University of Kiel
Robert Alexy was born on September 9, 1945 in Oldenburg i.O. After graduating (Abitur) from Sulingen/Hanover, he served in the German Armed Forces for three years with, in his final year, the rank of lieutenant. In 1968, he commenced his studies in law and philosophy at the Georg-August-University in Göttingen. After his first state examination in law (1. juristische Staatsprüfung), in 1973, he wrote a dissertation entitled “A Theory of Legal Argumentation” (Theorie der juristischen Argumentation), published in 1978. During this period he was supported by a scholarship from Germany’s Studienstiftung. In 1982, he received the award of the philologico-historical class of the Academy of Science in Göttingen for his published dissertation. In 1976, he began his legal apprenticeship service; its completion, in 1978, was marked by the second state examination in law. Hereafter, he served as assistant to Ralf Dreier, Chair of General Legal Theory, Göttingen. In 1984, he qualified as university lecturer in the faculty of law at the University of Göttingen for public law and legal philosophy. His thesis, submitted for the certificate of the Habilitation, was entitled “A Theory of Constitutional Rights” (Theorie der Grundrechte). After teaching in Regensburg and Kiel, he accepted, in 1986, the offer of a chair at the Christian-Albrechts-University in Kiel. From 1994 to 1998, he was president of the German section of the International Society for Philosophy of Law and Social Philosophy (IVR). Since 2002, he has been a member of the Academy of Science in Göttingen (Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen). In 2008 he was awarded a honorary doctorate, honoris causa, by the University of Alicante, the University of Buenos Aires, and the University of Tucumán.

E-mail: lsalexy@law.uni-kiel.de