The Center invites several leading legal specialists from
Europe to visit the
Law
School , providing them with a strong institutional setting to carry out research and teach. These stays take the form of semester-long or short-term visiting professorships. The model for semester-long visiting European appointments is the current Banque Nationale de Paris (BNP) Professorship of European Law. Each year, with generous funding from a BNP gift, a distinguished European law professor is invited to teach European Law at
Columbia .
Past BNP Professors include:
Michael Joachim Bonell (
University of
Rome - La Sapienza)
Giovanni Bognetti (University of Milan Law School)
Marco d'Alberti (
University of
Rome I)
Fabrizzio Cafaggi (European University Institute)
Antonio Cassese (University of Florence)
Vincenzo di Cataldo (
University of
Catania )
Giorgio Gaia (
University of
Florence )
Sara Volterra (
University of
Padua )
Petros Mavroidis (
University of Neuchâte, Switzerland)
Silvana Sciarra (
University of
Florence )
Ted de Boer (
University of
Amsterdam)
Joanne Scott (
University of Cambridge, Faculty of Law)
In addition to the BNP Chair, the BNP endowment, in cooperation with the Italian Academy for advanced Studies in America, also supports seminars and lectures by eminent Italian scholars and jurists such as Professor Giuliano Amato, former Prime Minister of Italy, and Professor Antonio La Pergola, former judge and advocate-general at the European Court of Justice.
2008-2009 BNP Professor Franco Ferrari
Professor Franco Ferrari is tenured professor of international law at Verona University School of Law. Previously, he was tenured professor of comparative law at Tilburg University in the Netherlands and Bologna University in Italy. After serving as a member of the Italian Delegation to various sessions of the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL) from 1995 to 2000, he served as Legal Officer at the United Nations Office of Legal Affairs, International Trade Law Branch (2000-2002), with responsibility for numerous projects, including the preparation of the UNCITRAL Digest on Applications of the UN Sales Convention. Professor Ferrari, who has been a visiting professor in many US and foreign law schools has published more than 170 law review articles in various languages and 12 books in the areas of international commercial law, conflict of laws, comparative law and international commercial arbitration. Professor Ferrari is a member of the editorial board of various peer reviewed European law journals (Internationales Handelsrecht, European Review of Private Law, Contratto e impresa, Contratto e impresa/Europa, Revue de droit des affaires internationales); Professor Ferrari also acts as an international arbitrator.
