Postgraduate Diploma in Marine Insurance online programme

Programme Director

Professor Patrick Donner LL.M
Associate Academic Dean
World Maritime University

Patrick Donner qualified for the Bar in Finland (vicehäradshövding) in 1977 and served on the bench as deputy judge and acting chief judge of the City Court of Mariehamn for several years in the late 1970’s. Professor Donner served the Sally Shipping group for 12 years, advancing from chief legal counsel and company secretary to deputy managing director with responsibility for the legal aspects of the group, which had ferry operations in Scandinavia, the United Kingdom and cruise operations in the Caribbean. After the Sally Group he was managing director for Delfin Cruises Ltd. in Finland, operating cruises in the Baltic. He then ran his own law and management consultancy firm for a few years. During all this time he taught maritime law at the Maritime Academy of Åland and also held numerous non-executive positions on boards of directors of shipping and insurance companies as well as being elected public office at local level. Since January 1995 Professor Donner has been at the World Maritime University in Malmö, Sweden, first as Associate Professor in Shipping Management and currently as Associate Academic Dean, teaching international post-graduate students in all commercial aspects of shipping with an emphasis on maritime and commercial law.

Course Authors

Dr. Phil Anderson BA (Hons.), D.Prof., FNI, MEWI, AMAE, ACIArb., Master Mariner
Managing Director
ConsultISM Ltd

Dr. Phil Anderson commenced his seagoing career in 1969 with the Bibby Line of Liverpool. He served on a wide variety of ships including General Cargo, Bulk Carriers, Gas Tankers, OBO’s and Container ships and qualified as a Class 1 Master Mariner Foreign Going. Dr Anderson came ashore in 1980 to work as a Claims Executive with Sunderland P&I Association and transferred to North of England P&I Association in 1987 where he remained until the end of 2004. At the time of leaving North of England Dr. Anderson had risen to the level of a full Director of the Management Company of the Club and was the Manager in charge of Risk Management and Loss Prevention.

He is currently the Managing Director of his own specialist consultancy company, ConsultISM Ltd., providing expert witness and advice on the ISM Code.  Dr. Anderson has written numerous books on Marine Insurance and the International Safety Management (ISM) Code. He is a Visiting Lecturer in the School of Marine Transport at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, a Part Time Lecturer in the Faculty of Law at the University of Northumbria in Newcastle and a Part Time Lecturer in the Faculty of Nautical Science at South Tyneside (Marine) College. His Doctorate in Professional Studies was with Middlesex University involving an extensive research project into managing safety on board ships. He is Immediate Past President of the Nautical Institute and is dedicated to supporting the cause of professionalism amongst seafarers. He is also a full Member of the Expert Witness Institute, an Associate of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators and a Practicing Associate of the Academy of Experts.

Dr Gotthard Mark Gauci
Lecturer
Plymouth University

Dr Gotthard Mark Gauci is a lecturer in law at the University of Plymouth, having previously taught at the IMO International Maritime Law Institute (Malta), the University of Wales, Cardiff, and Swansea University. He is an advocate (Malta) and a visiting lecturer at the World Maritime University (Malmo). His areas of research are shipping law and environmental law. He is the author of Oil Pollution at Sea – Civil Liability and Compensation for Damage (John Wiley, 1997) and also a contributor to Benedict on Admiralty.

Proshanto K. Mukherjee
Vice President (Research) Director, Doctoral Programmes ITF Professor of Maritime Safety and Environmental Protection
World Maritime University

Proshanto K. Mukherkee is ITF Professor of Maritime Safety and Environmental Protection, Coordinator of the Maritime Administration and Education Programme of the Master of Science (M.Sc.) Course, and Director Of Doctoral Programmes of the World Maritime University in Malmö, Sweden. He is Honorary Research Fellow of the University of Wales Swansea and Academic Coordinator of the joint Ph.D. programme in Maritime and Commercial Law of the World Maritime University and University of Wales Swansea. He has is external examiner for Ph.D. candidates at University of Wales Cardiff and Swansea and University of Greenwich and is supervisor for Ph.D. candidates at University of Wales Swansea and Lund University, Sweden. He was previously mentor and examiner at the Master’s level in law at Lund University.

He started his sea-going career as an officer cadet on the Training Ship Dufferin in Bombay and spent sixteen years at sea. He studied for the Bachelor of Science degree at University of Calcutta, read law at Dalhousie University, Canada and obtained his Ph.D. from University of Wales Swansea. He was called to the Bar of Ontario and practiced there as a barrister and solicitor. He served as a Senior Adviser, Maritime Policy and International Affairs of the Canadian Hydrographic Service, Government of Canada, before being appointed by the International Maritime Organization (IMO) as Senior Deputy Director and Professor of Maritime Law of the International Maritime Law Institute in Malta. He was formerly IMO Legal Adviser for the Caribbean Region under the Wider Caribbean Initiative on Ship-Generated Waste (WCISW), a project funded by the World Bank, and continues to serve periodically as Maritime Legislation Consultant to the IMO. He has drafted shipping and marine environmental legislation for some twenty-five jurisdictions around the world.

Professor Mukherjee is the author of Maritime Legislation and co-editor of Maritime Violence and Other Security Issues at Sea, published by WMU Publications in 2002. He has numerous publications to his credit embracing virtually every aspect of public and private maritime law which include articles in peer-reviewed journals and conference and symposia proceedings. He was previously a member of the Advisory Board of Editors of the Journal of Maritime Law and Commerce and is presently a member of the Editorial Advisory Board of the WMU Journal of Maritime Affairs, and of the Editorial Board of the Journal of International Maritime Law. He is also a Fellow of the Nautical Institute and an Associate Fellow of the Royal Institute of Navigation in London.

John Liljedahl LL.M
Master Mariner
Attorney at Law

John Liljedahl, was originally educated as a Master Mariner and served in the Danish merchant marine. Acquiring a law degree, he joined the Danish Register of Shipping and later Baltica, the leading insurance company in Denmark. While employed with the latter as a claims and contract manager from 1980 to 1992, he taught marine insurance and maritime law at the Danish Institute of Insurance Studies. He was also chairman of the Legal Committee of the Danish Marine Underwriters Association. In 1992, he was admitted to the Danish Bar and set up his own law firm in Copenhagen, at the same time as he maintained the position of lecturer with the Danish Maritime Authority. Since 1999, Mr Liljedahl was a lecturer at the World Maritime University on secondment from the Danish Government. His publications include: Places of Refuge for Ships: The Danish Approach (in Chircop, A, and Linden, O, Places of Refuge for Ships, Leiden, Boston: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 2005), Liability and Insurance in Respect of Pollution, and articles on shipping and maritime law in The Danish Encyclopaedia.

Professor Rhidian Thomas
Director of the Institute of International Shipping and Trade
University of Wales

Professor of Maritime Law and Director of the Institute of International Shipping and Trade Law at the Department of Law, University of Wales, Swansea.  He is author of Maritime Liens (British Shipping Law Series), published by Stevens and Sons; The Law and Practice Relating to Appeals from Arbitration Awards, Default Powers of Arbitrators, and Volume 1 (1996) and Volume 2 (2002) Modern Law of Marine Insurance, all published by LLP. He is Editor-in-Chief of Journal of International Maritime Law, co-editor of Arbitration International and co-editor of Journal of International Commercial Law.  He is a member of the British Maritime Law Association and chairman of the Sub-Committee on Mortgages and Ship Arrest, of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators and the British Insurance Law Association.