Structure and Board of Governors

Structure of the Foundation

The Foundation is headed by a President appointed by the Board of Governors, all of whom are distinguished jurists. The constitution of the Foundation is governed by its Statute. The President is assisted by an Administrator in the conduct of daily business.

The Board of Governors

President of the Uniform Law Foundation

Professor Sir Roy Goode QC (OBE (1972), CBE (1994), Knighted for services to academic law (2000), LLD University of London, Honorary doctor Universities of London and East Anglia)

• Queen's Counsel since 1990,
• Professor of Law, and for some years Dean of the Faculty of Laws, Queen Mary College, London
• University of Oxford. Chairman of numerous United Kingdom and international law reform committees. Collaborator and former Governing Council member of UNIDROIT, collaborator of the International Chamber of Commerce and the Hague Conference on Private International Law,
• Leading role in the development of the Principles of European Contract Law.

Vice-President of the Uniform Law Foundation

Professor Don Wallace, Jr. Professor Emeritus and Adjunct Professor, Georgetown University Law School.

• Regional Legal Advisor for the Middle East and Deputy Assistant General Counsel to AID in the Department of State (1962-66)
• Founding board member of the International Development Law Organization in Rome
• Head of the International Law Institute since 1970.
• Chair of the Advisory Committee on World Trade and Technology to the Office of Technology Assessment of the U.S. Congress (1976-79)
• Currently a member of the Secretary of State's Advisory Committee on Private International Law,
• U.S. Delegate to UNCITRAL, and a correspondent of UNIDROIT.

Secretary of the Uniform Law Foundation

Professor Kurt Siehr Independent Research Scholar, Max-Planck-Institute for Foreign and Private International Law

• Professor of Law (private law, private international law, comparative law), University of Zürich (Switzerland) since 1991 as full professor of law (with tenure) and Emeritus Professor since 2002.
• Professor Siehr has taught also at the University of Geneva (1985-1986), at the Universities of Southampton, Rome and Tel Aviv, at the Asser Institute Den Haag, and at the Dubrovnik Center.
• Correspondent Unidroit, Rome.
• He has also participated extensively in the work of the Hague Conference on Private International Law as the Representative of Germany.

Treasurer of the Uniform Law Foundation

Mr José Angelo Estrella Faria, Secretary-General, UNIDROIT

• Master of European Law, the Europe Institute, University of Saarland, Germany;
• B.A. Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre, Brazil
• Formerly Senior Legal Officer at the secretariat of the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL), working in the areas of door-to-door carriage of goods, electronic commerce and privately financed infrastructure projects.

Other Members of the Board

Professor Michael Joachim Bonell Professor of Law (Comparative Private Law), University of Rome I, "La Sapienza"

• Awarded Honoris Causa Law Degrees from the University of Louvain-La Neuve (Belgium) and the University of Basel (Switzerland);
• Consultant, UNIDROIT (since 1971), Chairman of the Working Group for the preparation of the Unidroit Principles of International Commercial Contracts and a
• Member of the Study Group for a European Civil Code.
• Visiting Professor at University of Mainz (1984); Columbia University School of Law (1993, 1999 and 2001); Oxford (1996); and the University of California School of Law at Davis (1998);
• Member of several professional associations including the American Law Institute and the International Academy of Comparative Law.
• Member of the team of Attorneys that acted for the for the Italian Republic in the case Raytheon-Elsi before the International Court of Justice (The Hague).

Mr Marcello Gioscia Senior Partner, Studio Legale Ughi & Nunziante, admitted to the Court of Cassation, Italy

• LLM from Columbia University Law School.
• Specialised in Banking and Finance and Corporate Law.
• Former Co-Chairman of the Banking Committee of the IBA
• Member of the Panel of the American Arbitration Association, of the Advisory Board of the Secured Transactions Project of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, and a Member of the Council of the AEDBF

Prof. Arthur Hartkamp Professor of Law, Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen

• Honorary Doctorate from the Demokritos University of Thrace (Greece) (1998).
• Former Procureur Général at the Supreme Court of The Netherlands
• Former Professor at the Universities of Amsterdam, Leyden and Utrecht
• Former member of the Civil Code Revision Office of the Ministry of Justice,
• Former Advocate-General at the Supreme Court of The Netherlands.
• Netherlands Delegate to UN-Commission on International Trade Law and to several Working Groups of the Commission and Head of Netherlands Delegation to Diplomatic Conference UN-Convention on International Sale of Goods (Vienna, 1980).
• Member of the Governing Council of Unidroit since 1984,
• Member of the Unidroit Working Group on the preparation of Principles of International Commercial Contracts and Chairman, Unidroit Study
• Chair, Study Group on International Franchising (1999)
• Member of the Commission on European Contract Law and a member of the Study Group for a European Civil Code (Steering Committee and Coordinating Group).
• Member, Royal Netherlands Academy of Sciences (1985).

Professor Berardino Libonati President of the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (UNIDROIT)

• Professor of Commercial Law at the University of Rome I, "La Sapienza";
• Senior Partner of the Libonati-Jaeger Law Office (Rome and Milan);
• Member of the Bar of Rome from 1961, Admitted to the Court of Cassation, Italy,
• Attorney for the Italian Republic in the case Raytheon-Elsi before the International Court of Justice (The Hague).
• Former Chairman of the Banco di Sicilia s.p.a.; Telecom Italia s.p.a., and TIM-Telecom Italia Mobile s.p.a.
• Current Chairman of the Banca di Roma s.p.a. and of Swiss Re Italia s.p.a.
• Member of the Board of Mediobanca s.p.a.

Professor Ferenc Mádl Former President of the Hungarian Republic (2000 - 2005)

• Member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences;
• Emeritus Professor of Budapest University;
• Since 1985 President of the European Community Law Research Center of Budapest University;
• 1990 - 1994 first Minister of Privatisation, then Minister for culture and education of the first freely elected Government.
• Since 1985 member of the Academy of International Commercial Law and of other academies.
• Former member of the Governing Council of UNIDROIT,
• 1989 appointed judge on the Washington-based international arbitration court for States and foreign investors.
• 1999 awarded the Széchenyi Prize for his internationally recognised scientific achievements in the areas of European law, private international law and international commercial law, as well as for his higher educational and scientific organisational efforts.
• 1999 he was also honoured with the French order Chevalier of the Legion of Honour.

Professor Jacques Putzeys Emeritus Professor of the Université catholique de Louvain and a recognised authority on transport law,

• Lawyer authorised to practice at the Brussels bar.
• Member ad honorem of the UNIDROIT Governing Council,
• former member of the Board of Governors of GIBET (Groupement interuniversitaire Benelux des économistes des transports), Brussels;
• former Chairman of the Commission on Legal Af airs and honorary member of the International Road Transport Union (IRU), Geneva;
• member of the Belgian Royal Marine Academy (Antwerp),
• member of the Board of Governors of the Albert Lilar Foundation (Antwerp) .

Mr Jeffrey Wool Head of Aerospace Law & Policy, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, London, currently on secondment to the Aviation Working Group (AWG), London.

• Practises in the area of international commercial transactions and international law reform.
• Secretary to and General Counsel of the AWG, represents the AWG in various international fora
• Chair of the group with primary responsibility for drafting the Aircraft Protocol to the Cape Town Convention
• Visiting appointments at the University of Oxford (transnational commercial law) and the University of Washington (comparative commercial law) and has taught at McGill and Leiden (aviation law).
• Special advisor to UNIDROIT on international equipment financing.

Honorary Legal Advisors

NautaDutilh
Strawinskylaan 1999
1077 XV Amsterdam
P.O. BOX 7113
The Netherlands