PhD Studies

The Chair is actively encouraging students to undertake PhD studies and provides suitable candidates with a stimulating environment and thoughtful supervision. An important number of projects have been completed in recent years and were published by major domestic and international publishers.

Once a supervisor has accepted candidates, they must obtain confirmations from (1) the University (Service des immatriculations) and (2) the Law School (Dean's Office) that they are admissible for PhD Studies at the University of Lausanne. You must fulfil the conditions of the University and the Law School.

If you are interested in supervision by Professor Andreas R. Ziegler, ideally, you should have followed the Master course in INternational Economic Law taught by Prof Andreas R. Ziegler and have written a Master Thesis under his supervision (MLaw UNIL) or the LLM in International Business Law at UNIL.  External students without a degree from UNIL can only be adccepted if they receive a sholarship that requires previous approval by the supervising professor (see below). 

Students wishing to be supervised by Prof. Andreas R. Ziegler must prepare (1) a CV, (2) a motivation letter clearly stating (a) career objectives, (b) planned period and place of of research and (c) available funding, (3) an electronic copy of the Master Thesis or another piece of academic research; and (4) a transcript of grades obtained in their Master Studies.

A limited number of paid PhD / Research Assistant positions is available. These positions are advertised when open but you should still inquire with your desired supervisor in view of up-coming opportunities.

Third-party funding may be available from various sources such as:

• SNSF - Doc.CH in the humanities and social sciences (HSS)
• Swiss Government Excellence Scholarships for Foreign Scholars and Artists

Please contact your desired supervisor early if you consider applying for one of these schemes and be aware of the stringent deadlines.

Students wishing to apply for one of these funding schemes and in need of an invitation/acceptance letter by Professor Andreas R Ziegler must prepare (1) a CV, (2) a motivation letter clearly stating (a) career objectives, (b) planned period and place of of research and (c) available funding, (3) an electronic copy of the Master Thesis and (4) a transcript of grades obtained in their Master Studies.

If you need guidance on how to write a research proposal you could check out this.

At the University of Lausanne you can benefit from the all the services and programmes offered by the Graduate Campus.

In addition, the common doctoral programme of all Law Faculties of French-speaking Switzerland  may be of interest.

You are also entitled to participation in the International PhD Academy at Venice International University (VIU) - an intensive training opportunity open to PhD students, post-docs, and young researchers from the member institutions of VIU.

We would also like to recommend active participation in the following networks:

• Schweizerisches Nachwuchsforum Öffentliches Recht / Forum suisse pour la relève en droit public / Forum svizzero per le giovani leve nell’ambito del diritto pubblico 
• Arbeitskreis junger VölkerrechtswissenschaftlerInnen - AjV
• Jeunes chercheurs (SFDI)

For women we recommend in addition the Réseau Romand de Mentoring.

The following information guides on PhD studies provided by UNIL may be very useful:

• « Getting your thesis off to a good start »
• « Beyond the doctorate »

The contents of these guides (in French and English), as well as many other tips, can be found online at the Young Academics Portal.

For students desiring to write a PhD thesis (in English) the follwing may be useful:

• Cryer, Robert, Tamara Hervey, Bal Sokhi-Bulley, and Alexandra Bohm, Research Methodologies in EU and International Law. (London: Hart Publishing, 2011). <http://dx.doi.org/10.5040/9781472560919.ch-007>
• Kathleen McMillan & Jonathan Weyers, How to research & write a successful PhD (Harlow, England, London, New York : Pearson, 2013).
• Dr. Karen’s Foolproof Grant Template

For citations and formatting use:

• OSCOLA (Oxford Standard for Citation of Legal Authorities) 2006:  CITING INTERNATIONAL LAW SOURCES SECTION