Clara De Chirico is a cotutelle Ph.D. candidate in Business Law, currently pursuing her doctoral studies at the University of Ottawa (Canada) and the University of Macerata (Italy) since 2021.
She holds an LLM (5-year program) from the University of Trento, where she graduated magna cum laude. Clara has extensive teaching experience as an International Tutor at the University of Macerata and has been assisting in Commercial Law and European Company Law courses since 2021.
Additionally, she collaborates with Giurisprudenza delle Imprese, an open-access database of Italian business law rulings, where she contributes to the review and summary of court decisions on business matters. In 2022, Clara completed her articleship at the Bari Bar Association (Italy), further enhancing her legal expertise in civil, tax, and insolvency law. Her research interests focus on promoting sustainability in corporate governance, with particular attention to the legal protection of local communities as vulnerable corporate stakeholders.
Clara has presented her work at several international conferences across Europe and Canada, addressing topics such as the inclusion of Indigenous and local communities in corporate governance frameworks and the establishment of a legal definition of local communities as stakeholders. Her current Ph.D. research explores how corporate governance can better integrate sustainable practices and provide compensation for damages suffered by local communities due to environmental impacts caused by business activities, particularly within the evolving legal landscapes of Europe and Canada.