Comparative Legal System

Basil C.Bitas has substantial practice experience in international legal and business matters, having been in-house counsel to a major multinational corporation in Lausanne, Switzerland and subsequently the Managing Partner of the Geneva office of a US law firm. The nature of his practice has involved intensive interaction with the legal systems of North America, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. The latter region became a sub-specialty of his practice, with particular focus on certain countries in both Northeast and Southeast Asia, including Japan, Korea, China and the Philippines. Mr. Bitas is currently an Associate Professor of Law (Practice) at the Singapore Management University, where he teaches Comparative Legal Systems, the Economic Analysis of Law, and Ethics and Social Responsibility. He has increasingly focused his research on legal convergence in general and its implications for ASEAN integration in particular, setting these issues within a broader political and economic frame. Mr. Bitas holds Bachelor's degrees in History and Economics from Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, having graduated Magna cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa in 1981. He also holds a Juris Doctor degree (1987) from Georgetown University Law Center in Washington, D.C. and maintains active bar memberships in the State of New York and Washington, D.C.