Olivier de Frouville is a Professor of Public Law at Paris-Panthéon-Assas University Director of the Paris Human Rights Center (C.R.D.H.). From 2012 to 2020 he has been a member of the Institut Universitaire de France (I.U.F.), undertaking a program of research called « On a democratic theory of International Law ». At Panthéon-Assas University, he teaches general international law, international human rights law and international criminal law. He also lectures of international human rights law at the Geneva Academy on humanitarian law and human rights.
His fields of research include general international law, the theory of international law, international human rights law, international humanitarian law and international criminal law. His research is characterized by a back-and-forth between theory and practice, from cosmopolitan legal theory to « cosmopolitan building sites », such as the status of civil society in international organisations or the creation of a United Nations Human Rights Court.
Parallel to his academic carreer, Olivier de Frouville has worked for more than twenty five years as a human rights expert in the United Nations. In June 2019, he was elected as a member of the UN Committee on Enforced Disappearances. If was reelected for a second 4-years mandate in June 2023 and was then elected as President of the Committee in September 2023. Previously he has been a member of the UN Human Rights Committee (2015-2018) and of the United Nations Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances (2008-2014), of which he was the Chairperson-Rapporteur between April 2012 and Octobre 2013. He was also a member of the Coordination Committee of UN Special Procedures in the year 2013-2014. Between 2009 and 2020, he has been an expert appointed by France in the framework of the OSCE Human Dimension Moscow mechanism.
Between 2009 and 2015 he was a member of National Consultative Commission on Human Rights in France.
