Nicolas Michel has been a member of faculty at the Graduate Institute Geneva since 2008 and is also a Full Professor on the Faculty of Law at the University of Geneva. He has previously been the Under-Secretary-General for Legal Affairs and United Nations Legal Counsel from 2004 to 2008.
From 1998 to 2003, he acted as the Director of the International Law Directorate in the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs and served from 1998 to 2004 as Legal Adviser of the same department. Michel was Professor of International Law and European Law at the University of Fribourg, Switzerland, from 1987 to 2004 and has also taught at the Universities of Geneva, Lausanne (Law Faculty and Federal Polytechnic School), Neuchatel and Paris II (at the Institut des Hautes Études internationales).