Professor R.C. (Ruth Christa) Tobler is Professor of European Law at the Universities of Basel (Switzerland) and Leiden.

More information about Christa Tobler

Curriculum Vitae

Professor Tobler studied law at the University of Zurich (Switzerland) where she obtained her law degree in 1985. In 1989 she was awarded a PhD based on a thesis on Swiss trade mark law. Professor Tobler subsequently worked as a researcher at the Kyoto Comparative Law Centre (Japan) and as a court clerk in Switzerland. In 1992 she passed the Zurich bar exam and then worked as an attorney-at-law. In 1994 she was awarded an LLM degree in European Community Law from Leiden University. During her studies in Leiden, she was also Winning Advocate General in the European Law Moot Court Competition. This resulted in an internship at the European Court of Justice (November 1994).

Professor Tobler then spent the first half of 1995 as a researcher on an interdisciplinary research programme at the European University Institute in Florence (Italy). In August 1995 she returned to Leiden where she worked as the Academic Coordinator of the LLM degree programme in European Community Law. In 1998 she was appointed as a part-time lecturer in gender law at the University of Basel (Switzerland).

In 2000, Professor Tobler was appointed Associate Professor of European Law. In 2004, she completed the 'habilitation' procedure, which made her eligible as ordinary professor of Swiss public law, European law and gender law. In 2005, she was appointed Professor of European law at the University of Basel, and in 2007 at Leiden University. At Leiden, she is the Academic Director of the Advaned LLM Programme in European and International Business Law (EIBL).

Professor Tobler is a member of the editorial board of the Swiss Review of International and European Law. She is a member of the executive committee of senior experts of the European Equality Network – European network of legal experts in gender equality and non-discrimination. She is also an enthusiastic Moot Court judge (regional level) for the European Law Moot Court Competition. Professor Tobler is a co-founder of “The EU Law in Charts Project”. The project aims at using visualisation in legal teaching.

Courses

• The Legal Foundations of the European Union (Adv. LLM Programme in European and International Business Law)
• The Internal Market and Harmonisation (Adv. LLM Programme in European and International Business Law)
• Regulating EU External Trade (Adv. LLM Programme in European and International Business Law)             

Research

Subject of PhD and habilitation research

PhD (Zurich University, Switzerland): distinguishing criteria under Swiss trade mark law ('Unterscheidungskriterien im Markenrecht').  
Habilitation (Basel University, Switzerland): 'Indirect Discrimination. A Case Study on the Development of the Legal Concept of Indirect Discrimination in EC Law, with a Comparative Chapter on Swiss Federal Sex Discrimination Law'.  

Further research

Professor Tobler has published widely in the field of European Union law. Her fields of particular interest include the internal market, legal equality and non-discrimination in the economic and in the social field and EU association law, in particular the legal relationship between the European Union and Switzerland.  

See further under 'published work'.

Activities