André Thomashausen - Biography#

Prof. Thomashausen, a German national, graduated and obtained his doctor iuris (summa cum laude) at Christian Albrechts University in Kiel, Germany in 1980. He worked as a senior associate (Akademischer Rat) at the Institute of International Law (now: Walther Schücking Institute) before being granted a 4year period of special leave to assume the directorship of the Institute of International Law and chair of International and Comparative Law at the University of South Africa (UNISA), in 1984, aged 32.

Prof. Thomashausen moved on to become one of South Africa's most senior legal academics with 30 years standing and an established international profile in Europe, China and Africa. He was also admitted as a German attorney (*Rechtsanwalt") in Frankfurt in the year 2000 and has been a sworn (official) translator of English, French, German and Portuguese since 1983.

Prof. Thomashausen's work covers a wide range of legal studies. The Institute of International and Comparative Law at Unisa become under his leadership the leading authority throughout Africa on law reform and evidence on foreign law, operating in a manner very similar to the MPI in Hamburg except that in in addition to Private International Law, it also covers all fields of Public International Law and Comparative Law.

Since January 2008 Prof. Thomashausen combines his position of chair of his Institute with that of chair of the Department of Public, Constitutional and International Law – PCI-Law. PCI-Law is a flagship Department at Unisa with a lecturing staff of 32 of which 18 originate from formerly disadvantaged population groups. PCI-Law offers 34 courses for a total annual enrolment of over 20.000 undergraduate students, plus just over 300 post graduate (dissertation) students on both masters and PhD levels.

Curriculum vitae