Beautiful cars and a bunch of awesome lawyers abounded at the latest Eurojuris Congress in the Bavarian capital. Marcus Pilla, a local Eurojuris member, tells us all about the event which benefited from high attendance and sponsorship by BMW Welt.
Urbanism and City Life were the mottos of the latest Eurojuris Congress and served as a red line throughout the three days. Munich is a wide and densely populated metropolis, and almost two hundred Eurojuris lawyers from all around the world joined there to discuss opportunities created by growing urbanisation. The joint Congress celebrated both Eurojuris International's yearly autumn meeting and Eurojuris Germany's 25th birthday. For this occasion, lawyers were granted a lot of advantages thanks to a local sponsor: BMW Welt, the exhibition and business centre of the famous automobile brand BMW.
'We wanted urbanism to be the main topic', explains Marcus Pilla, a local Eurojuris member who played a central role in organising the event, 'so we settled in a hotel at the very centre of town. Except for our Debating Day at BMW Welt, we did not even need a bus, everything was very close at hand, we could just walk around: shows, visits, dinners... and all participants were quite enthusiastic about the venues!'
First of all the BMW Welt attracted a great deal of attention from attendees. 'Automobiles and mobility play a great role in urban life. Attendees were amazed at what they discovered in the BMW business center, but also the day before in the BMW showroom ”pavillion“ in the city centre, for example, at our national-stands-event: there were electric cars and hybrid cars: that was inspirational.'
After their visit of the national stands in the pavillion, for the subsequent “beer&würstl-rallye“, lawyers divided into small groups and visited up to three different restaurants in that evening. 'People saw a lot of places in just one evening, they got an overview over Bavarian “beer culture“, and the various groups ran into each other several times in the city centre', says Marcus with a smile.
On Saturday, the Congress was devoted to urbanistics. 'We had speakers from the network as well as speakers from outside, scholars, city officials in Munich, BMW managers, entrepreneurs.... They gave us a clear picture of trends in the global development of urbanization, not only in Munich but all over Europe and around the world. Urbanites are becoming a bigger and bigger share of the worldwide population. Already today, it is said that more than one Frenchman in five lives in the greater Paris area. In Germany it is the same albeit spread across several cities. This is the trend everywhere.' Attendees were granted explanations on the phenomenon, including one by a historian who retraced the evolution of urban life. 'We talked about mobility, public transportation and private vehicles, we talked about the situation of media and its influence on city life...' In short, important aspects of the topic were explored, including a discussion with all participants at the end of each of the three panels.
According to Marcus, the speakers opened up a lot of valuable markets for lawyers: 'We did not only talk about urbanism in general, we looked into it to find specifically how this can give work to lawyers. We saw, for example, that lawyers can act on behalf of cities, their institutions, or investors who seek to rejuvenate districts, or environmentalists, etc. Even the question of the role of media is not abstract, there are a lot of jobs for us regarding media infrastructure and media content.
And during the breaks, the participants of Eurojuris International and Eurojuris Germany, having its conference next door within the business center, met for a coffee and for lunch, taking advantage of the opportunity to get acquainted very easily on the terraces of BMW Welt.
The rest of the day was dedicated to leisure. 'We were granted a visit of the Olympic park and a small group climbed up its impressive tower. Another group. welcomed in the law office of Glock Liphart Probst & Partner, saw the Glockenspiel, a traditional puppet theatre that rings music when the clock hits five at the city hall. A third group played a football match. On Sunday it was very sunny, so a group took a tram to Nymphenburg Castle, to which belongs an English-style wide park. Another group rented BMW sportscars to drive to Tegernsee lake and Starnberg lake, that was a superb moment!'
As a conclusion, organisers were very satisfied by the large number of Eurojuris members who attended the Congress. 'They came mostly from Europe', concludes Marcus, 'but also Costa Rica, Dubai, China, the United-States... this is very encouraging for future Congresses and Practice Group Days.”
The next meeting to come is the Practice Group Days in May 2016 in Marseille. So make sure you don't miss it!
