ELRC Visiting Researchers 2007-2008

Marta Montero Simó, (Spain) is a Professor of Tax Law in ETEA at the University of Córdoba. She has a Ph. D in Law from ICADE, Universidad Pontificia de Comillas de Madrid, Spain, and received an award from Instituto de Estudios Fiscales, Ministerio de Economia y Hacienda for her Ph. D Thesis “Legal and fiscal analysis in co-operative transactions with members and with third parties”. She has a Masters Degree in Legal Practice (LLM) from Instituto de Empresa, Madrid, Spain. She has written several articles and a book on her specialty, taxation of Spanish cooperatives. Her research at the ELRC centers around her project on “Comparative study of tax treatment for nonprofit organizations in the United States and European Union Countries”.

Rasmus Goksor (Sweden) is a S.J.D. candidate at Duke Law School. His dissertation aims at understanding the pursuit of local particularity, specifically for Scandinavia, in view of pressures toward convergence of private law. He holds an LL.M. in American Law from Boston University School of Law (2005) and a Master of Laws degree from University of Göteborg School of Law and Economics, Sweden (2004). Previous research has produced two papers: Jurisprudence on Protection of Weaker Parties in European Contracts Law from a Swedish and Nordic Perspective and Superstructures to State-Sovereignty. His research at the European Law Research Center focuses on Private Law Theory and Comparative Federalism.

Julia Haas (Germany) earned a law degree from Leibniz University of Hannover and a Master of European Law from Stockholm Uni­ver­sity. She is currently an assistant lecturer and PhD candidate at Leibniz University where he dissertation focuses on control of administrative action by Ombuds­man and Co­m­mis­sioner institutions from the comparative perspective of German and European Law. Her current research at the ELRC focuses on different approaches to control of administrative action in the emerging system of European Adminis­trative Law. Julia is also the author of two books - “Constitutional Protection of Human and Civil Rights – A Comparative Ana­lysis of Swedish and German Law” and “The Theory of the Holy Roman Empire in Pufendorf´s ‘Severinus de Monzambano’ - The Thesis of Monstrosity and the Debate on the Constitution of the Empire in the Political and Legal Literature from 1667 to the Present”.

Rémi Bachand (Canada) received his L.L.D. in international law from the Université Panthéon-Sorbonne in Paris in 2007. His thesis examined the legal and extra-legal elements that influence the jurisdictional organs in international law, and specifically in economic international law. His recent works focus principally on international law theories, with an emphasis on critical theories.

Antonio Martinez Marin (Spain) is a Full Professor of Administrative Law at University of Murcia, Visiting Scholar at the European Law Research Center at Harvard University, and Fellow at the Real Colegio Complutense in Harvard. He has been also a Visiting Scholar at La Sorbonne (working especially in the libraries Cùyas and Saint Genevieve), La Sapienza (library of Seminario di Diritto Publico), Max Planck Institut in Heidelberg, and ITTM in Münster. Hi is the founder (and until 2005 the Chairman) of the Department of Administrative Law in the University of Murcia. He is the author of 13 books and dozens of specialized papers in scientific journals and newspapers. Likewise, he has supervised and written the introduction to 7 Doctoral Theses. During this year 2007, Antonio is carring out a comparative study about “The control of Federal Administration in USA and the control of State Administration in Spain”.

Abel Arias-Castaño, (Spain). graduated with First Class Honours from the Law School of the University of Oviedo (Spain) (‘03). where he was awarded the “Fermín Canella” and the “Olga Menéndez” prizes as the best student. He began his academic career working as Research Assistant at the Spanish Institute of Advanced Studies (CSIC). He has been Visiting Researcher at the London School of Economics (LSE) (‘04) and Fellow of the Real Colegio Complutense (‘05 Fall Term). Currently, he works as Research Assistant at the Constitutional Law Department of the University of Oviedo. There he is writing his doctoral dissertation, which concerns the “Clear and present danger test” that was formulated by the American Supreme Court.

Celia Martinez Escribano is a Lecturer of Private Law at the University of Valladolid (Spain), where she received her Ph. D in Law in 2003. Se has been a Visiting Researcher at the University of Panthéon-Assas (ParisII) in 2002 and at the University of Salzburg in 2005. In 2004-2005 she has also participated in a World Bank project about the mortgage market and the security of transactions in the South-East Europe. During the summer of 2006 she was a fellow of the Real Colegio Complutense in Harvard University, researching on premarital agreements. She has published several works on Tort Law, Family Law and Property Rights. Her research in the ELRC is focused on a comparative study between the Spanish and the American systems of property rights and Land Registry.

Bernardo Periñán (Spain) is an Associate Professor of Roman Law at Pablo de Olavide University in Seville, where he is also the head researcher in the multidisciplinary Research Group “Law, Persons and Citizens in Historical and Contemporary Experience." Prof. Periñán is the author of more than twenty articles and books about Roman and Comparative Law and is an active member of several international Roman Law Journal editorial boards, including “The Roman Legal Tradition”, which is the only scientific Journal devoted to Roman Law in the United States. Professor Periñán received he his PhD from the University of Seville in 1997.

Haitham H. Osta (Saudi Arabia) earned a Master’s degree in Islamic Jurisprudence at Umm Al-Qura University in Mecca, Saudi Arabia in 2004 and an LLM in International Law and Business from Suffolk University Law School in 2007. He has served as a Teaching Assistant/Fellow and Instructor of Philosophy of Islamic Jurisprudence at King Abdulaziz University in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, as well as an intern with Judge Nancy Gertner of the US District Court of Massachusetts. He is currently conducting a comparative research between Islamic based law/systems and that which is based on Western Legal Traditions.

Luca Cruciani (Italy) is a PhD candidate at Pisa University and a research assistant at Perugia Faculty of Law. His research focuses on general clauses which operate in the context of contract law, in particular - good faith, diligence, good morals and public policy viewed in their possible interactions with some of the new principles which operate in European contract law. His main areas of interest concern European contract law, consumer law, EU integration process, European family law, and American legal thought.

Vijayashri Sripati (Canada) is a S.J.D. candidate at Osgoode Hall Law school, Toronto, Canada. She was awarded the Canadian Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) Doctoral Scholarship and she is spending the second year of her doctoral studies at HLS. In tune with her research interests in the fields of international human rights law and constitutionalism, her doctoral dissertation examines the United Nation’s role in Afghanistan’s constitution-making process. Ms. Sripati has a LL.M. in human rights from The American University, (USA) a Master’s degree in International Politics from University of Hull, England and a LL.M. in comparative constitutionalism from University of Alberta, Canada. She has published widely in the fields of human rights and constitutionalism. Her most recent article comparing constitutionalism in India and South Africa from a human rights perspective is due to appear in the Fall 2007 issue of the Tulane Journal of International & Comparative Law.