The two post docs are Peter Čuroš and Petra Gyongyi.
Peter Čuroš is Assistant Professor at the Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice, Faculty of Law, where he successfully presented his dissertation thesis on Right to Disobey: Civil Disobedience, in February 2017. He holds a BA and a masters degree in law from Pavol Jozef Šafárik University; Faculty of Law, Kosice, Slovakia. Aug. 2015- May 2016 he was a visiting scholar under supervision of Vincent Bradford Professor of Law James Moliterno at the Washington and Lee University School of Law, with the research areas of Professional Ethics, Professional Responsibility, Law and Morality, Civil Disobedience. He has published several articles on legal theory and the theory of rights.
His mother tongue is Slovakian, and he masters Czeck and English, and has some knowledge of German.
His project will focus on the Czech Republic and Slovakia and “research the core concepts of judicial profession, that are independence, accountability, impartiality, integrity and competence.” He will investigate “how different political regimes consider these concepts and what qualities of the judge do they expect from its justices”. For this he will look at the different regimes the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Czechoslovak Republic between 1918-1938, Slovak Republic and Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia during Nazi regime in WWII, Communist regime in Czechoslovak Republic, the period after the fall of Communist power after 1989, and the last period - since the entrance of both republics into the EU in 2004.
Petra Gyöngyi has completed her PhD dissertation in comparative constitutional law and theory in 2018 at the Erasmus University. She holds a BA in law from Babes-Bolyai University and an LLM in human rights law from the Central European University. Before starting her PhD she completed a traineeship at the European Court of Human Rights.
Her mother tongues are Hungarian and Romanian, she is fluent in English and Dutch and has basic knowledge of German and French and some knowledge of Norwegian.
Her main research interest concerns judicial independence and rule-of-law promotion in EU member states with new democracies. Her dissertation explained how rule-of-law principles underpinning the legitimate functioning of the judiciary have developed incrementally in the Western liberal-democratic tradition and how are these reflected in legally binding and non-binding requirements by the EU, Council of Europe and judicial networks. The implementation of the emerging theoretical framework was critically tested and refined in the context of on-going judicial reforms in Hungary and Romania. Her proposed project is on “Different shadows for judicial independence – Comparing the influence of communist legacy in Hungary and Romania”.
The PhD position will be filled by Lukasz Bojarski
Lukasz Bojarski has a law degree from the Law Department of the University of Warsaw. He has extensive experience from legal work for Polish Civil Society Organizations and international organizations and also from the teaching of law. He was a member of the National Council of the Judiciary of Poland, appointed by the President of Poland (09.2010-09.2015). He is president and co-founder of INPRIS, Institute for Law and Society, a foundation registered in Poland in 2009. They are an independent, non-partisan think tank focused on law. He is also co-founder and Chairman of the Board of the Polish Legal Clinics Foundation (FUPP) and co-founder and member of Holda Association. In June 2018 together with several organizations representing judges, lawyers and civil society he set up the Justice Defence Committee KOS (Komitet Obrony Sprawiedliwości).
Lukasz has been engaged in a variety of activities in research, writing and consultancy. His position as a member of the National Council of the Judiciary (NCJ) has given him unique insight into the situation of the Polish judiciary. His more than 20 years of professional experience in research, consultancy, advocacy, and training in human rights, legal and judicial reform, legal profession, legal aid, legal and law related education; including program and curriculum development and evaluation, training methodology and training for trainers, makes him uniquely equipped to do research under the project. He was particularly involved in monitoring transitional justice in post-Soviet states.
His mother tongue is Polish, he is proficient in English and he reads and understands Russian.
(For more information and list of publications see: http://www.inpris.pl/en/people/)