Josep Ferrer i Riba

Josep Ferrer-Riba is Professor of Civil Law at Universitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF, Barcelona). He graduated from Universitat de Barcelona (1982), with honors, and obtained his PhD in Law (1989) at the same university. Since 1996 he has been a member of the Law Department at UPF, where he has also been Dean of the Faculty of Law (2006-10) and Vice-Rector for International Relations (2010-2017). He has been a visiting scholar at the universities of Göttingen (1986-87), Yale (1993-94), Bologna (1999), Leuven (2003) and Cambridge (2018). 

His research focuses mainly on the law of persons and the family, succession law and the law of non-profit organizations, with some inroads into tort law (torts in family relationships) and contract law (standard terms, residential leases, mandate contracts). He is head of a research group devoted mainly to the legal analysis of personal self-determination, the formation of family structures and relationships, relationships between adults and children, and the personal and property consequences of family life and its breakdown, with a focus on Catalan, Spanish and comparative law. He is currently the coordinator of a consolidated research group dealing with the law of contracts, torts and property (Grup de recerca en Dret patrimonial), recognised and funded by the Generalitat de Catalunya (AGAUR) since 1995. He is also co-director for the UPF of the inter-university institution Barcelona Chair of Housing Studies.

He has participated in the preparatory work of the Catalan civil legislation in most of his areas of research and has co-edited works of legal commentaries to Books 2, 4 and 6 of the Catalan Civil Code which have become benchmark works for the study of Catalan family, succession and contract law. He is currently Director of the Codification Commission of Catalonia, institution of which he has been a member, in its various sections, since 2000. He regularly transfers knowledge to public institutions, non-profit organizations and law firms. He holds the medal of honor of the Generalitat de Catalunya for exceptional services to justice (2010).

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