Bachelor's Degree:

To be eligible to apply for admission to write the thesis, the candidate must have earned at least 120 credit points. This includes the seminars (modules 3DEWRBA009 “Advanced Seminar in Law I” and 3DEWRBA010 “Advanced Seminar in Law (Economics/Interdisciplinary Skills) II”), both of which must be successfully completed.

Master’s:

To be eligible to apply for admission to write the thesis, the candidate must have earned at least 70 credit points. These include the modules 3DEWRMA015 “Advanced Seminar in Law I” and 3DEWRMA016 “Advanced Seminar in Law II,” both of which must be successfully completed.

Once you’ve decided on the topic area in which you’d like to write your thesis, you can approach or contact a professor in that field of research and ask to be assigned as your advisor. Depending on the professor, you should do this several months in advance. For others, supervision on short notice is also possible. You can then discuss the selection of your second advisor with your supervisor.

First, you should consider which general subject area or field of law interests you most. Next, it’s a good idea to research current topics in that area—for example, by reviewing recent articles in relevant academic journals. Current news, legislative processes, or similar developments can also provide guidance for choosing a topic. If you don’t have a specific idea, your advisor can help you find a topic or suggest one.

A bachelor’s thesis should be approximately 40 pages long, and a master’s thesis approximately 60 pages (50 pages starting with the 2026 study catalog). The time allotted for a bachelor’s thesis is 9 weeks, and for a master’s thesis, 13 weeks.

The professors themselves set more specific guidelines for academic work. Most of them have their own guidelines. Ask your advisor about this or visit their website.

For literature research, you can use our library or the Katalog Plus. In the field of law, the databases Beck Online and Juris are particularly important for literature research. To access these resources from home, you’ll usually need VPN access. You can find information on setting up VPN access here.

In some cases, the departments also have relevant literature available for borrowing.

You can find information about Professor Krebs’s department library here.

To register, you must submit the following application to the Registrar's Office:

During the colloquium, you must first present the results of your work within 15 minutes. Afterward, the examiner will ask questions about your work or your presentation for 15–30 minutes.