Professor Dr. iur. Dr. h.c. Thomas von Danwitz
(Head of the Institute 2006 – 2020)
Judge at the Court of Justice of the European Union (ECJ) and Chevalier de l'Ordre National Du Merite of the French Republic
Thomas von Danwitz was born in Bedburg/Erft on May 2, 1962. After graduating from high school, he studied law, political science and modern history at the universities of Bonn and Geneva from 1981 to 1986. He passed the first state examination in December 1986 and the second state examination in January 1992.
Having obtained his doctorate in 1988 at University of Bonn, he continued his studies from 1989 to 1990 at the leading French administrative college École nationale d'administration (E.N.A.) in Paris. There he received practical training at the Préfet de la Haute-Marne, at the Conseil d'Etat, Paris and in the cabinet of the French judge at the then Court of Justice of the European Community in Luxembourg. In 1990 he obtained the Diplôme International d'Administration Publique.
In 1996, von Danwitz habilitated at the Faculty of Law and Political Science at the University of Bonn, where he had worked as a research assistant since 1992. In 1996, he was appointed to the Chair of Public Law and European Law at the Ruhr University in Bochum. At the same time, he served as director of the Institute for German and European Environmental Law. From 1998 to 2001, von Danwitz was also managing director of the University Institute for Mining and Energy Law. In the academic year 2001/02, he held the office of Dean of the Faculty of Law at the Ruhr University in Bochum.
In 2002, von Danwitz declined a call to the LMU Munich and in 2003 accepted a call to the chair of Public Law and European Law at the Institute for Media and Communications Law at the University of Cologne. In 2000, von Danwitz was a visiting professor of international law at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University/Medford, MA, USA. From 2001 to 2006, he held a visiting professorship at the Université François Rabelais in Tours and from 2005 to 2006 at the University of Paris I (Panthéon-Sorbonne). In 2005, von Danwitz completed a teaching and research stay at the University of California at Berkeley. In 2006, he moved to the Chair of Public Law, European Law, Economic Constitutional Law and Economic Administrative Law and became Director of the Institute of Public and Administrative Law. Until 2012, he also served as program officer for the German-French Master of Laws Cologne/Sorbonne program.
On 07 October 2006, von Danwitz was appointed Judge at the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg, where he was President of the 8th Chamber from October 2008 to October 2009; in October 2012, he moved to the 5th Chamber of the Court. In 2004, he was awarded the French National Order of Merit for his special services to Franco-German relations, and in 2010 he was also awarded the academic degree of doctor honoris causa from the Université François Rabelais de Tours.
Further information in English can also be found on the ECJ-ebsite.