A special focus has developed in the area of Contract Law, combining classical dogmatic approaches and European developments. The two professors responsible, Prof. Dr. Reinhard Singer und Prof. Dr. Dr. Stefan Grundmann, cover between them the full breadth of this particular discipline. This is shown in their many monographs covering fundamental questions in the area and in the one main contract type for service providers, the fiduciary relationship, and in several contributions to the major commentaries. Prof. Dr. Dr. Stefan Grundmann is additionally responsible for the only current complete commentary on European Contract Law. He is also the president of the Society of European Contract Law and the editor of the European Review of Contract Law. Students can benefit from this expertise through a regular course of seminars on the basics and/or current issues in German and also European Contract Law.

The idea of a European Constitution was first developed at the Humboldt University. The Hallstein Institute for European Constitutional Law, led and founded by Prof. Dr. Ingolf Pernice, has been a meeting point for protagonists from politics and science since the famous speech from German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer regarding the future of the European Constitution.

Prof. Dr. Dieter Grimm, responsible for the early literary work “Does Europe need a Constitution?” and who also wrote “Solidarity as a Legal Principle”, brings the vast experience of a retired Supreme Court judge (Constitutional Law) to the faculty, together with an extensive historical and philosophical bias. In Bernhard Schlink, co-author of the standard text book on fundamental rights, the faculty has not only a leading figure in Constitutional Law, but also one of the great present day German writers. He is author, among others, of “The Reader” (“Der Vorleser”), a book in which the issues of responsibility and involvement in the fateful twelve years of the 3rd Reich are described in a very sensitive and universally applicable manner.

Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Christian Tomuschat, one of the leading figures in Constitutional and Public International Law, also teaches at the faculty and is very active in the United Nations, the Hague Academy and the Foreign Office as well as in the area of human rights.

Administrative Law is taught most intensively at the Humboldt University, this is where development is more dynamic today and where most practical issues occur. No subject matter is as strongly European today as Environmental Law, it is in fact the paradigm of a European policy and the development of efficient safeguards on the EC level. This area is taught by Prof. Dr. Michael Kloepfer, author of the standard textbook in Environmental Law, and also by Prof. Dr. Ingolf Pernice, who has a particular interest in the European aspects of Environmental Law. Other major subjects, perhaps less in the area of Europeanisation, but, still important from the comparative law perspective are Public Service, Regional Planning and Construction Law. Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Ulrich Battis is the author of standard commentaries and textbooks in this area. Prof. Dr. Rainer Schroeder completes the civil law side of this area with Private Construction Law.

The coverage in the area of Corporate Law is very comprehensive, more so than almost anywhere else in Germany. Company Law, Capital Market Law, both German and European, including the economic foundations and supplemented with certain references to Employment Law are all available at the Humboldt University. One of the three or four standard textbooks on Company Law was written at the Humboldt University by Prof. Dr. Christine Windbichler. Likewise the standard textbook on the ‘Law of Limited Liability Companies’ was prepared by Prof. Dr. Thomas Raiser, one of the protagonists of the research in law and social theory. Prof. Dr. Eberhard Schwark wrote the standard commentary on the whole area of Capital Market Law, which in an earlier phase had focused on Stock Market Law only. Prof. Dr. Dr. Stefan Grundmann is the author of a major textbook on European Company Law (with Comparative Law and economic theory). Prof. Dr. Dr. Christian Kirchner also lectures in this area, specialising in legal, economic, market, organisational and regulatory issues. Finally, also Insolvency Law is of major importance in this context; it is taught by Prof. Dr. Christoph Paulus, who has a strong European bias and is the author of a standard textbook on the Law of Civil Procedure.

Traditional Private and Public Law elements come together in the key area of Business Regulation. In no other field is this as tangible as in the area of Banking Law, or more generally the law relating to financial services. For example, the regulation of the right of supervision in accordance with the Basel II Agreement allegedly “squeezes out” the German middle class, through private legal instruments such as interest regulation and adjustment.

Not only was the “great” scientific Banking Law textbook written at the Humboldt University by Prof. Dr. Hans-Peter Schwintowski, but also the above mentioned (equally important) standard commentary on capital market law from Schwark. There are four Banking Law specialists at the Humboldt University today, specialising also in Insurance Law and the modern regulatory sectors of energy, telecommunications and transportation. In Public Commercial Law, Prof. Gunnar Schuppert has written a series of monographs on regulatory theory and public management. Prof. Dr. Theodor Bodewig combines the traditional area of competition law with a specially sponsored chair for Industrial Property Law.

Additionally, one of the great textbooks on International Penal Law was produced at the Humboldt University, and this picture is completed by the fact that the first series comprising text books in each key area of European substantive law is edited at the Humboldt University.

All key skills will be comprehensively taught during the course of studies, with particular emphasis on interdisciplinary aspects. Prof. Dr. Dr. Christian Kirchner is the only lecturer in Germany who belongs to both the Economic and Legal Faculties. Prof. Dr. Susanne Baer heads the specially created chair on Antidiscrimination Law and Policy, a highly interdisciplinary centre of social sciences. All these lectures are complemented by numerous practical exercises.

The Humboldt University offers many important courses which complement its international and inter-disciplinary curriculum. It offers law courses on the various legal systems at two levels, which are taught in the language of the particular legal system. A summer school on Mediation, in which the foundation and techniques of Mediation are learnt and practiced, strengthens the knowledge the students gain from the regular curriculum. Further courses are offered by the Humboldt-Viadrina and Hertie Schools of Governance.

Our aim, at Humboldt University, is to establish a network of excellence for the education in the European Lawyer programme specifically. This network will include both practitioners and academics from within and outside Germany. Through this network, during 1 or 1½ academic years, many eminent lecturers, from Germany and abroad, will teach their specific research area at the Humboldt University. The Humboldt University’s traditional excellence in the area of research is a particular asset for the course; it will attract truly eminent teachers. All these courses generally comprise one 2 hour lecture per week for one semester, often offered in one or more blocks.

This curriculum will be further enhanced by including one or two keynote lectures per annum in the area in which eminent historical figures represented (and taught at the Humboldt University), including

• Levin Goldschmidt and/or Otto v. Gierke Lecture on Business and Company Law
• Friedrich Carl v. Savigny on Contract Law
• Theodor Mommsen Lecture on European Constitutional Law and Legal History
• Rudolf Smend Lecture on Transborder Administrative Law and Public Management
• Franz v. Liszt Lecture on Transborder Criminal Law and Criminology
• Georg Friedrich Hegel Lecture on legal thought and philosophy
• Ernst Rabel Lecture on International Law