Paul-André Crépeau

Honourary Doctor of Laws - Fall 2008

Paul-André Crépeau was born in Gravelbourg, Saskatchewan and pursued his academic studies at the University of Ottawa after the family moved there in 1943. He went on to an extraordinary career, training as a Rhodes Scholar in common law and comparative law at the University of Oxford, and attaining a doctorate in classical civil law from the Université de Paris. He has six earned degrees and seven honorary doctorates, and throughout his distinguished career, he has always paid tribute to his formative years growing up in Saskatchewan.

Crépeau is widely recognized in the university community in Canada as one of the founders of the academic tradition in the law and is generally hailed as the spiritual father of the Civil Code of Quebec and the Quebec Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms. His work in the law of obligations and private international law over nearly 50 years at McGill University has set the standard for teaching and scholarship in law in Canada.

He now lives in Quebec where he is director emeritus of the Centre for Private and Comparative Law at McGill, which he founded in 1975.