The eagerly awaited concluding part of the series The Crown is set to arrive on 14 December 2023. Professor Maurice Sunkin recently engaged in an interview with Italy’s esteemed public national broadcaster RAI, delving into the intricacies raised by this acclaimed historical drama. The show, a fictional portrayal of Queen Elizabeth II’s journey intertwined with ..read more

Image via Shutterstock On 5 April 2023, Dr. Sabina Garahan (Lecturer, Essex Law School) and Dr. Matthew Gillett (Senior Lecturer, Essex Law School submitted evidence to the Joint Committee on Human Rights (the “JCHR”) as part of its legislative scrutiny of the Illegal Migration Bill. Their submission focused on detention-related questions posed by the JCHR. Dr. Garahan recently completed her AHRC-funded research on the right to liberty under European human rights law. Dr. Gillett is the Vice-Chair of the UN Human Rights Council’s Working Group on Arbitrary Detention (the “Working Group”). The ..read more

Image via Shutterstock By Dr. Konstantinos Kalliris, School of Law, University of Essex Legal aid, as we know it today, is a relatively recent institutional development, but the concept is old. From the Court of Requests in Tudor and early Stuart times to the pro bono advice offered by the Poor Man’s Lawyers Movement, the idea that everyone is entitled to some form of legal advice and support has been present in the United Kingdom for a long time. However, legal aid as charity did little to help those unable to pay for legal counsel (it was, after all, mostly restricted to pre-trial advice) or ..read more

Image by Shutterstock Investigations into alleged violations of international humanitarian law and international human rights law in armed conflict are crucial to the implementation of these bodies of law. There are, however, numerous legal and practical challenges that arise when considering a State’s obligations under international law with regard to such investigations. These include establishing the bases and scope of the duty to investigate under both bodies of law, and determining the way in which these investigations must be carried out. Furthermore, addressing the framework for investi ..read more

Photo by Jordhan Madec By Maurice Sunkin, Theodore Konstadinides and Lee Marsons, School of Law, University of Essex The UK government is pursuing multiple legal reforms designed to rebalance “the relationship between the government, parliament and the courts” – a commitment made in the Conservative party’s 2019 election manifesto. Many of these reforms will affect how people can hold the state accountable, potentially undermining independent scrutiny and weakening the role of the courts in holding the government to account. Among them is a review of the 1998 Human Rights Act  ..read more

Photo by David Rotimi Dr. Fikayo Taiwo, Lecturer in Law at the University of Essex, has concluded her Ph.D. thesis titled ‘Incremental Development of a Legal Framework for Arbitration in Emerging Markets: A Case Study of Construction Arbitration in Nigeria’. The problem the thesis sought to investigate is the continued exportation of Africa-related disputes for arbitration outside of the continent based on a perceived lack of an appropriately attractive seat of international arbitration within the region. Given the economic impact of arbitration activity on a nation’s gross domestic ..read more

Image: Dravyavati R., Jaipur by Rod Waddington licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0 By Dr. Birsha Ohdedar, Lecturer in Law, University of Essex The rule of law broadly underlies the idea that ‘no one is above the law’ and that the law is created and applied fairly. The dominant liberal-legal narratives on the rule of law often do not go much beyond this. That is, they do not ascribe content about ‘what that law should be’. Rarely does this narrow ‘rule of law’ speak to any right to have law made to protect the planet and realise the needs of marginalised and deprived peoples. A ..read more

Photo by Kevin Ku With a long history in international law, the concept of due diligence has recently gained traction in the cyber context, as a promising avenue to hold states accountable for harmful cyber operations originating from, or transiting through, their territory, in the absence of attribution. Nonetheless, confusion surrounds the nature, content, and scope of due diligence. It remains unclear whether it is a general principle of international law, a self-standing obligation, or a standard of conduct, and whether there is a specific rule requiring diligent behaviour in cyberspa ..read more

Photo by Markus Spiske Dr. Birsha Ohdedar, Lecturer at the School of Law & Human Rights Centre of the University of Essex, recently spoke at a special side event during COP26, hosted by global law firm Hausfeld, the British Institute of International and Comparative Law (BIICL) and the University of Glasgow on ‘Mobilising the Rule of Law in Climate Change’. Birsha spoke alongside Dr. David R. Boyd (UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and the Environment), Prof. Michael Gerrard (Columbia Law School), Prof. Christina Voigt (the University of Oslo and Chair of the IUCN World Commission on E ..read more

Image by Udo Pohlmann Dr. Tom Flynn, Lecturer in Law at the University of Essex, has recently had an article published in the International Journal of Constitutional Law (I•CON) as part of a symposium on last year’s controversial PSPP judgment of the German Federal Constitutional Court (GFCC). In that judgment, the GFCC for the first time declared a judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) to be ultra vires. As the symposium in I•CON demonstrates, this decision has come in for sustained attack from many quarters, and defences of it are partial at best. Most significantly ..read more