Prof. Sarah Progin-Theuerkauf

Sarah Progin-Theuerkauf has been Professor of EU Law and Migration Law at the University of Fribourg since 2009. She is a co-director of five institutes and centres: the Centre for Migration Law, the Institute of European Law, the Interdisciplinary Institute of Ethics and Human Rights, the Centre for European Studies and the Swiss Centre for Islam and Society.
Furthermore, she is Co-Chairholder of the UNESCO Chair in Human Rights and Democracy.

Sarah Progin-Theuerkauf studied law at the Universities of Bonn and Fribourg and subsequently wrote her doctoral thesis at the University of Fribourg on human rights.

From 2006 to 2008, she was a legal clerk at the Krefeld District Court, the German Federal Cartel Office, a major German law firm in Düsseldorf and the German Embassy in Bangkok among others. She then joined a law firm in Zurich before returning to the University of Fribourg.

Between 2014 and 2018, Sarah Progin-Theuerkauf led a research project on the emergence of a European law on foreigners for the National Centre of Competence in Research, “NCCR – on the move”, and was a member of the NCCR’s steering committee. She is one of the programme directors and responsible for different modules within the CAS in Migration Law and the CAS Asylum Procedure, which are offered in both German and French.

From 2019 to 2023 Sarah Progin-Theuerkauf was a member of the Senate of the University of Fribourg, most recently as its Vice President. Between 2018 and 2021 she served as President of the University’s Equality Commission, now called the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Commission. She was President of the Department of International and Commercial Law from 2021 to 2023.

Sarah Progin-Theuerkauf researches on and teaches a wide range of topics relating to asylum and refugee law, immigration law, human rights, free movement of persons and bilateral relations between Switzerland and the EU. Amongst other positions, she is co-editor of the Swiss Yearbook of European Law (published in French and German). She is also member of the board of various professional associations, including the Swiss Association for European Law (ASDE) and the European Communities Studies Association (ECSA Suisse), as well as a member of the European Law Institute and the European Society for International Law (ESIL).