Luís Barreto Xavier

Luís Barreto Xavier has been the President of the Knowledge Institute since 2019.

Of Counsel at Abreu Advogados since 2018, works as a legal consultant mainly on issues related to Constitutional Law and Private International Law.

His main focus is on providing opinions on matters relating to the competency of the courts, determining applicable law, acknowledging and enforcing foreign judgements, particularly in matters of contracts, international successions, matrimonial matters and property regimes.

As a faculty member at the Portuguese Catholic University, he initiated and coordinated the Advanced LLM in International Business Law (2006–2018), the first LLM in Portugal and one of the first of its kind in continental Europe. He founded and directed the Catholic Global School of Law (2009–2018), acknowledged by the Financial Times for seven consecutive years as one of the most innovative law schools in the world. He headed the Advanced Studies and Postgraduate Studies Office of the Faculty of Law of the Portuguese Catholic University – Lisbon School (2007–2018), and won the 2018 Alumni Award, awarded by the Alumni Commission of the Portuguese Catholic University Faculty of Law.

He also has extensive experience in representing the Portuguese State in various litigation proceedings, and before the Court of Justice of the European Union and is part of the Multidisciplinary Research Group on Artificial Intelligence and Law, created in 2018 under the Catholic Research Centre for the Future of Law.