Klaus D. Beiter, North-West University, South Africa

Namibian-born Klaus D. Beiter is an Associate Professor in the Law Faculty at North-West University, Potchefstroom, South Africa. He holds two law degrees from the University of South Africa and a doctorate in international human rights law from the University of Munich, Germany, where he wrote his thesis under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Bruno Simma. He focuses on economic, social and cultural rights, the right to education, conflicts between intellectual property and human rights, the right to enjoy the benefits of scientific progress and its applications, academic freedom, and the extraterritorial application of human rights. Prof. Beiter wrote the first English-language monograph on the right to education under international law. He spent two years in the United Kingdom as a Marie Curie Fellow on academic freedom in Europe. He is an Affiliated Research Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition, Munich (where he was a Senior Research Fellow and also the Legal Manager of the International Review of Intellectual Property and Competition Law for seven years), a member of the ETOs Consortium for Human Rights Beyond Borders in Heidelberg, and one of twelve ambassadors of the Observatory Magna Charta Universitatum in Bologna. One of his mid- to long-term projects is producing an expert Declaration on Establishing Conformity between National and International Intellectual Property Regimes and International Human Rights Law. Prof. Beiter teaches Intellectual Property Law, Socio-Economic Rights, and International Social Justice.