PD Dr. Rodrigo Polanco

PD Dr. Rodrigo Polanco is a Legal Adviser for Spanish and Portuguese-speaking jurisdictions at the Swiss Institute of Comparative Law, a Senior Lecturer, Researcher, and Academic Coordinator of Master’s Programmes at the World Trade Institute (WTI), University of Bern, and a visiting professor at the University of Chile. Rodrigo holds a Bachelor’s degree, a Diploma in Air and Space Law, and a Master of Law from the Universidad de Chile, an LL.M. in International Legal Studies from New York University (NYU), and a PhD in Law from the University of Bern, and a habilitation (“Privatdozent”) from the same University.

He served as a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Luzern (“The Governance of Big Data in Trade Agreements: Design, Diffusion and Implications – NFP 75”) and as an assistant professor and director of international affairs at the University of Chile’s Faculty of Law.

Rodrigo has published extensively as an author and editor with leading international academic publishers and international journals on investment law, trade law and comparative law. He has worked as a consultant for the World Bank, the United Nations, the International Trade Centre (ITC), Trade Impact B.V., and the Center for Economic and Social Research (CASE) on trade and investment issues.

He coordinated the WTI/SECO Project, which supported regional competence centres for trade law and policy in Peru, South Africa, Vietnam, Indonesia and Chile, and the SNIS Project “Diffusion of International Law: A Textual Analysis of International Investment Agreements”.

Rodrigo is a co-founder of the Electronic Database of Investment Treaties (EDIT), and a co-founder and member of the board of Fiscalía del Medio Ambiente (FIMA) a Chilean non-profit environmental organization. He is also a member of the editorial board of the journals The Journal of World Investment & Trade (Brill), Asia Pacific Law Review (Taylor & Francis), Revista de Derecho Económico (Universidad de Chile), and Justicia Ambiental (FIMA).