Christoph Sperfeldt

Dr Christoph Sperfeldt is a Fellow at the Center for Human Rights and International at Stanford University, a Research Associate at UNSW Law School, an Honorary Fellow at the Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness at Melbourne Law School, and an Adjunct Professor at the Center for the Study of Humanitarian Law, Royal University of Law and Economics, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

Christoph pursues socio-legal research in areas of human rights and justice, including statelessness and legal identity, international and regional human rights protection, and transitional and international criminal justice. He has studied these issues particularly in a context of peacebuilding and development cooperation, with a geographical focus on Southeast Asia. He holds a PhD from the School of Regulation and Global Governance (RegNet) at the Australian National University.

Prior to joining academia, Christoph worked for more than a decade on human rights, statelessness and transitional justice, predominantly in Southeast Asia. He was Deputy Director at the Asian International Justice Initiative, a joint program of the East-West Center and the Center for Human Rights and International Justice at Stanford University, where he supported human rights and rule of law capacity development in ASEAN. Prior to this, Christoph was Senior Advisor with the German development agency (GIZ) in Cambodia. In this capacity, he advised the Cambodian Human Rights Action Committee and the Victims Support Section at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC).