Burkhard Schafer studied Theory of Science, Logic, Theoretical Linguistics, Philosophy and Law at the Universities of Mainz, Munich, Florence and Lancaster. His main field of interest is the interaction between law, science and computer technology from doctrinal, comparative and legal-theoretical perspectives. This research encompasses both the problems that technology and technological change poses to the law – technology law – and the use of technology in the justice system and the legal services industry – legal informatics.

Both perspectives, technology as a subject of regulation and a tool for regulation, are brought together through a theoretical perspective: How can law, understood as a system, communicate with systems external to it? “Computational legal theory”, in the understanding of his chair, tries to give answers to this question, by exploring the scope and also limits of computational representations of legal thought, and also by an analysis of how technology changes the way law thinks about such issues as responsibility, liability, harm and ultimately personhood and what it means to be human, and living life lawfully.