The Institute is dedicated to performing fundamental comparative law research in the fields of foreign, European and international private law, commercial law, economic law and civil procedure as well as their neighbouring areas of study. Included herein are the methodological foundations of comparative law and legal harmonisation . The Institute’s charter provides that, within this framework, the Institute shall publish the results of its research and foster international cooperation. Additionally, the charter’s objective embraces the Institute’s collaboration on the drafting of national and international laws as well as the provision of expert opinion analyses.
 
The Institute was founded in Berlin in 1926 under the aegis of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society for the Advancement of Science, into whose exclusive sponsorship it passed in 1938. Its mission was to complete foundational research in the field of comparative private law and the law relating to cross-border transactions. Initially, the primary aims of the Institute were to facilitate the administration of the First World War’s private law consequences, to support international commerce with information on foreign law and to foster a comparative law dialogue between German jurisprudence and foreign nations.  Ernst Rabel (1874 - 1955), one of the most significant jurists of the last century, became the first Institute director. Under his leadership the Institute quickly garnered considerable influence, above all through the bustling issuance of expert opinions for judges, businesses, associations and state organisations as well as through legilsative consultations. Additionally, from the very outset fostering a new generation of scholarship was an important aim of the Institute. Many Institute members later held teaching appointments in and outside of the country, for example, Ernst von Caemmerer, Konrad Duden and Max Rheinstein.
 
The reign of National Socialism left painful marks in the history of the Institute and in the biographies of a significant number of its scholars. Subsequent to 1933, as a result of Nazi racial purity laws, several members were forced to leave the Institute or, as in the case of Max Rheinstein, did not return to the Institute following a trip abroad.   In 1937 Ernst Rabel was forced to resign his position as the director of the Institute; in 1939 he emigrated to the United States. Under the leadership of his successor Ernst Heymann, director from 1937 to 1946, the Institute escaped further direct political interference.   In addition to comparative law research, reports on foreign legal systems and expert opinions continued to be prepared during these years.  In the process, the Institute also reported on the law in countries occupied by Germany during the Second World War and drafted expert reports on behalf of the government and party authorities.  To this extent, the Institute also made its expertise on foreign and private international law during the era of national socialism available to the rulers of state and the economy.  As a result of the Institute's transfer from Berlin to Tübingen, the extensive library was saved from the effects of the war. In 1956 the Institute – which had become a part of the Max-Planck-Gesellschaft in 1949– relocated to Hamburg. Hans Dölle (director from 1946 to 1963) led the Institute in the first decades of the post-war years and was followed by Konrad Zweigert (director from 1963 to 1979). In this period the Institute was not only enlisted in the construction of national and international research frameworks in the field of comparative law, but they also began one of the world’s most ambitious comparative law projects, the ‘”International Encyclopedia of Comparative Law”.  
 
In 1979, subsequent to the departure of Konrad Zweigert, the Institute’s leadership was for the first time assumed by a team of directors.  Ulrich Drobnig, (director until 1997), Hein Kötz (until 2000) and Ernst-Joachim Mestmäcker (until 1994) represented not only an expansion of personnel but also an enlargement of the research spectrum with regards to content. Alongside its traditional fields of study, the Institute established foreign and international economic law, particularly international telecommunications law, as a further research emphasis.
 
At present, Jürgen Basedow (since 1997), Holger Fleischer (since 2009) and Reinhard Zimmerman (since 2002) form the Institute’s directorate. Through their respective fields of interest and methodological approach, they have added new dimensions to the work of the Institute. Whereas Basedow has intensified the activities of the Institute in European private law, including conflict of laws, in commercial law, transportation law, insurance law and international competition law, but also in family law, Zimmerman has added a historical dimension to the Institute's activities in comparative law by analysing, in particular, the various branches of the law of obligations from a historical and comparative perspective and by asking how an understanding of legal history can productively contribute to the development of modern private law doctrine. The connections between English common law and the Continental civilian systems, the mixed legal systems shaped by both traditions and the European law of obligations constitute further major elements of his work. Klaus J. Hopt, Director Emeritus as of 1 September 2008, brought a focus on international business law, company law, banking law and capital market law. In January 2009 Holger Fleischer accepted the Institute's call to succeed Klaus Hopt. He will continue the Institute's research in the areas of company law and securities regulation.

 
The recent development of the Institute is, however, not only characterised by a broad range of research in the different fields of private law, but also by an increased endeavour to focus on problems common to all of them. Particularly, the shared interest in developing a European private law has decisively shaped the academic profile of the Institute.
 
Additionally, the Institute has in recent years broadened its cooperation with other research institutions in distinct ways. This includes above all the collaboration with the University of Hamburg in support of the International Max Planck Research School for Maritime Affairs, but also includes the agreement of cooperation with the University of Cambridge regarding the interchange of scholars as well as the conflict of laws project with regards to intellectual property being carried out in conjunction with the Max Planck Institute for Intellectual Property, Competition and Tax Law. An ongoing Institute forum on international sports law presents not only the opportunity to bring the Institute’s expertise to bear on a topic within which several fields of law intersect, but also documents the Institute’s receptiveness to the discussion of current themes featuring a direct social effect.

• Last update: 30 Jun. 2011
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