Prof. Dr. Jan-Erik Schirmer

By appointment. Registration at sekretariat-schirmer@europa-uni.de

Jan-Erik Schirmer teaches private and corporate law. His research focuses on the role of private and corporate law in processes of social transformation, especially in the context of sustainability and digitalization. Schirmer's research has received several awards and funding from third parties such as the German Research Foundation.

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Representative Publications

• Nachhaltiges Privatrecht, Mohr Siebeck 2023

• AI and Corporate Climate Governance, forthcoming in: Kysar/Lim (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Climate Change and Private Law, Oxford University Press 2025/2026

• Climate Liability: Causation and Duty Demystified, fortcoming 2025

• Metaphors Lawyers Live by: Cognitive Linguistics and and the Callenge for Pursuing Objectivity in Legal Reasoning, in: Bender (ed.), The Law between Objectivity and Power, Hart Publishing 2022, 427–448

• AI and Legal Personality: Introducing Teilrechtsfähigkeit, in: Wischmeyer/Rademacher (eds.), Regulating AI, Springer 2020, 123–142

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Jan-Erik Schirmer is a Full Professor at the Europa-Universität Viadrina, where he holds the Chair of Private Law, Commercial and Corporate Law, Compliance and Sustainability. Previously, Schirmer was a Senior Research Fellow at the Free University of Berlin (2012-2016) and the Humboldt University of Berlin (2016-2022). He has held visiting positions at Yale Law School, the University of Oxford, the University of Münster and Dar es Salaam Law School.

Schirmer is a graduate of the Free University of Berlin (JD equivalent) and holds a JSD (summa cum laude). His postdoctoral thesis deals with sustainability and private law.

Schirmer is a member of numerous research groups, including the Zukunftsfakultät (Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin/Recht im Kontext), the Forum Junges Gesellschaftsrecht (Max Planck Institute for Private Law) and the Global Perspectives on Corporate Climate Legal Tactics (British Institute of International and Comparative Law). He is a permanent member of the selection committee of the German Academic Scholarship Foundation and a reviewer for the German Research Foundation and Oxford University Press.

Schirmer has lectured widely in Germany and abroad, including at the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin, the Beijing University and Harvard Law School.

Overview of the current courses. VIACAMPUS