Prof. Dr. Benedikt Pirker

Prof. Dr. Benedikt Pirker, LL.M., was appointed Director of the Institute for European and International Economic Law and Director of the World Trade Institute in August 2026. Benedikt Pirker holds degrees from the College of Europe (Bruges) and the Graduate Institute of International Studies (Geneva).

His professional career covers academia, research, and public service. He served as a titular professor at the University of Freiburg and as a senior research fellow at the Liechtenstein Institute. As a legal advisor at the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs, he focused in particular on international law (ius ad bellum, the Security Council, Swiss neutrality, and export controls) and served as a member of the Swiss negotiating delegation’s team on the free movement of persons during the negotiations between Switzerland and the European Union in 2024. He has taught at the Universities of St. Gallen and Ottawa and conducted research at the European University Institute, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law (MPIL) in Heidelberg, and the University of Michigan.

Benedikt Pirker served as Co-Chair of the International Language & Law Association from 2021 to 2023 and is a member of the editorial boards of the International Journal of Language and Law and European Papers. He also serves as an associate editor of the European Law Blog. His scholarly work appears in leading academic journals, including the European Journal of International Law, the Leiden Journal of International Law, the European Law Review, the Cambridge Yearbook of European Legal Studies, and the Yearbook of European Law.

He teaches and publishes in English, German, and French and advises government agencies and private institutions on issues of international economic law and EU law.

For more information, please visit the German website.

Recent representative publications

General:

Liechtenstein and the European Economic Area, in Finn Arnesen, Halvard Fredriksen, Hans Petter Graver, Ola Mestad, and Christoph Vedder (eds.), The EEA Agreement – A Commentary 2026 (in preparation).

Pirker, Benedikt, Art. 28 LV (Niederlassungsfreiheit), Stand: 5. Januar 2026, in: Liechtenstein-Institut (Hrsg.): Online-Kommentar zur liechtensteinischen Verfassung, https://www.verfassung.li/Art._28

Contributions financières de cohésion, in Christine Kaddous und Andreas Kellerhals (éds), Bilatérales III Suisse–UE, Premières analyses, 2026, Schulthess, pp. 411-437.

Das Abkommen über den regelmässigen finanziellen Beitrag der Schweiz zur Verringerung der wirtschaftlichen und sozialen Ungleichheiten in der Europäischen Union, in Christine Kaddous und Andreas Kellerhals (Hrsg.), Bilaterale Abkommen III Schweiz – EU, Erste Analysen, 2026, EIZ Publishing, pp. 419-447.

Plus c’est la même chose, plus ça change – Schiedsverfahren im Rahmen des Pakets Schweiz-EU, Zeitschrift für Europarecht 2025 (Ausgabe 08 / 2025), https://eizpublishing.ch/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/EuZ-08-2025-Pirker-Digital-V1_02-20250917.pdf.

Principe d’autonomie et renvois préjudiciels dans les accords externes de l’Union européenne – L’exemple de l’Accord d’association entre l’UE et respectivement l’Andorre et Saint Marin, in Astrid Epiney et al. (Hrsg.), Schweizerisches Jahrbuch für Europarecht 2024/2025 / Annuaire suisse de droit européen 2024/2025, Bern/Zürich 2025, pp. 595–614.

Free Movement of Workers and Persons, in Graham Butler (ed.), Research Handbook on EEA Internal Market Law, Edward Elgar Publishing, Cheltenham, 2025, pp. 46–69.

Language and Law (including experimental studies):

An Effective Settlement Architecture? How Friendly Settlement Affects the Perception of Fairness and Trust, with Veronika Fikfak and Izabela Skoczeń, Human Rights Law Review, 2026, Vol. 26, Issue 3.

Anthropocentrism and Short-Termism in (International) Legal Definitions of Ecocide – An Experimental Approach, with Izabela Skoczeń, Journal of Environmental Psychology, Volume 108, December 2025, 102838.

Experimental Jurisprudence in International Law, with Izabela Skoczeń and Veronika Fikfak in Kevin Tobia (ed.), The Cambridge Handbook of Experimental Jurisprudence, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2025, pp. 270–281.

“Linguistics and the Contra Legem Principle – A Response to Anthony Arnull,” with Jennifer Smolka, European Law Review 2023, pp. 117–123.