Biography

Academia

I studied law at University College Dublin, qualifying also as a solicitor in the Republic of Ireland. Then I went to Cambridge University (Wolfson College) where I took a Masters Degree in Law and after that a PhD, in environmental law. By then I had become a Fellow in Law at Emmanuel College and I stayed in that job for seven years, before moving to King’s College London in the early 1990s. After many happy years at King’s I moved to LSE in 2002, to a post in the law department but also to become the first Rausing Director of LSE’s new Centre for the Study of Human Rights centre for the study of human rights . I am still director of the centre and professor of human rights law at LSE, though I have decided to hand over directorship to the centre to another colleague at the end of this academic year, 2008/9. I have been a visiting professor at a number of universities abroad and have also been an external examiner at many universities in the UK and Ireland

Research

My academic research focuses primarily on civil liberties, terrorism and human rights. My first book (co-authored with my colleague at both Cambridge and King’s, Keith Ewing) was Freedom under Thatcher and as its subtitle made clear it dealt with the state of civil liberties in modern Britain. I then wrote a book on terrorism, simply entitled Terror which was published by Faber and Faber in 1991. Since then I have kept up my interest in both these subjects, writing more books on each – most recently Civil Liberties (published by Oxford University Press in August 2007)Civil Liberties. In recent years I have also deepened my interest in human rights law and, more generally, in human rights – writing a book in 2004 called Principles of Human Rights Adjudication and a more inter-disciplinary and shorter book in 2006, Can Human Rights Survive? This last book was based on my 2005 Hamlyn lectures. My very latest book is a selection of essays on human rights and terrorism, published by Cameron May in April 2008 Cameron May

It has been really remarkable for me to see my various research interests rise to the top of the political as well as the scholarly agenda. Each is more complex that it first appears and I continue to work on a better understanding of the remit of each subject area and also on how they interrelate with each other. Because I have been reading and thinking about each area for many years I try to bring a longer historical perspective than is something to be seen in these sometimes dangerously current fields.

Public Policy

I have been heavily involved in trying to influence public discussion of my various academic specialisms. I have quite a large journalistic output, writing a regular column for The Tablet (for which I am legal correspondent) and also for literary and political journals like The London Review of Books, Prospect and Renewal. Apart from my own speaking engagements, the Centre for the Study of Human Rights has a lively events programme which also engages with the general public from a scholarly/public policy perspective. I think it is right that academics should not be shy about seeking to communicate their ideas to a wider audience.

Teaching

I teach graduate and undergraduate classes at LSE in my various specialisms: human rights; civil liberties; terrorism and human rights law. I also teach a little on the undergraduate Public Law course. During the Summer I teach a summer school on human rights for three weeks: this is open to all who are interested, with no prior qualifications being required summer school The centre for the study of human rights also runs various short certificate courses on human rights topics and I teach a number of classes on these as well certificate courses

Practice

I am a founder member of Matrix Chambers which started in 2000 Matrix . I have a practice which specialises in judicial review and which includes human rights law within its main fields. I have appeared in cases in the High Court, the Court of Appeal and the House of Lords and have been involved in applications to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. I also created the Matrix legal team which successfully defended the former prime minister of Kosovo against the international crimes with which he was charged before the International Criminal Court for the Former Yugoslavia.

Contact Details

Please see the Contacts page for full details of how you can get in touch with me.