Eva Steiner’s main areas of research are French and Comparative Law. Within these fields she has written on such varied topics as criminal omissions, the prosecution of war criminals, surrogacy and, more recently, codification of the law, civil registered partnerships, the right to knowledge of one’s origins and same-sex parenthood.

Her major work French Law: A Comparative Approach (OUP, 2010) is widely used in the UK and abroad.

In 2006 she was appointed Expert witness in French law in the inquest in the death of the Princess of Wales in Paris in 1997. She was called to give evidence in the High Court in front of coroner Lord Justice Scott Baker.

She has also acted as a referee or an expert witness in French law for a number of solicitors firms and official bodies, including the Nuffield Foundation, the BBC and, more recently, the Crown Prosecution Service and the Metropolitan Police.

Since 2005, at the request of the French Ministry of Justice and the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS), she has been taking part in a number of major European research projects on various topical issues such as the best interest principle in children law, human trafficking and the law of ancillary relief.

In 2012, she was appointed General Reporter for the 19th Congress of the International Academy of Comparative Law (2014 Vienna).

In 2013, Eva was elected a member of the International Academia of Comparative Law. She is also a member of the Société de Législation Comparée (Paris) and of the Franco-British Lawyers Society.

Her edited book Comparing the Prospective Effect of Judicial Rulings Across Jurisdictions [Springer 2015] examines the difficulties arising from the retroactive effect of overruling and the issues surrounding the adoption of prospective overruling: a US practice that is being adopted by many global jurisdictions, wherein a court announces changes to a previous decision but only for future cases. 

Teaching

Undergraduate

•  French Legal System
•  French Private Law

Eva Steiner is a Senior Lecturer and the Director of the LLB English Law & French Law programme, having joined the Dickson Poon School of Law at King's in 1988 as a lecturer in French Law.

A graduate from the University of Paris, she holds a Doctorate in Private Law and Criminal Sciences (with distinction-Paris). 

Before moving to England in 1987 she was a full-time lecturer in civil and criminal law at the University of Paris I-Pantheon-Sorbonne.

She is also a qualified Avocat and was a member of the Paris Bar from 1981 to 1987.