Arno Akkermans

Board member

Biography by Arno Akkermans

Arno Akkermans (1958) graduated from the faculty of law of Tilburg University (cum laude) and obtained his doctorate at the same university (cum laude). Until his appointment as professor of civil law at the VU University in 1999 he worked as an attorney in the field of liability and insurance. His research focus is on the impact of law and legal procedure on the wellbeing and health of individuals, in the context of civil procedure in general and of the settlement of personal injury claims in particular. Arno works with multidisciplinary research teams and cooperates with colleagues at the Faculty of Psychology and at the VU University medical centre (VUmc). He is a fellow of the European Centre of Tort and Insurance Law in Vienna (ECTIL), member of the board of the Netherlands Comparative Law Association (NVVR), and co-founder and member of the steering committee of the International Network on Law and Apology Research (INLAR).

Arno Akkermans is director of the Amsterdam Law and Behavior Institute (A-LAB) and of the Amsterdam Centre for Comprehensive Law (ACCL). Within A-LAB several faculties of the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and the Netherlands Insitute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement (NSCR) join forces in conducting interdisciplinary research in the field of law and behavior. The ACCL is one of the research centres of A-LAB. The ACCL is pioneering a variety of innovative empirical-legal research methods and is experimenting with the way legal research is oriented and organized. The ACCL stands for a more comprehensive approach to the function, the effects and the meaning of law and legal procedures for those who resort to the legal system. Its mission is to contribute with its research to the improvement of the performance of the legal system in meeting a wider spectrum of human needs and motivations than traditionally are the focus of law and the legal discipline, such as justice, acknowledgement, validation, involvement, ‘voice’, restoration, apology and forgiveness.