and balances that tax laws require.

Languages : Hebrew – native, Spanish – proficient, France – elementary.

Bio:  Shajan Kreuter is a PhD student at the University of Freiburg in Germany. He studied law at the University of Frankfurt and spent his clerkship at the Higher Regional Court in Frankfurt. 

Shajan Kreuter is admitted to the bar and works at Sullivan Cromwell LLP in Frankfurt.

Research Focus:  In his PhD thesis Kreuter portrays the regulation of crypto assets in Germany, the EU and the US . The thesis examines the current regulation of crypto assets in Germany and the EU and analyses the digital finance package of the European Commission which contains three draft legislations constituting the first comprehensive regulation of crypto assets in the EU . Furthermore, the thesis describes the current regulatory landscape and developments in the US and compares the EU draft legislation with the US regulatory regime.

Languages:  German (native), French (proficient)

Linda Meister

Bio:  Linda Meister is a PhD student at the Department for Private International Law, International Civil Litigation and Comparative Law at the Eberhard Karls University of Tuebingen in Germany. After her state exam in 2020 which included a specialization on Private International Law, International Civil Litigation and Comparative Law, she started working as a Research, Teaching and Grading Assistant at the University of Tuebingen. In this capacity she has taught courses in Public Law, Private Law and Private International Law. During her undergraduate and doctoral studies, she also participated successfully in the certificate programs “Law, Ethics, Economics” and “Human Rights Law in Practice”.

Her interests include Principles of Private International Law, International Civil Litigation, Comparative Law and Human Rights Law.

Research Focus:  Linda’s research focuses on the principle of neutrality in Private International Law. This area of law determines which country’s law is applicable in a case with connections to multiple countries. The classical European approach aims to treat all legal systems equally and abstracts the question of applicable law from the content of the different laws. This abstraction is called the principle of neutrality. However, this principle is being challenged. Developments in Europe and especially teachings in the US focus on a just outcome rather than a neutral decision. Linda tries to substantiate the principle of neutrality and assess deviating developments.

Languages:  German (native), French (intermediate), Spanish (intermediate), Turkish (elementary)

Zhiruo Ni

Bio:  Zhiruo Ni is a PhD candidate in the College of Comparative Law, China University of Political Science and Law, in Beijing. Prior to her PhD studies, she received a Master of Laws at King’s College London and a Bachelor of Laws at the University of International Business and Economics in China. In 2017 she was a Visiting Student at Bar-Ilan University, Tel Aviv (Israel). From 2016 to 2018, she held legal internships in the China International Economic and Trade Arbitration Commission ( CIETAC ) and JunHe LLP , China. Her research interests mainly include Antitrust Law and Comparative Law.

Research Focus:  Ni’s research focuses on antitrust regulation toward vertical integration. She has found that antitrust law is getting primary attention in China, but there is still a lack of Law & Economics studies and relevant cases, due to a long-term regulatory and judicial oversight before the information age. As vertical integration has been a dominant characteristic of some major 

industries in the U.S., she hopes to build a comparative antitrust study on the issue between both jurisdictions, where the digital platforms could be the most suitable legal subjects for antitrust analysis at present.

Languages:  Chinese (native)

Saba Pipia

Bio:  Saba Pipia holds a Ph.D. degree in Law from Tbilisi State University (Tbilisi, Georgia). He taught international law at several universities in Tbilisi, Georgia. Throughout his doctoral and post-doctoral studies, he was a visiting researcher at Michigan State University ( USA ), The Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law (Germany); The University of Groningen (The Netherlands); Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (Greece); Max Planck Institute for Comparative and Private International Law (Germany), Peace Palace Library (The Netherlands) and Jerusalem Institute of Justice (Israel). He was an invited lecturer at the University of Porto (Portugal) and the University of Iasi (Romania). He is a recipient of multiple research scholarships including from the Georgian National Scientific Foundation, German Academic Exchange Service ( DAAD ), European Commission (Erasmus program), and the US State Department (Fulbright Visiting Scholars program). Areas of his research include international humanitarian law, international criminal law, global animal law, and international environmental law. He has published academic publications in Georgia and abroad.

Research Focus:  Saba’s research project is about missing persons. He intends to study the issue of missing persons from all possible international legal angles and provide an analysis, which will be useful for various target groups, including academics, students, governments, and armed forces. Saba thinks that there is a need to develop the concept of ‘international law of missing persons’ and examine this multi-dimensional issue through the lens of various international law instruments to determine the body of law, that regulates the issue of missing persons, and which can be 

applied whenever there is a need to deal with missing persons. The most important goal of this research visit is to promote legal scholarship in the emerging field of international law – missing persons law – and eventually to produce an academic publication on this topic.

Languages : Georgian (native), Russian (limited working proficiency), Hebrew (elementary proficiency)

Elena Pribytkova

Bio:  Dr. Elena Pribytkova is a Lecturer in Law at Southampton Law School. She received a Doctor of the Science of Law ( J.S.D. ) degree from Columbia Law School and is a Habilitation candidate at the Faculty of Law of the University of Basel. She held various research and teaching appointments at leading universities and research institutes all over the world, including Columbia Law School, New York University School of Law, University of Oxford, European University Institute, Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law, Heidelberg University, Swiss Institute of Comparative Law, University of Basel, Radboud University Nijmegen, and National University of Singapore. She has more than fifty publications, including publications in top U.S. law reviews and internationally recognized peer-reviewed law journals, such as the  Chicago Journal of International Law ,  University of Pennsylvania Journal of International Law ,  Archiv für Rechts- und Sozialphilosophie ,  RphZ – Rechtsphilosophie – Zeitschrift für Grundlagen des Rechts , and  N.Y.U. Journal of International Law & Politics .

Research Focus:  Elena has worked extensively on individual and collective multidisciplinary research projects on theories of justice, human dignity, law and morality, governance, and human rights, in particular, socio-economic rights and their role in reducing poverty and inequality as well as in promoting social, global, and environmental justice, and sustainable development. Her current project  Towards a World of Accountability: Extraterritorial Obligations in the Area of Socio-Economic Rights from Philosophical, Legal and Practical Perspectives  pays special attention to human rights obligations of non-state actors. Her Habilitation monograph  A Decent Social Minimum in the Language of Human Rights  focuses on mechanisms for ensuring the social minimum guarantees in international, regional, and national orders.

Languages:  Russian (native speaker); English & German (fluent); French (intermediate); Slavic languages & Swiss German (basic knowledge)

Sabrina Ragone

Bio:  Sabrina Ragone (PhD) teaches comparative law at the University of Bologna’s Department of Political and Social Sciences, where she holds the post of Head of International Relations. She is also a member of the scientific committee of the Buenos Aires Campus and the excellence college of the University. She is Senior Research Affiliate of the Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law (Heidelberg), where she pursued her research between 2015 and 2017. Previously, she was a García Pelayo Fellow at the Centro de Estudios Políticos y Constitucionales – Madrid (2012-2015) and researcher at the Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona (2011-2012). She has taught comparative law in Italy, Germany, France, Spain, Colombia, Chile, Mexico, and Argentina. 

She has collaborated with several competitive national research projects funded by the Italian and Spanish ministries of education as well as by research institutes in Latin America. Between 2018 and 2021 she was the PI of the Jean Monnet Module CRISES “Critical Risks for Integration and Solidarity in the European Space”, Erasmus+ Program. See:  https://www.unibo.it/sitoweb/sabrina.ragone2/cv-en  

Research Focus:  Sabrina Ragone’s research comparatively addresses constitutional adjudication, territorial organization, and the interaction between international and domestic laws. She deals with Latin American constitutionalism from a comparative perspective, taking into account its transnational dimension. Her book on constitutional adjudication on constitutional amendments was the first comprehensive assessment of the issue (“I controlli giurisdizionali sulle revisioni costituzionali” 2011 in Italian, 2012 in Spanish). She then focused on the core constitutional issues of European integration, publishing several pieces on the issue, among them, the edited book “Managing the Euro Crisis. National EU policy coordination in the debtor countries”, Routledge 2018, and the volume “Parlamentarismos y crisis económica: afectación de los encajes constitucionales en Italia y España”, Bosch, 2020.

Languages : Italian (native); Spanish (proficient); German (good); French (intermediate); Portuguese (working knowledge); Catalan (working knowledge) 

Lea Schneider

Bio : Lea Schneider is a PhD student at the Institute for International Law and Comparative Constitutional Law at the University of Zurich in Switzerland. From 2020 to 2022, she served as Research and Teaching Assistant at the University of Zurich, where she taught courses and co-organized the 22nd Conference of Young Research Scholars in Public Law ( Junge Tagung Öffentliches Recht ) and co-edited the annual anthology for young legal researchers of the University of Zurich ( APARIUZ ). Prior to pursuing her PhD studies, she received an LL .M. in Transnational Law from King’s College London and a Master of Laws from the University of Zurich. Her interests include public international law, public law, international economic law, transnational law and human rights law.

Research Focus : Lea Schneider’s research centers on the regulatory landscape of transnational corporations ( TNC s) regarding human rights and environmental standards. In her PhD thesis she analyses what insights are gained from a transnational perspective on the regulatory landscape of TNC s. Schneider conceptualizes transnational law, along the lines of Peer Zumbansen, as a methodology. In her thesis, she claims, for example, that a transnational perspective allows us to gain an enhanced understanding of the role and functioning of international soft law-initiatives in this regulatory area.

Languages : German (native), French (proficient), Italian (elementary)

Francesco Tumbiolo

Bio:  Francesco Tumbiolo is a Ph.D. student in Legal Sciences at the University of Milan-Bicocca. He was awarded a doctoral scholarship for his research project about cryptocurrencies’ taxation. Francesco is also a teaching assistant at the University of Insubria (Como), where he graduated in law. He was admitted, ranking among the top five students, to the School of Specialization in Legal Professions of the University of Milan. After getting the specialization diploma, he passed the bar exam, and he is currently an attorney-at-law in Italy at a renowned tax law firm with branches in Rome and Milan.

Research Focus:  Francesco’s research focuses on cryptocurrencies’ taxation, especially from the Italian tax law point of view. However, he is now interested in giving his doctoral thesis a comparative perspective: his aim is to find what are the solutions adopted by different OECD members, like the US , to fix the same problems every country faces in taxing cryptocurrencies. Since they are in rapid development, he agrees that policymakers have to progress in considering cryptocurrencies’ tax implications in order to find a shared best practice.

Languages : Italian (native)

Wu Weiding

Bio : Wu Weiding is currently a Ph.D. candidate at the School of Law of Renmin University of China ( RUC ). His areas of interest include corporate and securities law and arbitration law. He received his Bachelor of Laws degree and Juris Master degree respectively from China University of Political Science and Law ( CUPL ) and Peking University ( PKU ). Wu has participated in several research programs, such as “Research on Major Problems of Bankruptcy of Listed Companies” and “Improvement of Governance Mechanism of Listed Companies”. He has worked as an intern in Beijing JunZeJun (Changsha) Law Firm, Beijing Tiantong Law Firm and the People’s Court of Changping District. Currently, he is an editor of  Renming University Law Review . Wu has also already published a number of academic papers in core journals of China.

Research Focus : Wu has been focusing on social enterprises in the form of companies in China. Social enterprises are the types of enterprises pursuing both profits and public welfare. In China, there are a large number of social enterprises taking the form of companies. The core problem is that in China, the company is an organizational form purely pursuing profit-making goals, and Company Law of the People’s Republic of China does not provide any strong institutional guarantee for social enterprises to achieve social goals. Questions to be addressed in Wu’s research are as follows: Why do an increasing number of social enterprises exist in the form of companies in China? How can these social enterprises achieve their social goals without “mission drift”?

Languages:  Chinese (native) and German (elementary)

Bio:  Ms.Xiaodan Zhu is a Chinese professor specialized in International Tax Law. In this capacity, Xiaodan works at the Law School, Dalian Ocean University, where she also is the director of both Bachelor and Master Degree programs in Law. Prof. Zhu obtained a Ph.D. in International Tax Law from Xiamen University of China in 2013. She has been a Grotius Research Scholar of the University of Michigan Law School during 2015 and 2016. Her teaching activities include courses on international economic law, China’s tax law, and international tax law. Her writings (including journal articles and monographs) have appeared in many Chinese and English academic publications. Moreover, Professor Zhu is also a brilliant practical expert in tax law. She has been seconded to the Department of Tax Policy, Ministry of Finance of China in 2020, and she has been a part-time tax lawyer for almost six years in China.

Zhiyu Li

Bio:  Zhiyu Li is an Assistant Professor in Law and Policy at Durham Law School and a Fellow at the Durham Research Methods Centre. She holds undergraduate degrees in law and economics from the East China University of Political Science and Law and a J.S.D. from the University of California, Berkeley.

Zhiyu’s research investigates issues that lie at the intersection of law and policy, with a particular emphasis on the role of courts in democratic and authoritarian regimes. The findings of her research have been published in or accepted by U.S. and international journals, including the  Harvard International Law Journal , the  Columbia Journal of Asian Law , and the  Cornell International Law Journal , and presented at various fora, such as the Stanford International Junior Faculty Forum and the Annual Meeting of the American Society of Comparative Law.

Research Focus:  Zhiyu’s current research asks whether the rejection of the separation of powers principle in socialist jurisdictions makes it easier for courts to take on extrajudicial functions and exercise influence in ways that are salutary but forbidden to their liberal democratic cousins.

At Michigan, she will work on a joint project that aims to study cognitive biases of legal professionals and lay persons through survey experiments fielded on judges and university students. The project findings are expected to have normative implications for institutional choices in the civil and criminal justice system. She will also further her work on specialized judicial empowerment.

Languages:  Mandarin Chinese (native)

Sarah Zimmermann

Bio:  Sarah Zimmermann is a PhD student at the Max-Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory in Frankfurt am Main (Germany) where she also works at the European and Comparative Legal History department.

Zimmermann studied Law and European Studies in Mainz (Germany), Maastricht (Netherlands) and Dijon (France). Prior to pursuing her PhD, she obtained the German State Exams and a Masters (Maîtrise en Droit) from the University of Dijon with a focus on European economic law. She also holds a joint LL .M in international private law and European Law from the universities of Mainz and Dijon. She has received various scholarships during her studies and for her PhD research. During her legal clerkship she worked at the Frankfurt office of WilmerHale obtaining professional experience in the field of regulatory affairs and European Law.

Her interests include European law, procedural law, comparative law and administrative law.

Research Focus:  Zimmermann’s PhD research focuses on the procedural law of the Courts of the European Union. It looks at the emergence of these rules in the 1950s from a historical and comparative legal perspective. She is evaluating to which extent the ECJ procedural rules during that time were comparable to the national procedural rules of the member states and to those of international courts. She is using sources from the archives of the European institutions and the relevant ministries of the founding states and seeks to give insight into one of the first decision making processes of the Community.

Languages : German (native), French (proficient), Dutch (elementary)

Alain Zysset

Bio:  Alain is a Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) at the School of Law, University of Glasgow ( UK ). Alain holds graduate degrees in Philosophy ( MS c, London School of Economics), History ( MA , Graduate Institute) and Law ( LL .M., Toronto). He was awarded his doctoral degree at the University of Fribourg (Switzerland) funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation. His doctoral dissertation was published as a monograph with Routledge ( The ECHR and Human Rights Theory ). Alain subsequently obtained three post-doctoral fellowships funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation, the European University Institute in Florence (Max Weber Fellowship) and the University of Oslo (PluriCourts Centre of Excellence).

Research Focus:  Alain’s research aims to reconstruct and evaluate the practices of constitutional law, human rights law and international law from the perspective of normative theory. In particular, Alain has examined the practice of the European Court of Human Rights, UN treaty bodies and the International Criminal Court. His research has appeared in leading peer-reviewed journals such as  International Journal of Constitutional Law  (2019, 2022),  Global Constitutionalism  (2016, 2021, 2022),  Ratio Juris  (2019),  Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy  (2019, 2021),  Canadian Journal of Law and Jurisprudence  (2016) and  Criminal Law and Philosophy  (2018), among others. Alain is also currently Senior Research Fellow at the University of Oslo (PluriCourts Center for Excellence) for a two-year project (2021-23) studying the nexus between theories of populism and the practice of the European Court of Human Rights. His monograph on the topic is under contract with Cambridge University Press.

Languages : English, French, German, Spanish

Andrew John Cecchinato (USA)

Andrew Cecchinato is a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Global Fellow at the University of Michigan Law School and the School of History at the University of St Andrews. He is PI of the Horizon 2020 project on John Selden’s Harmonic Jurisprudence. A European Interpretation of English Legal History . Previously, he was a postdoc in St Andrews, working on the ERC project Civil Law, Common Law, Customary Law: Consonance Divergence and Transformation in Western Europe from the late eleventh to the thirteenth centuries . 

Andrew is a book review editor for the American Journal of Legal History. He has received scholarships from the Max-Planck-Institute für europäische Rechtsgeschichte and the Robert H. Smith International Center for Jefferson Studies. He has also been a visiting researcher at the Robbins Collection in Civil and Religious Law, the Georgetown University Law Center, and the Library of Congress. He studied law at the University of Trento, where his Ph.D. on The Legal Education of Thomas Jefferson won the faculty prize. 

Research Focus

Andrew’s main research aims to repurpose the idea of Europe by studying how the seventeenth-century jurist, historian, and Hebraist John Selden harmonized the history of English law and the authority of the European legal tradition. His project will center on Selden’s effort to preserve and harmonize the history of English law within the inclusive order of nations recognized by a distinct reading of medieval and modern European jurisprudence. The research will thus focus on the cogent yet overlooked reasoning by which Selden proved that no law, however discrete, can rightfully be understood if isolated from the continuum of legal experience. 

English and Italian (native), French and German (elementary)

Apostolos Chronopoulos (Greece)

Apostolos Chronopoulos is Senior Lecturer in Intellectual Property Law at the Centre for Commercial Law Studies, Queen Mary University of London.

Apostolos has studied law at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. He continued his studies at Queen Mary University of London ( LLM Lond.) and the Ludwig-Maximilian University of Munich ( LLM Eur. and Dr. Jur.). During his Ph.D. studies, he was supported by a scholarship from the Max Planck Institute for Intellectual Property, Competition, and Tax Law (now MPI for Innovation and Competition). At the postdoctoral level, he has received scholarships that allowed him to conduct research as a visiting scholar at Stanford Law School and as an invited overseas researcher at the Institute of Intellectual Property in Tokyo, Japan.

His research interests span the broader field of intellectual property and competition law. Currently, his focus is on US and EU trademark law, unfair competition law, patent law, economic analysis of intellectual property law, comparative intellectual property law, the relationship of intellectual property law and general private law, the interface between Intellectual property and antitrust law.

His latest publications include: Exceptions to Trade Mark Exhaustion: Inalienability Rules for the Protection of Reputational Economic Value [2021] 43(6) European Intellectual Property Review 352-365; Reconstructing the Complete Patent Bargain: The Doctrine of Equivalents , [2020] Intellectual Property Quarterly, Issue 2, 138-160; Strict Liability and Negligence in Copyright Law: Fair Use as Regulation of Activity Levels , 97 Nebraska Law Review 384-468 (2018).

English, German, Greek

Vivana Galletto Farro

Viviana Galletto Farro graduated from the Catholic University of Uruguay with a Juris Doctor degree. She has been a professional judge in Uruguay since 2014, and she is currently nominated by the Supreme Court of Justice of this country for an upcoming promotion. She has attended on a wide range of cases in both civil and criminal law matters, gaining experience as a judge.

She is a contract law specialist and holds an LL .M degree in Contract Law. In addition, she is pursuing an LL .M degree in Criminal Procedure Law, while she currently works on her Ph.D. thesis in Legal and Research Sciences from the Catholic University of Argentine.

She is a graduate teaching assistant in civil and procedural law at the Catholic University of Uruguay. Her writings have been published in numerous legal publications. She has received multiple scholarships and awards, including the Fulbright Scholar grant to study at the University of Michigan Law School as a research scholar.

The purpose of the research will be to identify the relevant legal standards for the admission, evaluation and sufficiency of the evidence presented by the parties in the intermediate stage of the criminal process, in order to discover the truth and achieve effective, fast and fair solutions.

The main focus will be to analyze the objective parameters that constitute the rules of evidence by which judges issue their rulings, so these criteria could be used as a framework in the Uruguayan Criminal Procedure System during the intermediate stage of trials.

Spanish (native), Italian (elementary). 

Jaka Kukavica (Slovenia)

Jaka Kukavica is a Ph.D. Researcher at European University Institute in Florence, Italy. His Ph.D. project comparatively examines consensus analysis as an interpretative method in various multilevel polities. He is also working as a researcher on “The Court of Justice in the Archives” project at the Academy of European Law and the “Judicial Networks between Supreme Courts in Europe” project led by Prof. Mathias Siems. Before commencing his doctoral project, Kukavica studied law at Ljubljana and Cambridge. He is the Head of Section for European Law at the European Journal of Legal Studies and he served as an Editor of the Cambridge International Law Journal in the past. He has received multiple scholarships and awards, including the Mary Higgins Scholarship and the Lilian Knowles Prize awarded by Girton College, University of Cambridge.

Kukavica’s doctoral research examines the relationship between the structure of multilevel polities and the types of consensus analysis courts use when interpreting legal norms. Kukavica argues that different types of consensus analysis imply different understandings of the value of state autonomy. On these grounds, he examines whether courts use consensus analysis in a way that fits the structure of the multilevel system in which they operate. In particular, he focuses on the jurisprudence of the United States Supreme Court, the Court of Justice of the EU , the European Court of Human Rights, and the UN Human Rights Committee.

Slovenian (native), Serbo-Croatian, and Italian (proficient)

Caroline Maciel (Brazil)

Caroline Maciel is a doctoral researcher in open data of the Quality of Law Research Clinic, which is a member of the International Association of Legislation. She works as Regulatory Affairs and Government Relations at Stone Co (financial and software solutions) and is interested in Big Techs entrance in financial markets and how regulation should approach this matter. She studied Law at UFMG (Brazil) and University of Leeds ( UK ) and won two of the university’s prizes (best in civil and procedure law). Her master degree Institutions and Public Policies (Arraes: 2019) won two awards. She was a Research Fellow at AI Labs in a project on artificial intelligence to understand Congress. Her teaching and academic activities include courses on law and technology, constitutional law, administrative law and legal theory. Her writings have been published in numerous peer-reviewed publications, some in english.

Caroline’s research addresses how technology, such as machine learning-based systems, can be used to improve regulatory and legislative risk management. She argues that Brazil has substantial unequal access to public data and political players. Given this, tools to automatically process, analyze and categorize data, identify trends and predict best courses of legal action could change how advocacy is done, reducing this asymmetry. She analyzes some of these situations in financial market, as Big Tech’s started to provide payment services in Brazil. She chose to collect improvements from the US private and public sector because it is one of the front-runners in AI and algorithmic transparency, which can be used in Regulatory Impact Assessment Brazilian models. She evaluates how to decipher the government’s decision-making process patterns (without losing the political aspect) and the possible benefits to the democratic and economic development. 

Portuguese (native), English (proficient) and Spanish (intermediate)

Veena Manikulam (Switzerland)

Veena Manikulam is a PhD student at the Institute for International Law and Comparative Constitutional Law at the University of Zurich in Switzerland. From 2019 to 2021, she served as Research and Teaching Assistant at the University of Zurich, where she taught several courses and co-authored three articles in the area of international economic law. Prior to pursuing her PhD studies, she received an LL .M. in Transnational Law from King’s College London and a Master of Laws from the University of Zurich. In 2016, she was an exchange student at the National Law School of India University. Her interests include international economic law, transnational law and human rights law.

Veena Manikulam’s research centres on the reform of international investment law. In her PhD thesis she addresses to what extent the concept of investor accountability has been incorporated in investment law. Based on the insufficient adoption of investor accountability in existing investment agreements, her research focuses on the question how mechanisms to enforce substantive standards (including human rights, labour and environmental standards) could be designed to adequately incorporate the notion of investor accountability in investment law. Manikulam argues that a transnational approach to this question presents the chance to propose innovative enforcement mechanisms.

German (native), Malayalam (native), French (proficient), Hindi (limited working proficiency), Arabic (limited working proficiency)

Marcin Menkes (Poland)

Marcin Menkes is an Associate Professor at Warsaw School of Economics, in the Department of Business Law, where he also heads the Post-Graduate Studies of Law and Economics of the Capital Market. He is a member of the International Law Association Committee on the Rule of Law in International Investment Law and the Investor-States Dispute Settlement Academic Forum. He has held visiting fellowships at top universities including Cornell University, Cambridge University, Università di Torino, Università degli Studi di Firenze, and Università di Bologna.

His research interests include international investment arbitration, international monetary and financial matters, sovereign debt restructuring, sovereign immunities, and economic sanctions. He has published four books, over 100 scientific articles, and more than 1,000 blog posts, newspaper articles, etc.

Besides his academic work, he is also Of Counsel in Queirtius, an international litigation and arbitration law firm.

Menkes’s recent piecemeal projects are part of a larger research agenda on the evolution of public international law. His overarching hypothesis is that current diagnoses of the Westaphalian international order crisis are superficial and address only symptoms, not the roots of change.

While at Michigan Law School, he will examine the extent to which blockchain carries the potential to go beyond what has been debated and analyzed so far: to undermine the legal personality of states, to recognize the personality of MNE s, to open up the catalog of sources of law, and, ultimately, to undermine the foundations of the entire system.

Polish (native), French (proficient), Italian (proficient), Spanish (Intermediary), Dutch (elementary)

Zarina Mussakhojayeva (Kazakhstan)

Zarina Mussakhojayeva is a lawyer specializing in international trade law and compliance, focusing particularly on regulatory compliance, international sanctions, and anti-bribery regulations. Zarina has worked for multinational companies, advising on corporate compliance and governance issues in the areas of Antitrust, U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, U.K. Bribery Act, Antiboycott and economic sanctions. Zarina is an experienced lawyer qualified to practice law in Kazakhstan with professional experience covering matters related to mining operations, corporate finance, and mergers and acquisitions in the oil and gas industry.

Zarina received her B.A. in law from Kazakh Humanitarian Law University in 2006, where she received the University President’s Scholarship award. In 2008 she obtained her LL .M. degree at Duke University School of Law. Zarina was awarded a prestigious Kazakhstan Government-sponsored International Scholarship to pursue her studies at Duke. Zarina studied at American University in Washington, D.C. and Minnesota State University as an exchange student under the U.S. Department of State “Freedom Support Act” Fellowship Program.

Zarina’s research focuses on regulatory and legal aspects of implementing global compliance practices in Russia and Kazakhstan. The research is intended to identify regulatory compliance challenges faced by multinational corporations operating in the region. It is aimed at analyzing applicable regulatory environment in these post-Soviet countries, understanding available compliance function and established practices, and investigating recent FCPA enforcement actions. The research identifies the OFAC -imposed economic sanctions and Russian countersanctions and conflict between Russian antimonopoly legislation and U.S. anti-boycott regulations as key areas for further examination. In addition, some of the essential legal concepts are proposed to overcome the identified challenges.

Kazakh (native), Russian (native), and English (fluent)

Azusa Ogasawara (Japan)

Azusa Ogasawara has been a public prosecutor in Japan for six years. She graduated from Kyoto University Law School with a Juris Doctor degree. She has worked on a wide range of cases in both the investigation and trial departments, gaining experience as a practicing lawyer. She was recommended by the Public Prosecutors Office in Japan and is currently studying at the University of Michigan Law School as a research scholar.

Azusa’s research investigates legislative and operational issues related to laws against money laundering. In recent years, Japan has seen an increase in the amount of money laundering cases. However, the reaction of Japan to these crimes has not been fulfilling due to the lack of our experience in this field; thus, Japan must consider further strengthening its regulations while referring to the efforts of other countries. She chose these issues, because she believed that studying in the U.S., where research in this field is more advanced, would provide meaningful results for Japanese criminal justice.

Japanese (native)

Aparna Singh (India)

Aparna Singh is a lawyer licensed to practice in India. She holds law degrees from the University of Cambridge ( U.K. ) and the University of Delhi (India).

After graduating from Cambridge with an LL .M. degree in International Law, she joined Fietta LLP (London). At Fietta LLP , she assisted in ongoing investor-state arbitrations and even worked on several maritime law issues including, but not limited to, extent of the territorial waters of archipelagic states.

Prior to pursuing the LL .M. program, Aparna practiced law in India for four years. As a Senior Associate at a premier law firm, she represented private parties and government authorities in cases covering diverse areas of law, ranging from government regulation to cross-border transactions. Aparna also had the opportunity to work on several international arbitrations and received favorable awards for the firm’s clients.

Before coming to the University of Michigan Law School, Aparna practiced as an Arbitration Consultant in India, advising clients on international and domestic arbitration issues. 

Aparna’s current research includes a comparative analysis of regulatory regimes adopted in developed and developing countries to promote cross-border transactions and foreign direct investment. She intends to expand the scope of this research by looking at regulatory practices adopted by the U.S. and how India’s recent reforms stand in comparison. In light of India’s recent termination of many of its Bilateral Investment Treaties ( BIT s), this research will also encompass India’s dispute resolution system, both within and without the new Model BIT , and how it can be improved to meet the challenges ahead.

Hindi (native), Spanish (basic/learning)

John Trajer (United Kingdom)

John Trajer is a doctoral researcher in law at the European University Institute in Florence, Italy. Over the course of his PhD, he has been a visiting fellow at the Amsterdam Centre for Migration and Refugee Law (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam) and at the Dickson Poon School of Law (King’s College London). Prior to commencing his doctoral degree, he obtained a BA from the University of Oxford, a Joint MA from the universities of Göttingen and Groningen, and an LLM from the European University Institute. He has acquired professional experience in the field of migration and refugee law at a range of NGO s and international organizations, including the AIRE Centre (Advice on Individual Rights in Europe), the Hungarian Helsinki Committee, and the Council of Europe.

John’s doctoral research explores the scope of states’ protective duties towards trafficked

persons under international and regional European law. Specifically, it examines the conditions under which host states are obliged to ensure access to rehabilitative assistance for trafficked migrants, focusing on points of intersection between anti-trafficking, human rights, and refugee law. Beyond his PhD project, John is interested generally in the fields of migration, criminal, and international human rights law. At the European University Institute, he is one of the coordinators of the Migration Working Group (Migration Policy Centre) and an active participant of the Human and Fundamental Rights Working Group (Law Department). He is also a member of the Human Trafficking Research Network based at Queen’s University Belfast.

John is proficient in Hungarian and Italian, while he speaks Dutch and German at an upper-intermediate level.

Geir Ulfstein (Norway)

I am Professor of International Law and Co-Director of  PluriCourts – Centre for the Study of the Legitimate Roles of the Judiciary in the Global Order , University of Oslo, Norway. I have been Director of the Norwegian Centre for Human Rights, University of Oslo. I was Co-chair of the International Law Association’s Study Group on the ‘Content and Evolution of the Rules of Interpretation’ and am Chair of the Scientific Advisory Board, Max Planck Institute for Procedural Law, Luxembourg. I have been a member of the Executive Board of the European Society of International Law.

I will give a special course as part of the 2022 Hague Academy Winter Course on ‘Deference by International Courts and Tribunals to National Organs’. I have committed to write a book on the basis of the lectures, to be published in the Academy’s  Collected Courses . I am looking forward to writing the book in the research environment provided by the University of Michigan.

English (some German and French)

Thomas Verellen (Belgium)

Thomas Verellen is Assistant Professor in European Union and International Law at Utrecht University (Netherlands) and a Research Fellow at the Institute for European Law, KU Leuven (Belgium). Thomas is an expert in EU and comparative foreign relations law and has a particular interest in the impact of geopolitical change on the governance of EU trade and investment policy. 

Thomas defended his PhD entitled ‘ EU Foreign Relations Federalism. A Comparison with the United States, Canada and Belgium’ at KU Leuven in September 2019. From 2018 to 2020, Thomas practiced EU and international trade law at the Brussels office of Bird & Bird LLP . Thomas has held visiting positions at the University of Michigan Law School (2016-2017) and the Université de Montréal (2015) and was a trainee in the chambers of Professor Koen Lenaerts, President of the Court of Justice of the EU  (2015).

At Michigan, Thomas will start a comparative research project on legal and political accountability mechanisms in EU and U.S. trade and investment policy, and he will work on the book version of his PhD, which will be published in 2022 as part of Oxford University Press’ Comparative Constitutionalism series. In addition, Thomas will teach European Union Law at Michigan during the 2022 Winter Term.

Dutch, French and English

Shuai (Eddie) Wei (China)

Dr. Eddie Wei is an International and Comparative Law Research Scholar at the University of Michigan Law School under the mentorship of Professors Catharine MacKinnon and Kimberly Thomas. During his stay in Michigan, he is also a postdoctoral fellow in the China- US Scholar Program, which is administered by the International Institute of Education. Dr. Wei received his PhD in Gender Studies from the University of Cambridge and JSD from City University of Hong Kong. His research interests include judges’ gender and sentencing, sexual abuse and violence, and feminist judgments project. He received the Graduate Student Paper Award from the Division on Women and Crime, American Society of Criminology in 2019, as well as the Jiang-Land-Wang Outstanding Student Paper Award from the Association of Chinese Criminology and Criminal Justice in the same year. His publications can be found in peer-reviewed journals, such as Feminist Criminology, Feminist Legal Studies, British Journal of Criminology, Asian Journal of Women’s Studies, and International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology . He has been a member of the All China Lawyers Association since 2008.

Legal studies worldwide have documented the ways in which sentences of rape are influenced by victims’ relationships with offenders. The systematic failure to effectively sanction private sexual violence speaks to the influence of extra-legal factors on judges’ decision-making processes. Nevertheless, what typically has been found in the literature on the categorization of rape offenders is the dichotomy between strangers and non-strangers to victims. Such classification is problematic because of the distinct nature of the relationships captured in acquaintance rape. I will use a more refined categorization of victim-offender relationships to examine the predictive power of relationship type in sentencing outcomes.

Mandarin (native) and Cantonese (proficient)

Sonya Ziaja (United States)

Sonya Ziaja is an assistant professor at the University of Baltimore School of Law, where she teaches Environmental Law; Climate Adaptation, Law and Equity; and Property. Ziaja holds a Ph.D. in Geography from the University of Arizona; M.Sc. in Water Science, Policy and Management from the University of Oxford; and J.D. from the University of California, Hastings College of the Law.

Ziaja’s research interests focus on the overlapping areas of environmental governance and law, technology and society: How can environmental law and institutions sustainably adjust to rapidly changing bio-geophysical conditions and societal demands associated with climate change? And with what consequences for equity and democratic participation? Her approach to these questions draws on her interdisciplinary background in geography, water policy and law, as well as her practical knowledge of energy regulation.

Prior to entering academia, Ziaja worked in energy regulation at the California Public Utilities Commission and was the research lead for the Water, Energy, Climate Nexus at the California Energy Commission. She was a lead author of California’s Fourth Climate Assessment. Her research has informed the climate adaptation strategy of the U.S. National Parks Service and the first climate adaptation regulation of investor-owned energy utilities in California.

Dr. Ziaja’s current research project examines an emerging paradox in climate adaptation and equity. Climate adaptation is necessarily dependent on algorithm assisted decision making. These algorithmic tools are new fora for deliberation and environmental lawmaking. But these necessary tools also embed value laden assumptions and biases that make them counter to democratic participation and equity. This project is based on multiple years of qualitative research and detailed analysis of two cases where decision support software has informed climate adaptation for water and energy sectors. Through these case studies, Ziaja’s research provides a novel framework for evaluating procedural and substantive equity in algorithmic tools. Early versions of this research benefitted from discussions at the University of Columbia’s Sabin Colloquium for Innovative Environmental Scholarship and the University of Michigan Law School’s Junior Scholars Conference. Ziaja’s article, How Algorithm Assisted Decision  Making is Influencing Environmental Law and Climate Adaptation , is forthcoming in volume 48 of Ecology Law Quarterly .

Luisettov Lorenzo Giovanni

Lorenzo Giovanni Luisetto is a Ph.D. student in Comparative and European legal studies from the University of Trento in Italy. Prior to receiving his scholarship to pursue his Ph.D, studies, he received an M.A. in law at the University of Trento. Luisetto received the Giorgio Ghezzi Award - Mention of Merit in 2018 for the adoption of a comparative and multidisciplinary method in his master’s thesis, entitled  “Working Conditions at “Amazon”: a Comparison between the United States and Italy.”  In 2018 he was a Visiting Researcher at the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations ( AFL - CIO ), Washington D.C. ( USA ), and in 2020 he was a Visiting Scholar at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven ( BE ), where he worked at the Institute for Labour Law. His research interests include Comparative Labor and Employment Law, Antitrust Law and EU  Law.

Luisetto’s research focuses on the interaction between Antitrust Law and Labor and Employment Law. He is conducting a comparative study between the United States’ and the European Union’s models of anti-competition law and their application to labor issues. His research question is based on the ineffectiveness of both Labor and Employment Law in protecting workers and the possibility of antitrust principles providing better protections for workers in different kinds of labor markets. Luisetto argues that antitrust should not only focus on consumer welfare but also on other important interests, such as the welfare of workers. More generally, he believes the goals of anti-competition law should be reconsidered in order to expand protection for labor. 

​Francesco Marotta (Italy)

Francesco Marotta is a doctoral student in commercial law at the University of Padua. He was awarded a doctoral scholarship in 2019 after submitting a research project aimed at investigating the main legal issues posed by the Italian insolvency law reform. After graduating in Law at the same university in 2017, he worked for a year and a half as a deputy Public Prosecutor’s assistant in the section of the Prosecutor’s office specialized in economic, financial and tax crimes. He currently holds lessons and seminars for students at the university during the course of Commercial Law and Business Crisis Law. Marotta published academic articles/papers on insolvency and commercial law in various Italian law reviews. He is also a member of the American Bankruptcy Institute (International member) and the International Association of Restructuring, Insolvency and Bankruptcy Professionals ( INSOL ). 

Marotta’s research interests lie primarily within international comparison of insolvency laws, with a particular emphasis on the different legislative policies aimed at preventing insolvency and promoting business rehabilitation. Marotta’s research project analyses, with a comparative approach, the differences between the Italian and American legal regimes governing the prevention of business crisis. His purpose is to verify if the U.S. system is the most suitable for preventing insolvency without jeopardizing companies themselves. In this way, it will be possible to draw several inspirations to improve the Italian insolvency law, especially considering the high percentage of businesses that will probably experience financial difficulties due to the outbreak of the COVID -19 pandemic.

An Guohui (China)

An Guohui is a Ph.D. candidate majoring in law and economics at China University of Political Science and Law. He focuses on economic analysis of law, especially administrative law and tort law. He studied law in China-Euro School of Law and received a Juris Master. Before he started his Ph.D. program, he worked in the China Export & Credit Insurance Corporation, Chinese official Export Credit Agency. He previously was in an internship at the International Finance Corporation (World Bank Group) as a temporary consultant.

The social disciplining on various wrong doings is a new and fast-growing means of regulation. The wrong doings consist of criminal offense, administrative offense, contempt of court, bad faith in civil cases, etc. These are supposed to reduce the social transaction cost by reinforcing the authority and enforcement of law. As a very new regulation with universal influences, the disciplining is lack of prudent demonstration. Especially, an economic analysis needs to be used to deliberate the cost and benefit of the regulation. Due process in the disciplining is also a key issue.

Janis Beckedorf (Germany)

Janis Beckedorf is a fellow of the doctoral research group “Digital Law” at Heidelberg University, an interdisciplinary institution of the Faculty of Law and Computer Science carrying out fundamental research to prepare and accompany the development of legal expert systems. Janis studied law at Bucerius Law School in Hamburg, Germany and at the University of Michigan during the fall term of 2014. Currently, he works on his PhD thesis and conducts a research project on “Complex Societies and the Growth of the Law” with three other scholars. Janis’ research is funded by the Foundation of German Economy (Stiftung der deutschen Wirtschaft) and the State of Baden-Württemberg. He is co-founder of iusio, a company providing customized software to law firms and insolvency administrators. 

Tax law is regularly criticized for being too complex. What does complexity mean in respect of law, how can it be quantified and what insights can be gained about law? To answer these questions, the research uses insights from economics, systems theory and network science. The first objective is to elaborate a definition of legal complexity. The second objective is to develop new methods to measure legal complexity laying a focus on network science. As underlying data for these approaches, the research uses federal laws of the United States and Germany as well as court decisions.

Won Kyung Chang (South Korea)

Won Kyung Chang is an associate professor in the Scranton Honors Program at Ewha Womans University, Seoul, South Korea. She received a joint doctoral degree (Ph.D. in Law and Social Science) from the Maurer School of Law and the School of Public and Environmental Affairs at Indiana University-Bloomington.

Her research addresses a broad range of issues related to society, law, and public administration, including legal consciousness and legal culture, alternative dispute resolution, collaborative public administration, biomedical law and ethics, legal interpreting, and school violence. She has published around 30 articles in journals of law and public administration, such as  Asian Journal of Law and Society ,  Canadian Journal of Law and Society , and  Public Administrative Review . She also serves as a member of the Conflict Management Committee in the Ministry of Justice, Republic of Korea, and as a member of the board of directors in the Korean Society for the Sociology of Law and the Asian Women Law Association.

Dr. Chang’s main research question has always been how to design a legal apparatus that gives a sense that the justice system is, in fact, just. In searching for answers, she studied different concepts of justice—procedural, distributive, restorative, and relational—in alternative disputes resolution, public participation in administrative procedure, and biomedical law and ethics. Currently, she is investigating the institutionalization and evolution of American class actions, a project she believes will provide a basis for analyzing the mobilization of collectivized disputes in South Korea, and, ultimately, contribute to elaborating the theory of interaction between social transition and legal systems.

Lukáš Hrdlička (Czech Republic)

Lukáš Hrdlička is a Ph.D. candidate at the Faculty of Law of Charles University in Prague and a former bills drafter working for the Ministry of Finance. Lukáš was asked to draft a bill implementing the EU Anti-Tax Avoidance Directive (“ ATAD ”), thus becoming the author of the first rules dealing with hybrid mismatches enacted in the Czech Republic. He was also a member of the team drafting the first exit tax and CFC rules in the Czech Republic.

Regarding his studies, Lukáš is the principal investigator of the “International Co-operation in Tax Matters” research project funded by the Grant Agency of the Charles University and a researcher of several other research projects. His article about loopholes in the ATAD ’s CFC rules won the faculty prize and led to an amendment of a proposed bill implementing the ATAD . Lukáš is a co-author of a commentary to the Income Tax Act and a recipient of the prestigious Hlávka Foundation scholarship.

Lukáš’ research encompasses both taxation and financial regulations, but his visit to the University of Michigan Law School shall be focused rather on tax policy, income taxation, and, particularly, international taxation from the US and EU perspective, e.g. hybrid mismatch rules, CFC rules. In his current research, Lukáš analyzes the impact of the OECD anti- BEPS project on the European tax system and how the proposed and/or enacted EU rules implementing this project should be amended to become more effective and bring a greater fairness to the European tax system.

Constantin Hruschka (Germany)

Dr. Constantin Hruschka works as a Senior Research Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Social Law and Social Policy in Munich since November 2017. He is part of the Research Initiative of the Max Planck Society in “Challenges of Migration, Integration and Exclusion” (for further information see:  https://www.eth.mpg.de/4397290/wimi ). 

Before fully returning to academia, he had inter alia worked as head of the protection department at the Swiss Refugee Council (2014-2017) and as a lawyer for UNHCR , the UN Refugee Agency (2004-2014) in Nuremberg and Geneva. Dr. Hruschka studied law, history and philosophy in Würzburg, Poitiers and Paris. He holds a PhD in history from the university of Würzburg and a maîtrise en histoire from Université Paris IV (Sorbonne). In addition, he is a fully qualified lawyer and has passed his bar exam in 2002. 

He is teaching European Law and European Asylum Law as well as Human Rights Law mainly at the Universities in Germany and Switzerland. 

His current research project is focused on responsibility sharing mechanisms in the asylum context from a regional and global perspective. He looks into the structural challenges of regional and global asylum governance as well as into the compatibility of existing schemes with the 1951 Convention and the human rights standards. This focus derives from his longstanding research on the Common European Asylum System and on the 1951 Convention.  In addition to his research on refugee law, he is currently working on a research project looking at the access of European Union citizens to welfare in other EU Member States in cooperation with the University of Lausanne.  He has authored many publications on international, European, Swiss and German asylum and migration law inter alia he co-authored (with Francesco Maiani) a commentary on the Dublin III Regulation, is co-editing a comprehensive commentary on the Swiss migration law (5th edition 2019) and is the editor of the first German language commentary on the 1951 Convention (forthcoming 2020).

Niamh Kinchin (Australia)

Niamh Kinchin is a Senior Lecturer at the School of Law, University of Wollongong, NSW , Australia. Niamh teaches Administrative Law, Constitutional Law and Refugee Law. From 2008-14 she was as a sessional lecturer at the University of Wollongong and the University of New South Wales ( UNSW ), teaching a variety of subjects including Administrative Law, Constitutional Law, Torts and Contracts Law. Prior to teaching, she worked at the Commonwealth Administrative Appeals Tribunal as a legal officer. Niamh was admitted as a legal practitioner to the Supreme Court of NSW in 2002. She holds a Bachelor of Social Science from University of Newcastle, a Bachelor of Laws (Hons Class 1) from Western Sydney University, a Masters of Administrative Law and Policy from University of Sydney and a PhD from UNSW . The title of Niamh’s PhD is ‘Accountability in the Global Space: Plurality, Complexity and United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees’.

Niamh’s primary research interests are in global accountability and administrative justice, administrative decision-making within the refugee context and constitutional interpretation within the international and Australian settings. Her current research includes projects on the potential and risks of artificial intelligence in refugee status determination, the accountability of UNHCR in a time of Global Compacts, the interpretation of the constitutions of international organizations, NGO participation in the United Nations ( UN ) and the evolution of constitutional principles in Australia. In December 2018, Niamh published a monograph with Edward Elgar Publishing ( UK ) focusing upon Administrative Justice within the UN .

Andreas Th. Müller (Austria)

Andreas Th. Müller is Full Professor at the Department of European Law and Public International Law of the University of Innsbruck, Austria. He studied law and philosophy at the Universities of Innsbruck, Strasbourg and Yale Law School. He has been a regular Visiting Professor at the University of Alcalá, Spain, the Universidad Panamericana, Mexico, as well as Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia. In 2009/2010, he clerked for Judges Abdul G. Koroma and Bruno Simma at the International Court of Justice. His habilitation thesis dealt with Effet direct. The Direct Effect of EU Law. He is the principal investigator of the research project “Permissive Rules in Public International Law”, funded by the FWF (Austrian Science Fund). His teaching activities include courses on public international law, EU law, constitutional law, asylum and migration law and legal philosophy. 

Müller’s research focuses on international human rights law, international humanitarian law, international criminal law, international and European migration and asylum law, EU constitutional law and questions of legal philosophy and legal theory. His current research project starts from the observation that lawyers are trained to focus on rules ordering or prohibiting a certain conduct. However, numerous examples for permissive rules can be found also in public international law. The research project seeks to identify and systematize them and examine whether a distinction between thin and thick permissive rules may help to better conceptualize the architecture of contemporary public international law.

Tatjana Papić (Serbia)

Tatjana Papić ( LL .B. Belgrade, LL .M. Connecticut, PhD Union Belgrade) is a professor of international law at the Union University Belgrade Law School. She teaches courses in public international law, international human rights law, and the European Court of Human Rights. She was a Visiting Professor at the Washington and Lee University School of Law (2013). She is a former Head of Legal Department of the Belgrade Centre for Human Rights. Tatjana received Ron Brown Fellowship and OSI ’s Civil Society Scholar Award. She has published on questions of law of international responsibility, human rights, European Court of Human Rights and domestic reception of international law. Her work has been cited by the UN International Law Commission and the High Court of England and Wales.

Tatjana’s research addresses interactions between international law and domestic politics in post-conflict societies. Specifically, she explores impact of the international dispute settlement mechanisms – both on a dispute as such and on parties in the dispute – by focusing on highly political cases involving the states of the former Yugoslavia. Tatjana is, in particular, interested to see if, how and to what extent these proceedings have affected bilateral relations of the states involved, as well as their internal political dynamics and discourse. This will provide a background against which broader conclusions can be reached on the potential of legal means of settling international disputes in a post-conflict setting.

​Louise Southalan (Australia)

Louise Southalan is a lawyer working in the area of prison and detention health systems and is currently undertaking a  Churchill Fellowship  examining ways in which national agencies can best support state-based prison and jail mental health services.  As part of this travelling fellowship, she is delighted to be spending September at the University of Michigan Law School as a Michigan Grotius Research Scholar.

Louise works in the  Western Australian Department of Justice  on prison health projects and as a researcher with the  Justice Health Unit in the University of Melbourne’s School of Population and Global Health .  Her current projects with the University of Melbourne include undertaking a review for the  Australian National Mental Health Commission  on justice and health policies and strategies at federal and state levels, to identify ways in which they could better meet the mental health needs of justice-involved people.  Her previous roles include:

Working for  Australian Red Cross  monitoring conditions of detention in immigration detention facilities, 

In the  Western Australian Mental Health Commission , commissioning prison mental health services and developing forensic policy, and

Practicing as a lawyer.

She is very interested in international collaborations involving prison and detention health and would welcome opportunities to collaborate with colleagues from the University of Michigan.  Louise is a steering committee member of  WEPHREN , the Worldwide Prison Health Research and Engagement Network , a non-executive director of  HepatitisWA , and a collaborator on several international justice health projects.  She has a law degree and masters degrees in International Development and in Mental Health Policy and Services and is a graduate of the  Australian Institute of Company Directors .

​Piotr Tereszkiewicz (Poland)

Piotr Tereszkiewicz is a tenured Associate Professor of Private Law at Jagiellonian University in Kraków, Poland, and a Senior Research Affiliate at the University of Leuven, Belgium. After obtaining his PhD at Jagiellonian University and a Magister Juris Degree at University of Oxford, Tereszkiewicz spent several years as a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Heidelberg, working on comparative contract law, funded by German Research Council. At Jagiellonian University, Tereszkiewicz teaches core private law courses (including contracts, torts, succession) as well as international commercial contracts. His published works deal in particular with contract and commercial law, financial services regulation, mostly from a comparative, international and European perspective. Tereszkiewicz held visiting positions among others in Zurich, Ferrara and Bloomington (Mauer School of Law).

Tereszkiewicz’s research analyzes the practice and theory of commercial cooperation between manufacturers and their suppliers and dealers in the automobile industry in the United States and selected European countries. It explores what legal and non-legal (economic, social, cultural) factors determine the content of long-term cooperation between manufacturers and their suppliers and dealers. The central assumption of the study is that an in-depth examination of network governance within the automotive industry should build upon three major perspectives: the economic approach, the sociological approach and the contract law approach. In particular, a profound comparative study of contract law rules dealing with manufacturer-supplier and manufacturer-dealer relationships is undertaken.

​Sina Van den Bogaert (Belgium)

Sina Van den Bogaert, Dr. jur. (2017), Johann Wolfgang Goethe-University (Frankfurt am Main), is a Legal Officer at the European Commission in Brussels, and a voluntary research affiliate at the KU Leuven Centre for Global Governance Studies. She is a former Research Fellow of the Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law in Heidelberg. Her doctoral dissertation on Segregation of Roma Children in Education (Brill Nijhoff: 2018) was awarded magna cum laude. The dissertation examines how the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities (Council of Europe) and the Racial Equality Directive 2000/43/ EC (European Union) have contributed towards desegregation of Roma children in education in Europe. Sina has also published several articles on European Non-discrimination Law. 

Sina has been awarded a post-doc Fulbright and BAEF grant to study how US desegregation injunctions can be of inspiration for European judges when they seek to establish a proportionate, dissuasive and effective sanction mechanism in cases of school segregation. She argues that European judges should impose positive desegregation measures on infringers, if the effectiveness of the Racial Equality Directive is to be ensured. She identifies a recent shift in jurisprudence of the Court of Justice of the European Union towards ‘effective judicial protection’ for practicing rights derived from EU law, to the detriment of procedural autonomy of the EU Member States. She will focus on two intertwined developments: tackling domestic obstacles to effective enforcement and the possible creation of remedies otherwise unavailable in domestic law, based on the notion of ‘effectiveness’ and on Article 47 of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights.

​Wang Qi (China)

Wang Qi is a Ph.D. candidate at the School of Law of Renmin University of China ( RUC ). He studies commercial law as his major and works as a research assistant in the Research Center of Civil and Commercial Jurisprudence of RUC , which is funded by the Ministry of Education of China. Wang Qi received his master’s degree from RUC and bachelor’s degree from Wuhan University both in law. He was awarded the “Outstanding Graduate” by the Beijing Municipal Education Commission in 2017. He has been awarded a scholarship under the China Scholarship Council ( CSC ) to pursue study at the University of Michigan Law School. Wang Qi has participated in several research projects, including “The Theory and Practice of Dual-Class Share Structure”, “The Institutional Structure of the Initial Compensation of Sponsors”, and “The Regulation of Securities Investor Protection”. He has published a number of academic papers in numerous Chinese journals.

Wang’s research focuses on the securities investor protection in China. He chose to study this issue, because minority investors constitute the main body of China’s capital markets; therefore, the protection of their interests is closely related to the effective operation of the stock markets. By comparing the investor protection systems between China and the US , he analyzes the institutional deficiencies of investor protection in China based upon China’s Securities Law Amendment and the reform of the registration-based IPO system at the Shanghai Stock Exchange. He is exploring the approaches to improve the investor protection system in China.

Tadesse Kassa Woldetsadik (Ethiopia)

Dr. Tadesse Kassa Woldetsadik is an Associate Professor of International Law and Human Rights at Addis Ababa University (Ethiopia) and Principal Advisor to the Ethiopian Investment Commission on Investment Policy and Jobs Compact. He was a Visiting Scholar at the Xiangtan University (China), Martin Luther University of Halle Wittenberg (Germany) and Fulbright Visiting Scholar at the UC Berkeley. He has published a book titled International Watercourses Law in the Nile Basin, Three States at a Crossroads (Routledge, Oxfordshire 2013) and co-authored edited books including Ethiopian-African Perspectives on Human Rights and Good Governance ( NWV Pub., Graz, Austria 2014). He is deeply involved in the drafting of national investment, industrial park, CRRF and refugee related laws and policies in Ethiopia, and has extensively published articles, book chapters and policy briefs on refugee law, human rights, labor rights and legal aspects of Ethiopian foreign policy.

Tadesse’s research focuses on the fast-evolving refugee law and policy setting in Ethiopia. It addresses lingering issues relating to legal frameworks, institutional response mechanisms, challenges and opportunities in the implementation of the new refugee policy and the Comprehensive Refugee Response Framework in Ethiopia. Specifically, the research analyzes what the new normative and institutional responses on refugees imply in terms of the rights of refugees recognized under international instruments and whether such approaches represent sustainable solutions.

​Andrew Woodhouse (United Kingdom)

Andrew Woodhouse is a lecturer in law at the University of Liverpool and co-director of the EU Law @ Liverpool research unit. Andrew received his PhD in EU law from the University of Liverpool with no corrections. He has engaged with a number of European universities, co-organizing a transnational PhD colloquium with the Universities of Leiden and Oslo and spending time as a visiting researcher at the University of Antwerp. He has taught and lectured on courses in EU law, UK constitutional law and comparative constitutional law. As part of the EU Law @ Liverpool research unit, Andrew has helped to shape the debate on the UK ’s withdrawal from the European Union. This has included engaging with governmental actors, as well as contributing to the public debate through national ( LBC ) and international media ( Yahoo ). 

Andrew’s research interests lie in the area of constitutional law and theory. His PhD research focused on the role of national parliaments in the European Union assessing the limits of national representative democracy in a multi-level governance framework. His work on the potential for judicial review of national parliamentary action in the EU legislative process was published in the  Common Market Law Review . Andrew will continue to explore the role of national parliaments in the European Union as a Michigan Grotius Scholar, reflecting on the extent to which they are being instrumentalized in the EU . In particular, he will ask whether the symbolism of national parliaments is being used by a range of national and European actors in pursuit of political ends.

​Junseok Yoon (South Korea)

Junseok Yoon has been a judge of the Supreme Court of the Republic of Korea for seven years. He has obtained a Master of Laws degree from and has completed Ph.D. coursework in tax law at Seoul National University School of Law. He is also a member of the International Association of Tax Judges and the International Fiscal Association. He has published articles and given presentations on tax issues, such as “Tax Statutory Interpretation in Law and Economic View“, “A Study on Notification on Changes in Amount of Income”, “Requirements of Acquisition Tax Exemption on Real Estate for Religious Organizations”, “Commercial and Tax Accounting in Korea” and “Withholding Tax on Domestic Source Income”. Since he has been interested in and conducted research on other legal issues as well as tax issues, he participated in the WIPO IGC 35th Session and UNCITRAL Working Group 3 ( ISDS Reforms) 37th session as a member of a Korean Delegation.  He is also a member of the Task-Force Team for Judicial Support for the Disabled.    

Junseok’s main research topic is “Prevention of Treaty Abuse and Limitation on Benefits of U.S. Model Income Convention”. He argues that in light of the substantial interaction between Korea and the United States, they might agree to revise the current income tax treaty and align their agreement with contemporary international tax policy on the prevention of treaty abuse. Because there have been few studies on the Korean Supreme Court’s Decision on LOB provision or comprehensive LOB in Korea, his research on the LOB provision will serve as valuable guidance for both judges and researchers.  

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phd in private international law

CALL FOR APPLICATIONS

The International Programme for Law and Development (IPLD) is organised by the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law ( UNIDROIT ) thanks to the financial support of the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation/Directorate General for Development and Cooperation ( MAECI-DGCS ). 

The UNIDROIT IPLD is an initiative developed within the UNIDROIT Academy . It was established to promote and share knowledge of the international legal instruments elaborated and approved under the auspices of the Institute. The upcoming edition, IPLD 2024, will be the third edition after the two successful editions in 2022 and 2023.

The IPLD 2024 will be held from 6 June to 5 July 2024, the first two weeks online and the following three weeks in person at UNIDROIT’s headquarters in Rome, Italy:

             Online weeks: 06 June – 16 June 2024

             Residential weeks : 17 June – 5 July 2024

A complete and detailed course programme will be distributed to successful applicants.

Language: English

Maximum intake: 20/22 participants

Aim and objectives

The programme is intended for legal and judicial professionals, particularly judges, public lawyers, and experienced legislative drafters from African Countries. The IPLD’s goal is to provide participants with a thorough understanding of UNIDROIT’s legal instruments for the unification of private and commercial law, focusing on those relevant to sustainable development. The ultimate goal is for participants to use these instruments nationally while promoting international cooperation and mutual understanding.

Furthermore, the IPLD seeks to establish a community forum to foster an international network of legal professionals committed to advancing law and development by encouraging participants to exchange ideas and best practices.

The course syllabus

The syllabus of the programme includes distinct but interconnected topics summarised as follows:  

  • Introduction to the Role of Transnational Law and Unification
  • Access to Credit
  • International Commercial Contracts
  • Private Law and Agricultural Development
  • Law and Technology
  • Sustainable Development

The course will feature contributions from specialised experts, including judges, academics, practitioners from various countries, members of UNIDROIT governing bodies, UNIDROIT lawyers, and officials of other intergovernmental organisations that cooperate with UNIDROIT. All lectures will be conducted in English based on a teaching methodology aimed at fostering active engagement among participants in a dynamic environment. Through interactive workshops, case studies, and group discussions, participants can apply their knowledge to practical scenarios, thereby fostering a deep understanding of the subject matter.

Course certificate

A full-time presence, both online and on-site, and active participation in completing all assignments is required to obtain the course certificate.

IPLD Community and Alumni Association

Upon completing the International Programme, participants are granted free membership (for two years) to the UNIDROIT Alumni Association. In addition, they are invited to produce papers for publication in electronic format on the Institute’s website and to become members of the IPLD LinkedIn Community to exchange experiences.

All selected participants are exempt from any participation fees.

Travel, accommodation, and living expenses

Candidates are strongly encouraged to seek financial support from governmental institutions, employers, or funding agencies.

UNIDROIT will offer various support options for participants attending its in-person component. These provisions include student-level accommodation, grants to assist with living expenses, and coverage for round-trip travel costs to and from Rome on a case-by-case basis. Participants selected to receive a living travel grant are expected to attend both the online and in-person components of the programme.

Female applicants will be given special consideration in the selection process to promote equal opportunity.

Application process

The International Programme for Law and Development accepts applications from African countries for judges, public lawyers, and experienced legislative drafters.

To apply to the IPLD, candidates must submit a complete online application form , which must include the following 4 documents in English grouped into ONE single PDF file for submission:

  • a short cover letter – including at least three syllabus topics of relevance for the applicant’s institutional work;
  • Curriculum Vitae (CV) ;
  • a scan of the passport;
  • Endorsement/authorisation letter from the applicant’s institution according to the draft form .

Each candidate will be assessed on his or her cover letter, CV, English proficiency, and the relevance of UNIDROIT’s instruments in her/his institutional functions. In selecting candidates, consideration will be given to ensuring a diverse geographical provenance.

The application deadline has been extended to the 30 March 2024 at 11:59 pm CET.

For any inquiries and further information, please send us an email at [email protected] .

Short-listing will be undertaken in April 2024. Candidates will be informed of the outcome of their application in April 2024.

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ABOUT UNIDROIT

The International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (UNIDROIT) is an independent intergovernmental Organisation with its seat in the Villa Aldobrandini in Rome. Its purpose is to study needs and methods for modernising, harmonising and co-ordinating private and in particular commercial law as between States and groups of States and to formulate uniform law instruments, principles and rules to achieve those objectives.

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Dr Philine Wehling has primary responsibility for UNIDROIT’s work on corporate sustainability due diligence in global value chains. She is also responsible for the implementation of the UNCITRAL/UNIDROIT Model Law on Warehouse Receipts and advises on the other instruments related to agricultural development as well as the UNIDROIT Principles of International Commercial Contracts. Since 2020, she regularly lectures on international trade law at the Master’s in Law Programme at the International Training Centre of the ILO.

Prior to joining UNIDROIT in 2019, for about eight years, she worked as a Legal Advisor at the UNFAO Legal Office in Rome. She advised member countries on legal and institutional aspects related to trade in agro-food products, sustainable agricultural development, and responsible natural resources management, and managed and implemented both normative and project (field) work in over 20 countries. She also served as a government lawyer at the Federal Ministry of Justice in Berlin for almost two years, where she worked in international cooperation on consumer law and represented the Ministry in expert committees at the OECD and UNCTAD.

Philine holds a PhD in International Law ( summa cum laude ) from Heidelberg University, completed at the Max-Planck-Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law, for which she was awarded the 2018 Prize for Excellence in Research of the Margot-und-Friedrich-Becke Stiftung zu Heidelberg . She further holds a Master’s Degree in Law from Hamburg University and a Law Degree from Passau University. She completed undergraduate studies in Arabic Literature and Politics at Damascus University, and studies in French Culture at the University Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne. She is admitted to the German Bar.

Working languages: Arabic, English, French, German

Theodora Kostoula is a Legal Consultant at the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (UNIDROIT). She is mainly responsible for UNIDROIT’s Projects on Economic Assessment of International Commercial Law Reform, Implementation of and Compliance with International Commercial Law Treaties and Digital Assets and Private Law.

Prior to joining UNIDROIT, she worked for several years in private practice at a Greek law firm and at the EU agency Fusion for Energy in Barcelona. Theodora also worked as a Teaching Associate in FinTech and digital currencies courses at the Florence School of Banking and Finance, Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies, and held positions as Visiting Scholar at Copenhagen Business School and as Sir Roy Goode Scholar at UNIDROIT.

Theodora is admitted to the Bar Association of Thessaloniki (Greece) and is currently a PhD Candidate at the European University Institute (EUI). She holds an LL.M in Transnational Commercial law (International Hellenic University, Thessaloniki) and a Degree in Law (Aristotle University of Thessaloniki). Her main research and publication areas include distributed ledger technology, insolvency law and secured transactions.

I have been a member of the Working Group preparing the UNIDROIT Principles of International Commercial Contracts 2010 and 2016. My main areas of research are: Law of obligations and law of succession in historical and comparative perspective; relationship between the English common law and continental civil law; mixed legal systems (in particular Scotland and South Africa); harmonization of European private law.

Marcel Fontaine is Professor emeritus of the Law Faculty of the Catholic University of Louvain, where he taught the law of obligations, the law of contracts and the law of insurance. He has taught as a guest professor in several other universities. From 1979 till 2010, he took part in the working group which elaborated the Unidroit Principles of International Commercial Contracts. For 17 years, he has chaired another international working group devoted to the systematic analysis of specific clauses appearing in international contracts. He has prepared a Draft Uniform Act on the Law of Contracts for the 17 African member States of OHADA. He has been Secretary General, and is now Honorary President of the International Insurance Law Association (AIDA). He has long experience as a commercial arbitrator, domestic as well as international, ad hoc as well as institutional. He is the author of many publications. He is doctor honoris causa of the Universities of Geneva, Montpellier, Bourgogne and Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne.

Irini Stamatoudi is a Law Professor at the University of Nicosia (Cyprus) and a lawyer at the Supreme Court of Athens (Greece). She is specialised in Copyright and in Cultural Heritage Law. She holds degrees from the University of Athens – Greece (Law Degree) and the University of Leicester – UK (LL.M., Ph.D.). From 2007 – 2018 she was the General Director of the Hellenic Copyright Organisation (competent governmental organisation for copyright matters). She has taught at the Law School of the University of Leicester, on the joint LL.M. of the University of Turin, ILO, and WIPO, at the International Hellenic University, at the Academy of the World Intellectual Property Organization and on several other academic courses. For many years she acted as a legal counselor to the Ministry of Culture on issues of illegal trafficking of antiquities where she handled the famous return cases of masterpieces from the J. P. Getty Museum (in Los Angeles) and from the Leon Levy & Shelby White collection (NY). Since 1999 she has participated in several negotiation committees on the issue of Parthenon Marbles and is currently a member of the Ministry of Culture Advisory Committee on the Parthenon Marbles. She has published fourteen books in copyright and in cultural heritage law (whilst three more are in the pipeline) in Greece and abroad and several articles in academic journals worldwide. Some of her writings are considered internationally works of reference (e.g., I. Stamatoudi, Multimedia products as copyright works, Cambridge University Press, 2002, (reprint in paperback in January 2008, Kindle Edition 2010); I. Stamatoudi, Cultural Property Law and Restitution. A Commentary to International Conventions and European Union Law, Edward Elgar Publishing, Cheltenham (UK) – Northampton (US), 2011, I. Stamatoudi and P. Torremans (eds), European Union Copyright Law. A Commentary, Edward Elgar Publishing, Cheltenham (UK) – Northampton (US), 2014, and 2021 (2nd ed.)).

Professor Verónica Ruiz Abou-Nigm is Chair in Private International Law at Edinburgh Law School. She has widely published in private international law and has taught and researched in Europe and Latin America. Her work is published in English, Spanish and Portuguese. Her research focuses on the intersections between private international law and other disciplines, including international commercial arbitration, shipping law, migration, sustainable development and legal education.

Professor Ruiz Abou-Nigm is President of the European Law Faculties Association (ELFA), Vice-President of the American Association of Private International Law (ASADIP), and Member of the Scientific Council of the European Association of Private International Law (EAPIL).

Dr Ole Böger is a Judge in Banking and Criminal matters at the Hanseatic Court of Appeal (Hanseatisches Oberlandesgericht) in Bremen, Germany, and a Lecturer at the University of Bremen. Previously, he has been, amongst others, a Desk Officer at the German Federal Ministry of Justice and for Consumer Protection (2013-2016), a Legal Officer at UNIDROIT working on the Principles of Close-Out Netting (2012-2013) and a research assistant at the Max-Planck-Institute for Foreign and Comparative Private Law in Hamburg, Germany (2003-2008). He has represented the German government in UNCITRAL Working Groups and at UNIDROIT, specifically in the preparation and adoption of the UNIDROIT MAC Protocol, and he is an Ex officio Observer to the Preparatory Commission for the Establishment of the International Registry for MAC equipment. Recently, he has been an external consultant to secured transactions law reform projects of the World Bank in Suriname (2016), Greece (2020) and Lebanon (2021). Dr Böger holds law degrees of the University of Göttingen in Germany and King’s College London (UK) and he has authored numerous publications with a focus on international secured transactions law and the law of payment services.

phd in private international law

Professor Donati is the author of several publications on corporate law, restructuring, insolvency law, and bank crisis management. On the same topics, he has been invited as a speaker to various international and national conferences and participated in some high-impact international, European, and national research projects. Professor Donati’s education includes a Ph.D. in Corporate Law (University of Rome ‘La Sapienza’), an LLM in Corporate Governance (Stanford Law School), and a Law Degree with honors (University of Florence). He is qualified as an attorney in Italy and in the State of New York (USA).

Giulia Stella Previti is a Legal Officer at the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (UNIDROIT), based in Rome.  Giulia has primary responsibility for UNIDROIT’s projects on the Legal Nature of Voluntary Carbon Credits and on Digital Assets and Private Law.

Prior to joining UNIDROIT, Giulia was a Senior Vice President at Burford Capital, where she analyzed opportunities to invest in a wide array of legal assets, specializing in evaluating international arbitration claims and awards.  In addition, Giulia spent about seven years in private practice at Freshfields in New York, where she was a Senior Associate focusing on international arbitration and litigation matters.  Giulia also clerked in US federal court for Senior Judge Jack B. Weinstein in the Eastern District of New York.

Giulia is admitted to the New York Bar and obtained her Juris Doctor from New York University School of Law.  She has a Masters of Science from the London School of Economics and Political Science and a Bachelor of Arts from University College London.

Priscila Pereira de Andrade works as a Legal Officer at UNIDROIT. She is mainly responsible for the Agricultural Development and Private Law projects jointly developed with IFAD and FAO (Legal Structure of Agricultural Enterprise, Agricultural Land Investment Contracts and Contract Farming). Priscila holds a Ph.D. in International Law from the University Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne (France), a Master Degree in International Relations from the University Center of Brasília (Brazil), and a specialisation degree in International Environmental Law from the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR). Before joining UNIDROIT, she worked for the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) and was an assistant professor at the University of Pisa (Italy), as well as an associate professor at the Master in Law Program of the University Center of Brasília.

Keni Kariuki works as a Legal Consultant/MAECI Chairholder at UNIDROIT. He is mainly responsible for assisting in the “Private Law and Agricultural Development” projects jointly developed with IFAD and FAO (Collaborative Legal Structures for Agricultural Enterprises, Agricultural Land Investment Contracts and Contract Farming). Keni holds a Ph.D. in Agricultural Political Economy from SOAS University of London (United Kingdom), a Master’s degree in International Human Rights Globalisation and Justice from Keele University (United Kingdom), he completed his Bar Vocational Course (BVC) at Nottingham Trent University (United Kingdom), and has a Bachelor of Laws (LLB) in Law and Politics (Dual Degree) from Keele University. Before joining UNIDROIT, he worked for the African Union Commission (AUC) and as a consultant for other multilateral actors such as Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ), FAO, and Bread for the World, among others.

Dr Giray graduated from Istanbul University’s Law Faculty in 1998 before obtaining a postgraduate degree in EU Law from Marmara University European Union Institute in 2000. He carried out academic research at the London University Advanced Legal Studies Institute for his doctorate thesis in 2004. He was awarded a Ph.D. in Private Law from Istanbul University’s Social Sciences Institute in 2007. He worked as a research assistant from 1999 to 2007 at Istanbul University’s Law Faculty in the Private International Law Department. Then, he was appointed as a military judge to the 2nd Army Commandership for military service.

He was appointed as an assistant professor in 2008. While conducting research at Georgetown University’s School of Law, he was granted with a scholarship from the Turkish Higher Education Council and Georgetown University for the 2011-2012 academic year. He simultaneously conducted research on ICSID arbitration at the World Bank and also at the Library of Congress.

Dr Giray was appointed as an associate professor in 2013 due to his articles and book named “Compensation Arising from Expropriation in International Investment Arbitration and Methods Used in the Calculation of Compensation”. He was appointed as a full-time professor in the same department in 2020 due to his articles, projects and a new book named “Limitation Periods in International Private and Procedural Law”.

In 2022 he was appointed as a Correspondent of Turkey by the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (UNIDROIT).

He gives courses on Private International Law and International Civil Procedural Law for undergraduates, as well as International Family and Child Law, Disability Rights and International Investment Law-ICSID Arbitration for postgraduate students of the Law Faculty and Social Sciences Institute at Istanbul University, while carrying out administrative duties at the same time. Currently, he is pursuing additional postgraduate studies on Tax Law.

Mr Alvaro Galindo is an International Counsel advising on dispute resolution matters, particularly those involving Latin American jurisdictions. Currently, he is the Dean of the Law School at Universidad de las Americas. His practice focuses on disputes between sovereign states and state-owned entities and private companies. He has been recognised by The Legal 500 Latin America and was noted in this publication as “outstandingly intelligent” and for his “incomparable capacity for coordinating, planning, strategic assessment, and for his diplomatic approach”.

He was as member of the international arbitration practice at Dechert LLP in Washington, D.C. He also served as the Director of the International Affairs and Arbitration Unit for the Republic of Ecuador’s Attorney General’s Office. He acted as a legal consultant for the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) in Washington, D.C., and as regional director for the Latin American Development Corporation, where he coordinated the committee in charge of drafting the Arbitration Law of Ecuador.

Mr Galindo has significant teaching experience in the areas of dispute resolution, international investment, and arbitration law. He has authored numerous publications and articles related to arbitration and international investment law.

Currently, he is an Adjunct Professor at Georgetown University Law Center, with a course on Advanced Topics in International Investment Arbitration and Adjunct Professor of Practical Aspects of Arbitration (Spanish course) at American University Washington College of Law.

Mr Galindo has represented sovereign states in international and regional forums: the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, UNCTAD; the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law, UNCITRAL.

Member of the Court of the ICC International Court of Arbitration and arbitrator in various arbitration centres in Latin America. In September 2021, he was appointed to the list of arbitrators under the ICSID Convention.

My main areas of expertise related to UNIDROIT work include international commercial contracts, international civil proceedings and private international law.

Derek was permanently appointed to the Supreme Court (now renamed the High Court) as a Judge, with effect from 1 November 2017. This after being in private practice for nearly thirty years. His main interest areas and focus areas are in commercial law, with a particular interest in Private International Law.

Derek has already used the UNIDROIT Principles and the UNIDROIT Model Clauses in several commercial High Court judgments since June 2022. He has benefitted immeasurably from being exposed to the workings of UNIDROIT.  Put in another way, “my eyes have been opened”.

Derek has used the UNIDROIT Principles and the UNIDROIT Model Clauses as an interpretive aid by way of application in several judgments that have since been reported as precedent jurisprudence in South Africa. He has also effectively utilised the UNIDROIT Principles and the UNIDROIT Model Clauses to supplement domestic law in his judgments by referencing the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa.

Antenor Madruga is a founding partner of the law firm Madruga BTW and recognised as a leading Brazilian lawyer in complex litigations and negotiations involving government criminal and administrative proceedings, particularly in multijurisdictional cases. He was the lead counsel in several of the major white-collar cases in Brazil. He is currently a member of the Self-Regulation Board of the Brazilian Federation of Banks (FEBRABAN). In his former career as a Federal Attorney, Mr. Madruga occupied several positions in the Brazilian government, among them: Director of the Department of Assets Recovery and International Legal Cooperation of the Ministry of Justice, Coordinator of the National Strategy Against Money Laundering (ENCCLA); Board of the Brazilian Financial Intelligence Unit (COAF); and National Secretary of Justice. Ph.D. in International Law.

Full Professor at the Department of Law at the Federal University of Espírito Santo -UFES. Professor of the Master’s Program in Procedural Law at UFES. Postgraduate in International Economics and Finance and PhD in Law and International Relations from the University of Barcelona. Member of the American Association of Private International Law – currently holds the position of Vice President of Communication and Publishing. Member of the Brazilian Academy of International Law; the Brazilian Association Elas no Processo; the Brazilian Association of Procedural Law; and the Brazilian Association of Women in the Legal Career. Member of the International and Latin American Networks of International Civil Procedure. Coordinator of the Research Group and the Jurisprudence Observatory – Labyrinth of the Codification of International Civil Procedural Law. Researcher in the project “Keys for Digital and Algorithmic Justice with a Gender Perspective. Practice Areas: Public International Law. Private International Law. International Civil Procedural Law. Comparative law. International Trade Law. Theory and Comparison between Systems. Main areas related to the work of UNIDROIT: Civil Procedure; ELI Model European Rules of Civil Procedure; ALI/UNIDROIT Principles; Best Practices for Effective Enforcement; Cross-Border Investment; Law and Technology; Arbitration; Intellectual Property and other subjects.

Mr Gama Jr. is a Brazilian lawyer and arbitrator. Currently, he holds the position of Adjunct Professor at the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio (PUC-Rio), where he teaches Private International Law and International Commercial Arbitration. He is a correspondent of the UNIDROIT since 2016 and a member of the CISG Advisory Council. Mr Gama Jr. acted as counsel and arbitrator in more than 100 cases, under the rules of ICC, LCIA, UNCITRAL and Brazilian arbitral institutions. His experience includes corporate law, M&A transactions, shareholders agreements, major construction contracts, built-to-suit contracts, insurance disputes, international sale of goods, services, consulting, joint-ventures and transfer of technology. He has authored a number of books and articles related to the UNIDROIT Principles. In 2016, Lauro lectured at the Hague Academy of International Law on the topic of “The UNIDROIT Principles as the law applicable to commercial contracts”, which was published in vol. 406 of the Collected Courses.

Lauro participated in the UNIDROIT working groups which produced the UNIDROIT Principles of International Commercial Contracts, 3rd edition (2005-2010), and the Model Clauses for the use of the UNIDROIT Principles (2012-2013). Moreover, he worked on the Portuguese version of the Black Letter rules of the 2016 UNIDROIT Principles, and was one of the five experts who collaborated with UNCITRAL, HCCH and UNIDROIT to develop the “Legal Guide to Uniform Instruments in the Area of International Commercial Contracts, with a Focus on Sales”, which was published in 2021.

Mr Fontoura Costa researches and teaches International Business Law and Comparative Law at the University of São Paulo. He focuses on issues such as: (i) arbitration; (ii) civil procedure; (iii) commodities production and trade; (iv) company law; (v) contract law and clauses; (vi) energy; (vii) information technologies; (viii) infrastructure; (ix) intellectual rights; (x) negotiable instruments; and (xi) transport law. He also acts as lawyer and arbitrator.

Mr Ferro Catapani is a Federal Judge and Professor at the Federal University of São Paulo. He has experience in research and teaching of commercial law and financial market regulation. His main areas of expertise related to the work of UNIDROIT, include: (i) legal structure of agricultural enterprises; (ii) capital markets and banking law; (iii) bank insolvency; (iv) netting; (v) factoring; (vi) franchising; (vii) leasing; (viii) negotiable instruments; (ix) security Interests.

Fabio holds a PhD (summa cum laude) in Civil Law, with research on secured transactions and security rights, from Université Panthéon-Assas (Paris 2) and University of São Paulo, Brazil.

He is lawyer in Brazil, acting in the field of real estate law and financing, including receivables financing through the capital markets for the real estate industry.

He was also a delegate of Brazil in UNCITRAL Working Group VI (Security Interests) and he has assisted multiple organizations and governments in drafting secured credit and public registries’ reforms, including in Angola, Brazil, Madagascar, Mozambique and São Tomé and Príncipe.

Professor Sheelagh McCracken is Professor of Finance Law at the University of Sydney, Australia and a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Law.

She has lectured on finance law in various centres in Australia and around the Asia-Pacific region, including Singapore, Hong Kong, Beijing and Tokyo. She writes and speaks regularly on secured transactions law, focusing in particular on the development, operation and application of personal property securities legislation in Australia.

A graduate of the University of Cambridge, she obtained her PhD from the University of Sydney, which was subsequently published in the UK as The Banker’s Remedy of Set-Off and is currently in its third edition. Other major publications include a standard Australian text, Everett & McCracken’s Banking and Financial Institutions Law which she has co-authored since its first publication over 30 years ago and is now in its 9 th edition.

Professor of Space Law and Emeritus of International Law, Sapienza University of Rome. Vice-President of Italian Society for International Organization (SIOI). Chairman of European Centre for Space Law (ECSL/ESA). General Counsel of International Astronautical Federation (IAF). Member of the Advisory Council of European Space Policy Institute (ESPI). Senior Legal Advisor of Italian Space Agency (ASI).

Legal Expert at Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Italian Delegate to the 2001 Cape Town Diplomatic Conference for the Adoption of the UNIDROIT Convention on International Interests in High Value Mobile Equipment and Protocol on Matters specific to Aircraft Assets.

Chair of the Committee of Governmental Experts for the preparation of a Protocol to the Cape Town Convention on Matters specific to Space Assets (2003-2012). Chair of the Committee of the Whole of the 2012 Berlin Diplomatic Conference, which adopted the Protocol.

Since 2013, Chair of the Space Preparatory Commission, set up as Provisional Supervisory Authority for establishing the International Registry for Space Assets under the guidance of UNIDROIT General Assembly. Since 2010, UNIDROIT correspondent for Italy.

Italian delegate to UNCOPUOS, since 1997. Chairman of Legal Subcommittee (2004-2006) and Co-chair of Expert Group on Regulatory Regimes of the Working Group on Long-Term Sustainability of the Outer Space Activities (2010-2018).

Since 2007, Italian delegate to the Council of the EU for the Negotiation of the International Code of Conduct on Outer Space Activities (ICoC). Chair of the multilateral negotiations on ICoC held at the United Nations (New York, 2015).

Member of two UN Group of Governmental Experts on Outer Space Transparency and Confidence-Building Measures (TCBMs, 2011-2013), and on Practical Measures for the Prevention of an Arms Race in Outer Space (PAROS, 2018-2019). Member of the Specialized Panel of Permanent Court of Arbitration pursuant to Optional Rules on Disputes relating to Outer Space Activities.

phd in private international law

Ms Olga Fonotova is an Associate Professor of the Faculty of Law (Department of Legal Regulation of Business) at the Russian National Research University “Higher School of Economics” in Moscow. She holds a PhD degree cum laude in private law / private international law from the Lomonosov Moscow State University (2006). Her academic and teaching interests cover private international law, international and national commercial law, with a focus on unified and non-state legal regulation of cross-border commerce.

Olga is a Russian law qualified practicing lawyer in the sphere of national and international commercial and corporate law with 20+ years’ experience in leading law firms. As part of her legal practice, she has advised multinational corporations on the setting up of multi-jurisdictional commercial relations, on the formation / termination of international joint ventures, restructuring of assets, and financing / refinancing of projects. For her work on commercial and corporate legal matters she was included in the international rating of leading lawyers “The Best Lawyers® in Russia” (2018 – 2022).

She is a UNIDROIT alumna (2011) and a Correspondent of UNIDROIT in Russia (2023 – 2025). From 2016 to 2021 Olga was a member of the ICC Commission on Commercial Law and Practice (ICC CLP) and a member of the Association of European Business (AEB) in Moscow.

Correspondent of UNIDROIT since 1998 Attorney since 1978, specialist in international road transport law and transport insurance la w. Doctor in Law. Thesis, concerning liability of the carrier (cum laude). Member of the Spanish Royal Academy of Law. Vice-president of the Committee on Legal Affairs of the International Road Transport Union (IRU, Geneva, Switzerland) Chairman of the “ad hoc” Working Group for the updating of the IRU 1976 model of CMR consignment note, which was approved by IRU in 2007. Member of the International Legal Assistance Network agreed by the IRU. Consultant to the United Nations in traffic and road transport international conventions. Member of the Board of Directors and President of the Working Group “Transport Insurance” in AIDA (International Association of Insurance Law), Spanish section – SEAIDA. Lecturer in various University Master degrees (postgraduate courses) and speaker in various national and international congresses on Transport Law, transport insurance, etc. Author of several books (including the first book in Spain dealing with the whole CMR Convention) and hundreds of articles about Transport Law, Transport Insurance and other transport related activities. Member of the Editorial Staff of the legal journal European Transport Law (Antwerpen, Belgium). Sanchez-Gamborino’s opinions have been quoted several times as legal literature by Spanish Courts of Justice when deciding transport cases. Speech (November 2008) before the Spanish Parliament when National Transport Law, now in force, was being worded. His opinions quoted in the Bulletin of the Spanish Senate (September 2009). As to his relationship with UNIDROIT , his texts published several times in the Uniform Law Review (nr. 2001-3, pp. 643-648; nr. 2006-3, pp. 677-682; nr. 2016-4, pp. 561-573) and attended meetings at Rome, such as when drafting the CRTD (Convention on the civil liability for damages on the transport of dangerous goods), May 1986, jointly with the Delegation of IRU.

Ben Schuijling’s expertise spans the broad field of business law, with an emphasis on secured transactions, restructuring and insolvency. In relation to the work of UNIDROIT his areas of expertise include security interests, factoring, leasing, commercial contracts, agency and intermediated securities.

Prof. (Dr.) Sandeepa Bhat is working as a Professor of Law and Director of Centre for Aviation and Space Laws at National University of Juridical Sciences, Kolkata. He has the teaching and research experience of nearly twenty years. He was a University First Rank holder with double gold medals for his LL.M. and a University Third Rank holder with gold medal for top-scoring his college during LL.B. His five Major Research Projects are sponsored by World Bank, ISRO, the WB Judicial Academy, Ministry of Justice and Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change. Apart from being UNIDROIT Correspondent for India, he has the distinction of being a member of the American Society of International Law, International Academy of Space Law, and the International Institute of Space Law. Dr. Bhat has published eight books and more than fifty five articles in the journals of international and national repute. He has presented over hundred and forty research papers in the international and national conferences including the coveted International Astronautical Congress, as well as in international conferences held at Jakarta, Seoul, Sharjah, Singapore, Changsha, Paris, Austin, Southampton and Cambridge. He also has the distinction of being a member of Indian Space Research Organization’s Expert Group for drafting the National Space Act for India.

Bruce Whittaker is an Honorary Senior Fellow at Melbourne Law School, University of Melbourne. Before joining the Law School, Bruce was for many years a lawyer and partner at law firm Ashurst.

Bruce’s legal expertise is in the field of banking and finance law, with a particular focus on secured transactions law.

Bruce has been involved in a number of UNIDROIT projects. He was a member of the Australian delegation to UNIDROIT that developed and settled the text of the MAC Protocol to the Cape Town Convention. He continues to represent Australia as a member of the Preparatory Commission that is tasked with the implementation of the MAC Protocol, and in that context is chair of the drafting committee for the development of the regulations that will underpin the operation of the Register. Bruce is also a member of the expert working groups that have been established by UNIDROIT to develop its proposed Model Laws on Factoring and Warehouse Receipts. He is the co-chair of the drafting committee for each of these Model Laws.

Bruce has honours degrees in law and arts from the University of Melbourne.

My main areas of expertise related to the work of UNIDROIT are Capital Markets, Security Interests and Commercial Contracts

Ergun Özsunay graduated from the Istanbul University Faculty of Law in 1957 and joined the faculty staff. As a research assistant he studied with Alfred F. Conard and E. Allan Farnsworth (visiting professors, 1957-59). He attended graduate studies at Harvard Law School in 1959/60 (LL.M.). He obtained his PhD degree at Istanbul University (1961). In 1962 and 1963 he attended “Faculté International pour l’Enseignement de Droit Comparé” (“Diplome de Droit Comparé” and “Diplome d’Etudes Supérieures de Droit Comparé”) in Strasbourg. Then he studied at Max Planck Institut für auslaendisches-und internationales Privatrecht” for his Habilitationsschriftı (1965/66). He was appointed full professor of law for Civil Law and Comparative Law at Istanbul Uni. Faculty of Law and elected as the Director of the Institute of Comparative Law in 1978. He was active in the AIDC and AISJ (former president). After his retirement Prof. Özsunay served as a member of the Turkish delegations in UNCITRAL and DH-BIO (CoE). At present he teaches Civil Law (Contracts and Specific Types of Contracts, Torts (Civil Liability), Secured Transactions, comparative competition law, and International Arbitration and the US legal system). He has written several books and works on these topics.

Prof. Özsunay represented Türkiye in the following diplomatic conferences: “Convention on Agency in the International Sale of Goods” (1983); “Convention on the Applicable Law to Contracts for the International Sale of Goods” (1985); “Unidroit Conventions on International Factoring and International Financial Leasing” (1988), and in several Working Groups in UNCITRAL (II, III, VI).

He continues his activities in the following international organizations: “International Academy of Comparative Law (AIDC/IACL) (membre titulaire); “International Association of Legal Science” (A.I.S.J./IALS); “UNIDROIT” (correspondent member); “Deutsche Gesellschaft für Rechtsvergleichung” (correspondent member);“International Association of Procedural Law”; UNCITRAL WG II (Arbitration-Conciliation, until 2019); WG III (Online Dispute Resolution, and Investor-State Dispute Settlement) (until 2019); CoE: DH-BIO” (until 2019).

I am a lawyer and notary; Master in International Trade; Career Ambassador of the Diplomatic Service of El Salvador; Professor of Private International Law, Public International Law and Integration Law; Rapporteur on Private International Law when I was a Member of the Inter-American Juridical Committee of the OAS for 16 years; author of several articles on private international law; lecturers at various American Universities on issues of private international law; Panelist on the Vienna Convention on the International Sale of Goods at the UNCITRAL/UNCITRAL headquarters; Member of IHLADI (Instituto Hispano Luso Americano de Derecho Internacional); Founding Member of ASADIP (American Association of Private International Law); member of AMEDIP (Mexican Association of Private and Comparative International Law).

Dhafer DRIDI is a Lecturer at the Faculty of Law and Political Sciences of the University of Tunis. He teaches international contract law to the students of the master’s programme in International Business Law.

Dhafer is also an attorney in Tunisia, having practiced law since his admission to the Tunisian Bar in 2005. He is currently the proprietor of a law office in Tunis that offers legal services in several areas, such as arbitration, private international law, corporate law, banking and finance.

Dhafer has authored numerous academic articles published in local and regional revues and books. Dhafer has been invited as a speaker to several symposia and events addressing significant legal issues relating to arbitration and private international law. He is a native speaker of Arabic and a fluent speaker of French and English.

Dhafer has held a number of positions in academic, research, and civil society organisations. In particular, he was a trainer at L’Institut Supérieur de la Magistrature (The Higher Institute of the Judiciary), L’Institut Supérieur de la Profession d’Avocat (The Higher Institute of the Legal Profession), and L’Ecole Nationale des Finances (The National School of Finance).

Dhafer was a member of the research commission at the University of Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines – University of Paris-Saclay and a member of the translation team of the Diplomatic Conference which adopted the Aircraft Protocol under the auspices of UNIDROIT. He is a vice-president of the Tunisian Association for ADR.

Dhafer participated in several academic trainings and summer programmes offered by globally-renowned institutions abroad. He was a visiting researcher at UNIDROIT from December 2007 to January 2008 and an independent researcher at the same institution from November to December 2005. In the summer of 2006, he took the summer course at The Hague Academy of International Law. In the summer of 2007, he took part in the intensive training offered by the International Training Centre for Human Rights and Peace Teaching in Strasbourg. Over the same summer, he also took the summer course of the Human Rights Institute in Strasbourg.

Allan M. Mukuki, PhD Candidate (Navarra, Spain), LLM (Groningen, Netherlands), PGDip (KSL), LLB (Hons) (UoN), ACIArb (London), Advocate of the High Court of Kenya .

phd in private international law

Some of his many roles in the legal profession include Director of International Partnerships; a Doctoral Fellow; member of the Management Committee and moot court coordinator, all for Strathmore Law School; Research Fellow for the African Region (Kenya), for the European Research Council Grant Project on the interpretation of customary international law; and Acting Director for the Strathmore Institute of Advanced Studies in International Criminal Justice (SIASIC) Allan has previously worked at A.F Gross Advocate; in various legal institutes; in governmental agencies and in the Judiciary of Kenya. He was also a Legal researcher in the Office of the Solicitor General, Kenya, for the Maritime Delimitation in the Indian Ocean (Somalia v. Kenya), a case that was before the International Court of Justice. His main areas of specialization include Public International Law, The Law of International Organizations, International Humanitarian Law, International and Regional (EAC) Refugee Law and Legal Policy Development. Further, Allan has been involved in various national and international legal consultancies and projects; he has published several peer reviewed legal articles, a legal monograph and presented several legal papers in international conferences around the world. He has also developed several policy documents for Strathmore University as well as (currently operational) manuals and laws for the operation of the Judiciary as well as governmental agencies and regional agencies such as IGAD.

ANDREA SANTACOLOMA Director

phd in private international law

PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE

Andrea Santacoloma is a Panamanian lawyer that focuses her practice on international commercial arbitration.

Prior to joining Adell & Merizalde, Andrea was the Deputy Director for Latin America of the ICC International Court of Arbitration for 5 years. In this role, she gained vast experience in the internal functioning of the ICC’s Secretariat and Court and saw first-hand the work of hundreds of arbitrators and ICC Court Members in the region. Andrea was also in charge of identifying new opportunities and potential users of the ICC Dispute Resolution Services (ICC DRS) in Latin America, in liaison with the ICC National Committees and other institutions in the region. She also worked as a lawyer advising local and international clients on business and corporate law and M&A in 3 Panamanian law firms.

She is currently the Executive Director of the Latin American Arbitration Association (ALARB), one of Latin America’s leading associations gathering practitioners and arbitrators, which seeks to encourage the use of arbitration and foster initiatives for the development of international arbitration in the region.

In July 2022, the G

overning Council of the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (UNIDROIT) appointed Andrea as a Correspondent for Latin America. Namely, Andrea was appointed as a Correspondent for the Republic of Panama for the period 2022-2025.

• American University Washington College of Law, LL.M. in International Arbitration and Business Law • International Training Centre of the International Labor Organization (ILO) jointly with the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL), Università degli Studi di Torino, and University Institute of European Studies (IUSE), LL.M. in International Trade Law & Dispute Resolution • Universidad Católica Santa María La Antigua, LL.M. in Corporate Law • Universidad Católica Santa María La Antigua, Degree in Law and Political Science • Centro de Estudios Regionales de Panamá, Diploma in Entrepreneurship and Management of Small and Medium Enterprises

Bar admissions Republic of Panama

Languages Spanish, English, Italian (intermediate)

[email protected] +507 370 4155

Lawyer and Notary Public dedicated to the area of corporate and international business law, founder of Iurisconsulti, Abogados y Notarios. Attorney-at-law and Notary Public with a Degree in Juridical and Social Sciences graduate from Francisco Marroquin University (Guatemala City, Guatemala). Masters of Law LL.M graduate from Columbia University (New York City). Arbitrator in several arbitrations carried out in Guatemalan arbitration centers and abroad. Professor of General Contract Theory, Commercial Contracts, and International Businness Law at the Faculty of Law of the Francisco Marroquín University. Expert witness in Guatemalan law in several cases before USA courts. Associate member of the International Academy of Comparative Law. Guatemalan expert appointed within the project of the Organization of American States (OAS) for the drafting of the “Guide on Applicable Law for International Commercial Contracts in the Americas” (2017). Guatemalan expert appointed within the Lucerna Project of the Hague Principles on the choice of applicable law in the field of International commercial contracts (2017). Guatemalan correspondent of the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (UNIDROIT 2022). Member of the group that participated in the translation of the English version into Spanish of “Unidroit Principles on International Commercial Contracts”, Edited by the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (Unidroit) Rome, Italy (2018). Observer in several meetings of the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale Of Goods, Advisory Counsel (CISG-AC) (2015-2022). Guatemalan delegate to the United Nations Commission for International Trade Law (UNCITRAL) (2014-2015; 2021-2022). Member of the group that worked in the drafting of the Principles of Latin American Contract Law (2015-2017). Full member of The Asociación Americana de Derecho Internacional Privado (American Association on Private International Law).

Doctor of Law, Professor at Private International Law Department of the Institute of International Relations of Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. Oleksandr Biryukov successfully defended in Kyiv National University dissertations on Comparative Insolvency in 1999 and on Cross-Border Insolvency in 2010.

He is a proven legal consultant with extensive experience working in international projects in Ukraine funded by USAID, TACIS/European Commission, the World Bank, WTO, EBRD, DFID etc. He participated in drafting the Model Laws for CIS on Securities Market (1998-2000) and the Discussion paper in the frame of preparation of the Model law on Insolvency of Banks for CIS (2003-2004); was a member in the Governmental Delegation of Ukraine at Diplomatic conference convened in 2008 by Switzerland Confederation to discuss and adopt UNIDROIT Convention on Intermediated Securities (now is Geneva Securities Convention).

Dr. Biryukov is a bankruptcy specialist, scientist, consultant to the IMF (Ukraine, 2017-2018) and the World Bank (Kazakhstan, 2012-2018). Being a member to the World Bank Insolvency and Creditor/Debtor Regimes Task Force he was involved in preparation of the Report on the Treatment of the Insolvency of Natural Persons.

Prof. Biryukov teaches a number of private law university courses, including Private International Law, Bankruptcy, Cross-Border Insolvency, Comparative Securities Law and other.

He is a Fulbright Scholar (New York University School of Law, USA, 2000-2001). In 1996 Biryukov conducted a research at UNIDROIT and in 2009 received a grant from INSOL International to carry out research in the field of comparative and international bankruptcy.

He authored a number of publications, including a book Law and Legal System of Ukraine (JURIS Publishing Inc., 2005), a chapter Recent Bankruptcy Law Developments in Ukraine in Contemporary Issues on Public International and Comparative Law (Vandeplas Publishing Co., 2009), a brochure Research Guide to Ukrainian Law (NYU Globalex Journal, 2006), and more than 120 publications devoted to private law reform in Ukraine.

phd in private international law

NAME: PROF. DR. HERNANY VEYTIA (LL.M. YALE) AFFILIATION DIRECTOR BNM-CAMBRIDGE STUDY CENTRE ON SUSTAINABLE INVESTMENTS PRESENTATION Professor of law, international strategic consultant, arbitrator, and entrepreneur. Hernany Veytia is very comfortable with complex, high-profile and confidential transactions. Her consulting experience as partner of BNM and Deloitte enables her to focus on and add value to the sustainable and commercial aspects of each deal. Frequently she leads transdisciplinary teams to deliver fact findings and legal opinions, feasibility studies and turn-key projects for banks, governments, international organisations, and corporations willing to expand or withdraw operations in other jurisdictions. In Prof Veytia’s experience UNIDROIT works have been very useful to understand not only the foreign law, but also to recognise the cultural, political, and economic factors at play, and the way national and international regulators operate-and cooperate. In her opinion, UNIDROIT instruments have been of utmost importance for the legal strategies she designed for: • DANPREIT (Dispute Analytics Platform for Real Estate Investment Trusts in the Agriculture, Construction and Mining industries). • TELEKAIROS, innovative methodology that incorporates the use of space assets. • Corporate art collections, restitutions, including donations, sponsorships, and loans to museums. • Contracts used by a German waterworks company willing to grow in all the Caribbean and Central American countries. • Liquidation of commercial and investment banks • IPOs and reverse mergers for companies in the extraction industries (Canadian stock exchange), ILS listed in Bermuda and African sovereign funds listed in London. • Franchising and other commercial contracts in the food & drinks, health, aero-space, and automotive industries. In the last three decades Prof. Veytia has lived, and successfully completed investments and disinvestments in more than forty countries in the five Continents. She is frequently appointed as arbitrator and invited as speaker on risk transfers at international industry conferences in fields of her expertise: energy (both renewable and traditional), artificial intelligence, infrastructure, mining, real estate, agriculture, rail, space, automotive, and franchising. She sits in the board of directors of companies in Europe including the United Kingdom.

Suzanne Howarth is an Australian legal practitioner admitted to legal practice in New South Wales, the Australian Capital Territory as well as in England and Wales. Suzanne holds undergraduate and graduate law degrees from the Universities of Sydney and Melbourne, is a graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Director and an accredited mediator.

Suzanne joined the Australian Public Service in 1992. Before joining the Service, Suzanne worked with two major law firms in Sydney and in the City of London in the areas of insurance, international trade, and dispute resolution.

Since 2020, Suzanne has been an Executive Member of the International Law Section of the Law Council of Australia. For over two decades, Suzanne has worked as a senior Australian Government lawyer in various Australian central government agencies as well as the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission. Suzanne’s areas of expertise include government and public administration, competition and consumer law, corporate law, public and international law, trade and investment, taxation, and the regulation of not for profits.

Juliana is a lecturer in Private International Law at the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. Her main areas of research and teaching are international trade law, European competition law and international family law. In relation to the former, she is the author of 3 monographs, one of them on “Régimen jurídico de la abogacía internacional” (2003), another on “Abordaje marítimo y litigación internacional” (2007) and the third one on “Contratos internacionales de distribución comercial en el Derecho Internacional Privado de la Unión Europea” (2013). She has also published on international factoring contracts, international insolvency and international commercial and investment arbitration. With regard to European competition law, she is co-author of the monograph “La doctrina de las infraestructuras esenciales en Derecho antitrust europeo” (2012) and has also written on other issues related to this subject, such as the influence of Big Data on anti-competitive behaviour. Finally, within the last line of research mentioned, she is the author of a fifth monograph on ” Relaciones económicas de los matrimonios y las uniones registradas en España, antes y después de los Reglamentos (UE) 2016/1103 y 2016/1104″ (2019) and has publications on international successions and free movement of persons, among other subjects. She has been Commissioner of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, European Union and Cooperation of the Government of Spain, as delegate of Spain at the 51st Session of UNCITRAL and is a Member of the European Association of Private International Law – EAPIL- and has been part of the working group of this association created to draft the future European Regulation on Real Rights. Her current research focuses on the legal issues raised by new technologies, including intellectual property rights in the metaverse and digital assets.

Maria Hook is an Associate Professor at the University of Otago (Faculty of Law). Her main area of expertise is private international law, particularly in the New Zealand context. She is a joint author of The Conflict of Laws in New Zealand (LexisNexis, 2020).

Dr. Radwa Elsaman’s area of expertise includes commercial law, international comparative law, international sustainable development and the rule of law. She focuses mainly on the MENA region. In addition to being an Assistant Professor of Law at Cairo University in Egypt, she has lectured and conducted academic research at prominent universities throughout the United States, such as Cornell University School of Law and Boston University School of Law, and the Central European University in Europe.

With 20 years of experience, Dr. Elsaman is well known for assisting governments and private sector entities with legal and institutional reform. She has consulted for USAID on projects, including Automating Economic Courts in Egypt and Economic Stabilization Support for Syria. With the IDLO, she advised on Strengthening the Capacity of National Partners in Economic Laws and Capacity Building of Jordanian judges. Similarly, she advised the European Investment Bank on Improving Access to Finance by Facilitating SMEs’ Business Expansion. Moreover, she acted as a legal expert at the EU Euromed Justice Project. With the World Bank Group, she consulted on land and property projects in MENA. She was also engaged with other organizations, including the GIZ and the AFD. Between 2006 and 2015, Dr. Elsaman worked for international law firms, including Dentons and DLA Piper, where she represented clients in regulatory and transactional matters.

Her publications have appeared in worldwide-law journals. Currently, she contributes to the Cambridge Handbook on Comparative Law. Her book on “Comparative Franchising Law: United States, China, Malaysia, MENA Region” has been chosen as one of the six best books on franchising globally. She is a member of various professional global unions and is licensed to practice law in multiple jurisdictions. She got her LL.B. from Cairo University School of Law; an LL.M. from the IMO’s International Maritime Law Institute, a second LL.M. and J.S.D (PhD in Law), from the American University Washington College of Law.

Stefan Vogenauer has been teaching an intensive masters course in ‘Global Commercial Contract Law’ as a Senior Research Fellow at the University of Melbourne since 2012. He also taught the BCL/MJur options ‘Transnational Commercial Law’ and ‘International Commercial Arbitration’ at the University of Oxford, where he served as Professor of Comparative Law and Director of the Institute of European and Comparative Law from 2003 to 2015. He has taught and lectured widely in many European countries and has held Visiting Professorships at NYU Law School, the University of Auckland, the University of Paris 2, the University of Texas at Austin, Louisiana State University, National Taiwan University and National Law University Delhi.

Apart from legal history, his main research interests are in comparative private law, contract law and transnational commercial law. He is an expert in contract law where he has worked extensively on national laws (English, French and German) and on comparative, European and transnational aspects. He is the sole editor of the Commentary on the UNIDROIT Principles of International Commercial Contracts (PICC) (2nd edn, Oxford University Press 2015), a standard reference work in the field. He is also a co-author of the leading student textbook in comparative contract law, the Ius Commune Casebook for the Common Law of Europe: Cases, Materials and Text on Contract Law (3rd edn, Hart Publishing 2019). His co-authored monograph on contracts written in English but governed by another law (Englisch als Vertragssprache) was published with CH Beck in 2018.

From 2017, Professor Vogenauer served as a member of the panel of experts for the drafting of the ‘tripartite’ Legal Guide to Uniform Instruments in the Area of International Commercial Contracts, with a Focus on Sales, published jointly by UNCITRAL, the Hague Conference and UNIDROIT.

Prof. Amnon Lehavi (J.S.D, LL.M, Yale) is Full Professor at the Harry Radzyner Law School, Reichman University, Israel, and former Dean of the Law School (2016-2021). He acts as Academic Director of the G City Real Estate Institute at Reichman University. Prof. Lehavi is a member of UNIDROIT’s Exploratory Expert Group on “Private Art Collections: Orphan Objects.” He also served as Co-President of the Law Schools Global League (2018-2021). Prof. Lehavi was a visiting professor at the University of Toronto (Canada), University of California, Berkeley (USA), Tilburg University (the Netherlands), KU Leuven (Belgium), and Luiss University (Italy).

An expert on property law, urban law and policy, cultural property, international economic law, and law and globalization, Prof. Lehavi is the author of Property Law in a Globalizing World (Cambridge UP, 2019) and The Construction of Property: Norms, Institutions, Challenges (Cambridge UP, 2013), and the editor of Disruptive Technology, Legal Innovation, and the Future of Real Estate (Springer, 2020), One Hundred Years of Zoning and the Future of Cities (Springer, 2018), and Private Communities and Urban Governance: Theoretical and Comparative Perspectives (Springer, 2016).

Email: [email protected]; Twitter: @Alehavi; ORCID iD: 0000-0002-7976-9546.

I discovered UNIDROIT’s work through the study on Transport Terminals [when writing on OTT UN Convention (1991)]. Afterwards the Principles on International Commercial Contracts (Chapter 6, within a volume devoted to the Principles under my coordination, and Chapter 9.1, in Bonell Fs). I directed (and still I am mentoring) Master’s and PhD students’ research to deep in documents ending up in ULIS, to get a better CISG understanding on different CISG Articles (e.g., 7, 25, 78 and 79). With a group of students, we translated to Spanish the Guide to International Master Franchise Arrangements 1st. edition. Lastly, with a group of University colleagues and other bank experts we sent comments on Model Law on Factoring and on Principles on Digital Assets within the last four months or so. Apart from UNIDROIT’s works, but on international trade law area, I have had the benefit to represent Spain in UNCITRAL (1989-2014). There, I chaired the Plenary (1994) and two working groups: NIEO (1993-1994, while drafting Model Law on Procurement of Goods, Construction and Services, 1994) and the one on International Contract Practices (1995-2001) during the Convention on Assignment of Receivables on International Trade (2001) preparation. I was member of the Spain Delegation in Working Group V, dealing with Insolvency Law (2001-2014), and Working Group III (2001-2008) when drafting Rotterdam Rules. Consequently, my publications are within that ambits. In Spanish Law I wrote on Companies, Commercial Registry, Loans (with particular attention to interests’ debt in it and in other credit contracts, also on lack of timely payment). I was granted (DAAD, A. v Humboldt S. and Salvador de Madariaga) to research periods (three years in a sum) in MPI (Hamburg). I coach my University students’ teams to Willem C Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot and to MOOTmadrid.

Walter Doralt has his main research interests in Civil Law, European Private Law, and Company Law, with methods drawing on Comparative Law (Austria, Germany, England, France, Italy and Switzerland) as well as Law and Economics. His habilitation (Bucerius Law School) dealt with Long Term Contracts.

María Belén Moreno is an upcoming lawyer focusing on international commercial and investment arbitration cases. She works in the Dispute Resolution Department, mainly representing national and international clients in commercial arbitrations before the Centro de Arbitraje y Mediación Paraguay (CAMP), Paraguay’s only arbitration institution, and in ad hoc arbitration proceedings. Belén is a newly admitted member to the Arbitrator list of CIACBLP (Centro Internacional de Arbitraje – Cámara de Bélgica y Luxemburgo en el Perú). She was a part of the National University of Asuncion´s commercial arbitration moot team as an oralist, receiving an honorable mention at the Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot in 2015. Ever since, she has been coaching the University´s moot teams in the Latin America moot and the Willem C. Vis Moot. Belen has an LL.M. from Georgetown University and has graduated with academic honors as part of the Dean’s List 2020. She also earned a Certificate in International Arbitration and Dispute Resolution.

Fabián is a Senior Associate in the area of Litigation and Arbitration.

His practice focuses on Construction and Infrastructure Law, Public-Private Partnerships, Concessions, Public and Private International Law, Free Trade and Investment Treaties, International Contracting, Civil, Corporate, Administrative, and the resolution of disputes through Domestic and International Arbitration and Dispute Boards in the aforementioned areas of law. Fabián works on disputes related to the sectors and/or industries of construction and infrastructure, airports and ports, insurance, banking and finance, energy, and foreign investment.

Fabián has large experience advising and/or representing government agencies and companies in domestic and international arbitrations under different arbitration rules (ICC, UNCITRAL, LCIA, ICSID, etc.).

Fabián completed an internship at a law firm in Chile in the area of International Contracts and International Arbitration. He completed a period of training and academic research on the relationship between International Investment Arbitration and the law and jurisprudence of the World Trade Organization, specializing in non-discrimination clauses in both their substantive and procedural form in international economic law, at the Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law in Heidelberg, Germany as part of his LL.M.

Fabián is Arbitrator and Secretary of Arbitral Tribunal of the Conciliation and Arbitration Center of Tegucigalpa Chamber of Commerce and Industry. He is also Arbitrator of the Arbitration Center of México (CAM), Ibero-American Arbitration Center (CIAR), Institution for the Resolution of Disputes on Blockchain and Technology (IBT) and is part of the list of potential Arbitrators of the General Secretariat of the Madrid International Arbitration Center (CIAM). He has had experience for several years as a professor and participates regularly as a participant as well as speaker or lecturer in forums, colloquiums, training courses and international workshops on different subjects. He is fluent in Spanish, English and French. Basic knowledge of German (level A1 CEFR).

My main areas of expertise related to the work of UNIDROIT include international commercial contracts and secured transactions, as well as international civil procedure and private international law.

Dyalá Jiménez is a Costa Rican national who specializes in conflict resolution. She is frequently appointed as arbitrator in international treaty-based and contract-based disputes, both under institutional rules and ad hoc procedures. She is also trained in mediation by ICSID/CEDR and acts as conciliator in local complex disputes.

She is a member of the ICSID panel of conciliators and arbitrators for Costa Rica and of the ICC International Court of Arbitration. Dyalá is also a member of the International Council for Commercial Arbitration (ICCA) Governing Board.

In terms of her academic background, she is a Fulbright Scholar and alumnus of Georgetown University Law Center (LLM ‘99) and is author of numerous publications (visit www.djarbitraje.com). She has teaching experience in Costa Rica (Lead University, 2017) and in Chile (Universidad de Chile undergraduate and the Heidelberg/Universidad de Chile LLM Program, from 2004 to 2013). Dyalá is also the correspondent for Costa Rica of the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law, UNIDROIT.

From 2018 to 2020, Dyalá served as Minister of Foreign Trade of Costa Rica and in such capacity was charged with public policy on exports and foreign direct investment. In that role, she also led the country’s efforts to become the 38th member of the OECD, which included passing 14 laws of varied complexity and sensibility. During those two years Dyalá had to tackle a diversity of disputes including frictions with trade partners, obstacles in land transportation, challenges arising out of the Pandemic, strike on the ports, among others.

Dyalá is a member of the board of directors of Costa Rica’s investment promotion agency, CINDE, and served on the board of the local Chamber of Commerce.

Dyalá has lived in Washington, DC, Paris and Santiago (Chile) and works in Spanish, English, French and Portuguese.

Doctor of Law and Social Sciences, University of the Republic (1978); Professor of Private International Law at the University of the Republic (1984-) and at the Catholic University of Uruguay (1994-2017); Member of the Uruguayan Institute of Private International Law (1984-) and Director (2017-2021); Professor at the Uruguayan Centre of Judicial Studies (2017-). Visiting professor at several universities and institutions in foreign countries, professor at the Hague Academy of International Law (2015).

Author of 26 books and 175 chapters in books and articles published in Uruguay and abroad. Some of the main ones are La Autonomía de la Voluntad en la Contratación Internacional, Montevideo, FCU, 1991 (Thesis); Curso de Derecho del Transporte, Montevideo, coauthor Fernando Aguirre Ramírez, FCU, 8 volumes, several editions (1999-2011); Curso de Derecho Internacional Privado, Montevideo, FCU, 3 volumes, several editions (2001-2015); “Public Policy: Common Principles in the American States”, Recueil des cours, Vol. 379 (2016), Leiden/Boston, Brill Nijhoff, 2016, pp. 73-396; Legal Aspects of Cruises, Editor and author of the General Report, Ius Comparatum – Global Studies in Comparative Law, Volume 56, Switzerland, Springer, 2022; Derecho Internacional Privado. Parte General. Jurisdicción estatal y arbitral, Tomo I, 1st ed., Montevideo, FCU, 2022; Derecho Internacional Privado. Parte Especial Civil y Comercial, Tomo II, 1st ed., Montevideo, FCU, 2022; Derecho Internacional Privado. Parte Especial Civil y Comercial, Tomo III, 1st ed., Montevideo, FCU, 2022.

Lecturer and panelist in more than 150 seminars, conferences and workshops.

Research activities: Fulbright scholarship, University of California at Davis (1988); at UNIDROIT (1998); at the University of the Republic, Uruguay, and at foreign universities. Professional experience as external Consultant on Private International Law matters to several Uruguayan and foreign law firms and institutions and as arbitrator. Main areas of expertise related to the work of UNIDROIT: international contracts, international family law issues, cross border insolvency, international procedural issues, access to justice.

Mr Forrest is a Professor of Law and the Director of the Marine and Shipping Law Unit at the University of Queensland. He teaches maritime law, private international law and cultural heritage law and has a broad research interest in the unification of private maritime law. His most recent book is, with Professor Nick Gaskell, The Law of Wreck (2019, Informa Law). His current work involves UNIDROIT’S implementation of the Cape Town Convention on International Interests in Mobile Equipment, and particular, the possibility of adopting a Protocol addressing ships and maritime transport equipment. He also has an interest in cultural heritage and the current Private Art Collection’s project.

Professor Pilar Perales Viscasillas is the Chair of Commercial Law at Carlos III University of Madrid (UC3M). She acts as a national and international arbitration in commercial law disputes. Author of seven monographs in matters related to international sale of goods contracts, uniform law of international trade, commercial contract law, company law, insurance and arbitration, as well as more than 150 publications in collective and periodical works, several of them in English. Many of her publications relates to various Unidroit Legal instruments. Professor Perales Viscasillas is the current Chair of the CISG-AC (Advisory Council on the Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods) (2003) and Council Rapporteur of Opinion No. 4; she was an observer in the Working Group for the preparation of the third and fourth editions of the UNIDROIT Principles on International Commercial Contracts (2010 and 2016) (2007-2010 and 2017). She has been Spanish Delegate to the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL-UNCITRAL) (2001-2014) in Working Group II on International Commercial Arbitration, and Spanish correspondent for CLOUT (2002-2017). She participated in the working group that drafted The UNCITRAL, HCCH, and UNIDROIT, Legal Guide to uniform instruments in the area of international commercial contracts, with a focus on sales. Member of the Plenary of the Centro Internacional de Arbitraje de Madrid (CIAM) and Council member of The Spanish Club of Arbitration. Member of the Executive Board of SEAIDA (The Spanish Branch of AIDA, Association Internationale de Droit des Assurances). Co-Chair of the Cátedra de Derecho Empresarial Deloitte Legal.

She is also Director of the Moot Madrid , where usually UNIDROIT Legal texts are used; and co-Director of the Master on International Advocacy (UC3M).

Bernardo is a partner at Parra Rodríguez Abogados (Colombia) with more than 35 years of legal experience. Bernardo assists national and international clients in aviation regulatory matters, structured finance transactions, M&A operations, asset-based-financing, cross-border transactions and aircraft financing transactions under the Cape Town Convention.

Bernardo represents world-leading international airlines and financial institutions. His experience includes aircraft operating and financial leases, asset purchase and sale transactions, cross-border financing transactions, private placement transactions, secured loans and issuance of notes, among others.

Bernardo has also participated in some of the major M&A and financing transactions in Colombia, such as the financing of the Medellin Metro, the acquisition of Central, North and South Cerrejón, the acquisition of Bell South assets in Colombia, the establishment of Carrefour in Colombia and the first private placement abroad by the major Colombian airline, amongst others.

Furthermore, Bernardo is a member of the Aviation Working Group (“AWG”) legal panel and legal coordinator of the AWG Colombian National Contact Group.

Bernardo is a 1986 lawyer from Universidad de los Andes (Bogotá, Colombia). In 1988 he obtained an LL.M in International Business Law from London School of Economics and Political Science in London, England.

Edgardo Muñoz is a leading voice in the field of international business law as a member of Universidad Panamericana’s law faculty in Guadalajara, Mexico, from where he frequently contributes in specialized publications and discussion forums.

Besides his academic commitments, he practices in the area of international contracting and arbitration. He sits as arbitrator in international forums and represents clients in commercial and sport proceedings. He is a Member of the Court of Arbitration for Sports [CAS] and of the Appeal Tribunal of the International Gymnastics Federation.

Edgardo Muñoz is also a Member of the CISG Advisory Council and Correspondent of UNIDROIT in Mexico.

He received his Bachelor of Laws from Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico, and Master of Laws degree (LLM) from University of Liverpool in the U.K. and a second Master of Laws degree (LL.M) University of California in Berkeley. His Doctor of Laws degree (PhD) suma cum laude is from University of Basel in Switzerland.

Dr Teresa Rodriguez de las Heras Ballell is an Associate Professor of Commercial Law at University Carlos III of Madrid, Spain.

She is currently an Academic Visitor at the University of Cambridge, and was Sir Roy Goode Scholar at UNIDROIT in 2021-2022. The topics addressed during these appointments have been: secured transactions, effective enforcement, and digital assets.

Asset-based finance and secured transactions, specially, the international legal harmonization instruments are one of her main areas of expertise with a significant level of specialization in the Cape Town Convention system. Within this remit, she was member of the Study Group for the MAC Protocol and delegate of Spain in the Diplomatic Conference, as well as an observer and a delegate of Spain at UNCITRAL for WG VI on secured transactions.

Digital law and technology-related private-law matters (platforms, AI, data, digital assets, algorithmic contracts) are her second area of primary research, expertise, and international experience. She is delegate of Spain at UNCITRAL WG IV on ecommerce (AI in international trade), and an Expert for UNCITRAL and UNIDROIT on digital economy projects. She is also member of the European Commission Expert Group on Liability and New Technologies, the EU Expert Group for the Observatory on Online Platform Economy, and the EU Expert Group on B2B Data Sharing and Cloud Computing. She is member of the European Law Institute (ELI) Executive Committee and Council and author of the ELI Guiding Principles on Automated Decision Making in Europe, 2022.

She is an arbitrator at the Madrid Court of Arbitration and the Spanish Court of Arbitration. She has acted as an arbitrator in a variety of commercial disputes, mostly financial agreements, and banking contracts, as well as commercial contracts in general (agency, distribution, service agreements). Besides, she held a European Central Bank scholarship to prepare a report on FinTech regulation. So, she is also specialized in financial regulation.

I discovered UNIDROIT’s work through the study on Transport Terminals (when writing on Operators of Transport Terminals UN Convention). Afterwards the Principles on International Commercial Contracts (Chapter 6, within a volume devoted to the Principles under my coordination, and Chapter 9.1, in Bonell Fs, as a sequel from Assignment of Receivables UN Convention publications). I directed (and still I am mentoring) Master’s and PhD students’ research to deep in different aspects of the documents ending up in ULIS, to get a better CISG understanding on different CISG Articles (e.g., 7, 25, 78 and 79). In that documentary precedents vein one of the PHD students is digging on the documents related to Hotel Keepers and Travel Agencies. With a group of students, we translated to Spanish the Guide to International Master Franchise Arrangements 1st. edition. Lastly, with a group of University colleagues and other bank experts we send comments on Model Law on Factoring and on Principles on Digital Assets within the last four months or so.

Mr. Alvaro Galindo is an International Counsel advising on dispute resolution matters, particularly those involving Latin American jurisdictions. Currently, he is the Dean of the Law School at Universidad de las Americas and partner at Carmigniani Perez Abogados. His practice focuses on disputes between sovereign states and state-owned entities and private companies. He has been recognized by The Legal 500 Latin America and was noted in this publication as “outstandingly intelligent” and for his “incomparable capacity for coordinating, planning, strategic assessment, and for his diplomatic approach”. He was as member of the international arbitration practice at Dechert LLP in Washington, D.C. He also served as the Director of the International Affairs and Arbitration Unit for the Republic of Ecuador’s Attorney General Office. He acted as a legal consultant for the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) in Washington, D.C., and as regional director for the Latin American Development Corporation, where he coordinated the committee in charge of drafting the Arbitration Law of Ecuador. Mr. Galindo has significant teaching experience in the areas of dispute resolution, international investment, and arbitration law. He has authored numerous publications and articles related to arbitration and international investment law. Currently, he is an Adjunct Professor at Georgetown University Law Center, with a course on Advanced Topics in International Investment Arbitration and Adjunct Professor of Practical Aspects of Arbitration (Spanish course) at American University Washington College of Law. Mr. Galindo has represented sovereign states in international and regional forums: the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, UNCTAD; the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law, UNCITRAL. Member of the Court of the ICC International Court of Arbitration and arbitrator in various arbitration centers in Latin America. In September 2021, he was appointed to the list of arbitrators under the ICSID Convention.

Professor Mads Bryde Andersen (b. 1958) is a professor of private law at the Univer¬sity of Copenhagen. He is the author, or editor, of several books and articles in his field of contracts and obligations, intellectual property law and computer and high tech¬nology law. His authorship includes “Lærebog i Obligationsret I” (The law of Obligations, I, 5th edition, 2020), “Dansk Pensionsret” (Danish Pension Law, 2nd edition, 2017, with Jesper Mark), “Grund¬læggende aftaleret” (Basic Contract Law, 5th edition, 2021), “Enkelte transaktioner” (Commercial Transactions, 5th edition 2022), “Praktisk aftaleret” (Contract Law in Practice, 5th edition 2019), “Advokatretten” (The law of Advocates, 2nd edition, 2022, with Lars Lindencrone Petersen), “IT-retten” (The law of IT, 2nd edition, 2005) and “Ret og metode” (Legal Method, 2002). He has published numerous academic articles and anthologies. Since 2003 he has been the editor-in-chief of the most prestigious Danish legal periodical Ugeskrift for Retsvæsen, section B (The Weekly Law Report).

For a number of years Professor Andersen was the Danish delegation to UNCITRAL. From 1997 to 1998 he chaired the UNCITRAL working group on Electronic Commerce. He has been involved in a number of working groups within the OECD dealing with security and consumer issues of the information society and was the head of the Danish delegation during the OECD talks on encryption policy (1995-1996). From 2003 to 2012 he was co-chair and later chair of the Danish Guarantee Fund for Depositors and Investors.

Professor Andersen is a frequently used arbitrator in domestic and international arbitration matters and has been involved in more than 150 arbitration cases, either as chairperson, sole arbitrator or co-arbitrator.

Professor Andersen’s office address is:

UNIVERSITY OF COPENHAGEN, FACULTY OF LAW KAREN BLIXENS PLADS 16 (6A-3-26) 2300 COPENHAGEN S Denmark Mobile Phone +45 4058 0925 E-mail [email protected]

Tim Schnabel served as the U.S. head of delegation for the negotiation of the UNIDROIT Principles on the Operation of Close-Out Netting Provisions, the initial work on the MAC Protocol to the Cape Town Convention, and the Preparatory Commission for the Space Protocol to the Cape Town Convention. He led U.S. participation in several UNCITRAL projects, including the Singapore Mediation Convention, the Mauritius Transparency Convention, the Model Law on Enterprise Group Insolvency, the Model Law on Recognition and Enforcement of Insolvency-Related Judgments, and the initial work on reform of investor-state dispute settlement. He also participated in the negotiation of the Hague Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Judgments in Civil or Commercial Matters. He now serves as the Executive Director of the Uniform Law Commission, which has worked within the United States since 1892 to draft and seek enactment of state legislation on topics for which uniformity of state law is useful and feasible. Uniform acts developed by the ULC, which have been enacted over 6,000 times by state legislatures, include the Uniform Commercial Code and hundreds of other acts related to real property, trusts and estates, family law, civil procedure, emerging technologies, unincorporated organizations, and other areas of law.

Ana Filipa Vrdoljak is the UNESCO Chair in International Law and Cultural Heritage and Professor of Law, University of Technology Sydney. She has taught international law, cultural heritage law, human rights law, and international humanitarian law in Europe, Asia and Oceania, the Americas, and Middle East. She has been Fernand Braudel Senior Fellow (2017), Marie Curie Fellow (2006-2008) and Jean Monnet Fellow (2004-2006), Law Department European University Institute, Florence. She holds a Doctor of Philosophy (in Law) from the University of Sydney.

Professor Vrdoljak is the author of International Law, Museums and the Return of Cultural Objects (Cambridge University Press, 1e 2006 and 2008, 2e forthcoming) and editor of Oxford Handbook on International Cultural Heritage Law with Francesco Francioni (Oxford University Press 2020), and Oxford Commentary on the 1970 UNESCO and 1995 UNIDROIT Conventions with Andrzej Jakubowski and Alessandro Chechi (Oxford University Press, forthcoming 2023). She is a General Editor, with Francesco Francioni, of the Oxford Commentaries on International Cultural Heritage Law (Oxford University Press) and book series, Cultural Heritage Law and Policy (Oxford University Press). She is President of the International Cultural Property Society (U.S.) and Chair of the Management Committee, International Journal of Cultural Property (Cambridge University Press).

Professor Vrdoljak is a member of UNIDROIT’s 1995 UNIDROIT Convention Academic Project (UCAP) and member of the UNIDROIT Export Group on Orphan Works. She is a member of UNESCO Expert Group preparing Model Provisions for the 1970 UNESCO Convention. She has served on expert panels for UNESCO, UNIDROIT, European Commission and the OHCHR. She has been a member of the ILA’s Cultural Heritage Committee since 2008. She has been a Barrister and Solicitor of the High Court and Federal Courts of Australia since 1997, and Supreme Court of New South Wales since 1992.

Petra is a German and New Zealand qualified lawyer. Her main areas of research are international commercial law, in particular international commercial contracts and international dispute resolution, and human rights. Currently she focuses especially on access to commercial justice issues and issues in relation to cross-border contracting by MSMEs. Petra is a law reform specialist. She has, inter alia, lead two Commonwealth projects: an inquiry into judicial diversity in Commonwealth small states and regarding international commercial arbitration in the Commonwealth. She is also the director of the Institute of Small and Micro States. The aim of the Institute is to provide a platform for research and law reform regarding issues pertinent to small states.

phd in private international law

Anna Veneziano is the Deputy Secretary General of the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (UNIDROIT). She is a Professor of Comparative Law at the University of Teramo, Italy, where she was formerly the Director of the Department of Private Law. She has also formerly been a tenured Professor of European Property Law at the University of Amsterdam (UvA). Her education includes a Law Degree with honours from the University of Rome La Sapienza, an LL.M degree from the Yale Law School funded by a Fulbright scholarship, and a PhD degree from the University of Florence (Italy).

Her main research and publication areas are on secured transactions as well as international, comparative, and European contract and sales law. Before joining UNIDROIT she was a member of the Italian delegation with respect to the Cape Town Convention on International Interests on Mobile Equipment and its Aircraft Protocol as well as its Space Protocol. She was also a member of the Study Group on a European Civil Code and of the Compilation and Redaction Group on a Draft Common Frame of Reference on European Private Law (DCFR), and of the restricted Expert Group set up by the European Commission on a common European law on sales.

phd in private international law

Amongst other accolades to his professional experience, Professor Tirado is a founding member of the European Banking Institute, an International Fellow of the American College of Bankruptcy and has been Director and Academic Co-Chair of the International Insolvency Institute.

phd in private international law

Myrte Thijssen started her career in the Legal Service of the Dutch Central Bank (Supervision and Regulation Department). From 2015-19 she worked in the Legal Service of the Single Resolution Board, providing advice in banking crises and dealing with litigation before the Appeal Panel and the Court of Justice of the European Union. She studied at the University of Amsterdam and New York University. She has taught Corporate Law and Law of Bank Crisis Management at the University of Amsterdam and the University of Bologna respectively. She has published several articles in the field of banking and financial law with a particular focus on bank resolution.

phd in private international law

Prior to joining UNIDROIT, Michelle worked in the Department of Justice of Hong Kong, China, for over 10 years, advising and representing Hong Kong, China in various aspects of international law. Prior to that she worked in an international law firm, assisting leading companies and financial institutions in complex disputes. She has an LLB from the University of Hong Kong and LLM from New York University.

phd in private international law

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PhD thesis ‘Contractual Capacity in Private International Law'

On 30 June 2016, Eesa Fredericks is expected to defend his Ph.D.-thesis ‘Contractual Capacity in Private International Law’ in Leiden. Supervisors are prof. Sierd J. Schaafsma (Leiden) and prof. Jan Neels (Johannesburg).

Contractual Capacity in Private International Law contains a wide comparative study of reference rules in respect of the competence of a natural person to create rights and duties by concluding a contract with another (natural or juristic) person. In many common-law and mixed jurisdictions the legal position in this regard is remarkably unclear; it is nevertheless of significant practical importance. Sixty-five legal systems are investigated, from the civil-law, common-law and the mixed civil/common-law tradition, as located in Africa, Australasia, Europe, the Far East, the Middle East, North America and South America, together with all relevant regional, supranational and international instruments. The study leads to a detailed recommendation, which is presented in both a narrative and a codified form, in respect of the law that should govern contractual capacity. The proposed rules may be employed in the judicial interpretation, supplementation and development of the norm complex of private international law, particularly in common-law and mixed jurisdictions. They may also be considered for the purposes of future national, regional, supranational and international instruments.

  • private international law

University of South Florida

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Doctoral degree in politics and international affairs, overview and admissions.

The doctoral degree in politics and international affairs is an interdisciplinary program designed to prepare students to teach at the university and college levels and to conduct high-level research in the academic and nonacademic sectors. It combines a broad focus on international relations, comparative politics, American politics, and political theory with a critical understanding of institutions, rights, citizenship/identity, governance, global policy, and justice. Students work closely with faculty to frame their dissertation research and to advance their knowledge of their chosen fields of specialization. The program’s interdisciplinary approach to a variety of global issues provides a rich and open-ended opportunity to research current and past problems, movements, and transformations in politics.

Admission Requirements

We welcome your interest in our doctoral program. The department's deadline for fall admission is January 5 . The School of Interdisciplinary Global Studies only admits for the fall semester. Students must apply online through the Office of Graduate Admissions . For a listing of the admission requirements, students should consult the Graduate Catalog . 

*Effective starting with the 2023-2024 admissions cycle, GRE test scores are no longer required for applications to our doctoral program in Politics and International Affairs*

*International students should review the Office of Admissions International Students website for additional information and requirements.

*International students are also encouraged to contact the Office of International Services for information on visas, international travel, etc. 

PLEASE NOTE: International students whose native language is not English and who want to be considered for a teaching assistantship must show proficiency in spoken English even if their TOEFL has been waived for admission to a graduate program. More information on the TOEFL requirement can be found under Admission Requirements in the graduate catalog.

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Physical Address: Moscow 711 S. Rayburn Drive 208-885-6521 Boise 501 W Front St, Boise, ID 83702 208-364-4555

Email: [email protected]

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College of Law Library

Physical Address: 711 S. Rayburn Drive

Mailing Address: University of Idaho Law Library 875 Perimeter Drive, MS 2324 Moscow, ID 83844-2324

Phone: 208-885-6521

Idaho State Law Library

Physical Address: 501 W Front St, Boise, ID 83702

Mailing Address: Idaho State Law Library PO Box 83720-0051 Boise, ID 83720-0051

Phone: 208-364-4555

Web: Idaho State Law Library

  • International Law

Selected international legal materials are available online from several international bodies. In addition, we've provided a selection of research resources for your use.

  • Official U.N. Website
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  • Electronic Information System for International Law (EISIL)
  • Hieros Gamos
  • International Resources (Findlaw)
  • Law Library of Congress (Guide to law online)
  • Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law
  • bayefsky.com United Nations Human Rights Treaties
  • University of Minnesota Human Rights Library
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FIU News Homepage

FIU graduate programs among the best in the nation in U.S. News rankings

By Elizabeth Ferrer-Alfonso

April 9, 2024 at 10:09am

FIU’s International MBA program at FIU Business remains among the country's top-ranked programs, coming in at No. 2 among public universities, according to U.S. News and World Report rankings released Tuesday. Graduate programs in the Nicole Wertheim College of Nursing and Health Sciences , Robert Stempel College of Public Health and Social Work , Steven J. Green School of International & Public Affairs and the College of Law also were in the top 50 among public universities in U.S. News & World Report's 2024-2025 edition of Best Graduate Schools. Among public universities, the nursing master’s program ranked No. 21, the Doctor of Nursing Practice program ranked No. 30, the nursing anesthesia program ranked No. 33, and the occupational therapy program ranked No. 48. Public health ranked No. 35 among public schools. Green School programs that did well among public universities include global policy at No. 2, homeland security at No. 8, public finance at No. 18, public affairs at No. 38 and local government management at No. 15. The previously unranked urban policy program ranked No.16. Nationally, FIU Law ranked No. 68 (No. 37 among public universities). Its part-time law program was ranked No. 28 (No. 11 among public universities), the international law program was ranked No. 45 (No. 18 among public universities), and the trial advocacy program was ranked No. 52 (No. 18 among public universities). The college also ranked No. 71 in legal writing (No. 36 among public universities), and No. 94 (No. 49 among public universities) in environmental law. “FIU’s ongoing rise reaffirms our dedication to excellence and impact,” said FIU Provost, Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Elizbeth M. Béjar. “These rankings prove our commitment to equipping our graduates as leaders in education, research and innovation.” The new rankings join FIU’s recent accolades:

  • FIU ranks first among Florida public universities  according to the  Florida Board of Governors  performance-based funding (PBF) metrics .
  • The Wall Street Journal  ranked  FIU fourth among public universities .
  • Washington Monthly  ranked FIU the No. 1 university in Florida for its commitment to social mobility, public service, and research.
  • Degree Choices  ranked FIU  No. 8 nationally  for students’ return on investment, based on the cost of attending and the earnings a student can expect.
  • U.S. News and World Report  ranked FIU No. 64 among the nation’s public schools  in its undergraduate rankings landing the university in the top 100 nationally.

April 9, 2024

Emory University campus gate

Emory University’s graduate and professional schools and programs continue to be ranked among the best in the country, according to U.S. News & World Report’s 2024 Best Graduate Schools, which was released April 9.

The annual list uses data, surveys and other information to rank programs in schools of nursing, public health, business, law and other areas. The publication has delayed releasing rankings for medical schools, engineering schools and clinical psychology programs because of concerns with the data.

Here are the Emory schools included in this year’s national rankings:

The Nell Hodgson Woodruff School of Nursing master’s program ranks 1st in the nation. The school’s doctor of nursing practice program is 6th.

The Rollins School of Public Health ranks 3rd in the nation.  In the category of public health programs, U.S. News issued rankings for several master’s programs: biostatistics (5th), environmental health science (3rd), epidemiology (4th), health policy and management (8th) and social behavior (3rd). 

Goizueta Business School’s full-time MBA program ranks 18th. The Executive MBA program is 13th and the part-time program is 20th.

The School of Law ranks 42nd in the nation. Multiple programs within the school also received rankings including business/corporate law (22nd), constitutional law (25th), contracts/commercial law (21st) and health care law (21st).

The Laney Graduate School awards all PhDs at Emory in partnership with faculty located in various schools and departments across the university. Among doctoral science programs, computer science is 64th.

In U.S. News’ rankings of nursing master’s programs, Emory’s nurse practitioner, adult/gerontology, primary care is 3rd ; nurse practitioner, adult/gerontology, acute care is 4th; and family nurse practitioner program is 4th.

In rankings of Emory’s doctor of nursing practice programs, adult gerontology/acute care is 4th; adult gerontology/primary care is 3rd; family practice 5th; and nurse administration management 6th.

Each school may have additional information about rankings issued to specific programs. Not all graduate and professional programs are ranked annually.

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phd in private international law

Bloomberg Law Pro Bono Innovators Call for Nominations

By Lisa Helem

Lisa Helem

We’re thrilled to announce our call for nominations for the 2024 Bloomberg Law Pro Bono Innovators, our third annual edition of this special report.

We seek to recognize a selection of law firms, companies, non-profit organizations, universities and other entities that are successfully innovating in their approaches to pro bono client service. We seek to celebrate lawyers across the U.S. and beyond working to uphold the rule of law for underserved communities. (Want more background? Check out our 2023 and 2022 Pro Bono Innovators special reports.)

We’re looking for weighty, impactful pro bono client matters across a range of practice areas.

The successful resolution of these matters should include all or most of these elements:

  • The unique, innovative approach resulted in broad societal impact, through a legal or policy change.
  • The legal teams expended a significant amount of time, strategy and ingenuity to solve the issues presented.
  • The innovation and successful client outcomes were the result of fruitful partnerships between law firms, companies and/or non-profits.
  • The successful resolution of the matter(s) benefited from the perspectives of diverse legal teams. (Those teams may include lawyers who are diverse in gender, geography, race, culture, ability, orientation or other life or legal practice experiences.)
  • Include a brief summary of the pro bono history of your firm, company, non profit, university or other entity. ( Word count: Do not exceed 500 words for this summary.)
  • Include brief descriptions of at least four significant pro bono client matters that your team(s) resolved between April 19, 2023 and April 19, 2024.
  • For each client matter, list the lawyers involved and identify the lead attorneys. Detail if outside co-counsel participated, and if so, indicate the respective percentage of work handled by each firm, company, non-profit or other entity. For joint client matters, you must include the percentage of work handled by the attorneys in your submission. ( Word count: Do not exceed 1500 words total for the pro bono client matter descriptions and counsel listings.)
  • Optional: You may also include descriptions of up to two matters that are ongoing. In that event, label these matters “ongoing” in your submission and include a description of any interim successes your team has achieved for your client(s) in these matters as of your Pro Bono Innovators submission date. ( Note: If you choose to include optional descriptions of ongoing matters, they will be included in the 1500-word count limit noted above.)
  • What were the most innovative aspects of two of your client matters in your view? And who took the lead on driving innovation with the work? ( Tip: The more details you can provide about the innovative aspects of your work, the better. Draw out what made your approach to the work unique.) Word count: 500 words.
  • Tell us more about the impact of these two matters on the local, national, and/or global level. Word count: 500 words.
  • Why do you think your team ultimately achieved successful results in these two matters? Word count: 500 words.
  • Please compose your answers for the three questions above from the perspectives of the attorneys who completed the work. Avoid writing in the third-person in answering these three questions. (Feel free to write in the third-person for other areas of the submission, such as the summary of your organization’s pro bono history, if you so choose.)

Other Details

  • Optional Materials: You may also submit supporting documents such as news clips or brief recommendation letters from pro bono clients. Word count: Letters from clients should not exceed 500 words each. Please also limit the total length of supplemental documents to a maximum of five pages.
  • Nomination Limits: A law firm, company or non-profit may send in one submission representative of your work for pro bono clients from April 19, 2023 - April 19, 2024.
  • Word count: Please note, word count will be strictly observed.

To apply, please send your submissions to [email protected] by 11:59 p.m. EST on Wednesday, July 24, 2024.

For questions about Pro Bono Innovators, please closely review the rules listed above, then feel free to contact our team at [email protected] . Good luck!

To contact the reporter on this story: Lisa Helem at [email protected]

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