Javier Martínez-Torrón

Javier Martínez-Torrón

Javier Martínez-Torrón (Córdoba, Spain, 1955) has been Professor of Law (Catedrático) at Complutense University, Madrid (Spain)^[1] since 2000. He obtained his first chair at the University of Granada in 1993. Doctor utroque iure (of Law and of Canon Law). Founder and Director of the Seminar of Comparative Law of the University of Granada (1997–2000). Director of the Seminar of Professors of Church-State Relations of Complutense University (2000-). Visiting professor and researcher in numerous Universities of Spain, Europe, North-America, and Latin-America (among them Cambridge, Chicago, Columbia, Berkeley, Harvard, Ottawa, Freiburg (Germany) and Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México - UNAM). He is also, since 2001, part-time Professor of the Saint Louis University Law School (Comparative Law, Summer Law Courses).

Professor Martínez-Torrón is Vice-President of the Section of Canon Law and Church-State Relations of the Spanish Royal Academy of Jurisprudence and Legislation (1994). Member of the OSCE/ODIHR Advisory Council on Freedom of Religion of Belief (2005). Member of the Advisory Commission on Religious Freedom of the Spanish Ministry of Justice (2002). Member of the Bioethics Committee of the Autonomous Region of Madrid, Spain (2004). Co-founder of the Spanish Association of Comparative Law (1996), and member of its Board of Directors. Member of the International Academy of Comparative Law (2002). Member of the International Academy for Freedom of Religion and Belief (1997). Member of the International Advisory Council of The Oslo Coalition on Freedom of Religion and Belief (1999). Member of the Academic Advisory Board of the International Center for Law and Religion Studies at Brigham Young University (2006). Member of the Steering Committee of the Project “EuReSIS Net” (European Studies on Religion and State Interaction), funded by the Erasmus Program of the European Union (2006–2009). He has consulted for the governments of Spain, Mexico and France, on issues related to freedom of religion and belief.

In Israel

Javier Martínez-Torrón was a founding member of the Directive Board of the first Spanish legal periodical specifically focused on the law of the State on religious issues (Anuario de Derecho Eclesiástico del Estado, 1995). He is founder and Deputy Director of the Revista General de Derecho Canónico y Derecho Eclesiástico del Estado (2003), the first electronic legal periodical in Spain specialized on Church-State relations and canon law (included in the Latindex catalogue). He is also a member of the Editorial Board of the Ecclesiastical Law Journal, published by Cambridge University Press (2006).

Publications

Javier Martínez-Torrón is the author of numerous books and articles, published in eighteen countries; in total, fourteen books and more than eighty essays in legal periodicals or collective volumes. His writings have been published in Spanish, English, Italian, French, Russian, Lithuanian, Turkish and Chinese. His research is characterized by a predominant interest in comparative law issues, especially from two perspectives: the legal treatment of freedom of religion and conscience, and the historical evolution of the great Western legal traditions. He is internationally recognized as an expert in the case law of the European Court of Human Rights, especially on issues related to freedom of religion and belief. He has lectured on those themes in more than sixty international and national conferences or colloquia.

He has received funding for his investigation from different Spanish and foreign sources, among which are: the Fulbright Commission, the U.S.-Spanish Joint Committee for Educational and Cultural Cooperation, the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs, the Spanish Ministry of Education and Culture, the Spanish Ministry of Science and Technology, the Autonomous Governments of Andalusia and Madrid (Spain), and Complutense University.

Among his writings in the last years are particularly well-known those related to the protection of freedom of religion or belief in international law, especially in the European environment. The results of his research include books on the Spanish system of agreements between the State and religious groups (Comares, Granada 1994); the international protection of religious freedom (Eunsa, Pamplona 1994); the regulation of different kinds of conscientious objection in comparative and international law (with Rafael Navarro-Valls, Giappicchelli, Torino 1995, which obtained the Arturo Carlo Jemolo Award, and McGraw-Hill, Madrid 1997); the historical influence of canon law on the Anglo-American legal tradition (Civitas, Madrid 1991; and Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1998); religion, society and law (Comares, Granada 1999); and some of the legal problems derived from the activity of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Latin-America (Comisión Nacional de Derechos Humanos, México 2000 – this latter book reproduces a large report written for the Mexican National Commission on Human Rights and constituted the ground for a change of the Commission’s policy with regard to the objection of Jehovah’s Witnesses to the flag salute in public schools). His books published as editor include a one-thousand volume on the treatment of freedom of religion by constitutional courts, from a comparative perspective (Comares, Granada 1998); and a volume on religion and state in the Spanish and European Constitutions (Comares, Granada 2006).

References