Centre for Legal Research Annual Report 2013-2014
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Centre for Legal Research Annual Report 2013-2014 Follow the CLR on Twitter @CLR_UWEBristol Centre for Legal Research / Annual Report 2013/2014 Contents Overview of the Centre for Legal Research 2013-2014 3 Overall purpose of the CLR 4 Research units 4 Aims of the research units 4 Unit reports 5 • Criminal Justice Unit 5 • Commercial Law Research Unit 8 • Environmental Law Unit 11 • Family, Gender and Equality Unit 13 • International Law and Human Rights Unit 14 Centre for Legal Research publications 20 • Books 20 • Chapters in books 20 • Journal articles 21 • Conference and seminar papers 22 Centre for Legal Research members 25 Post-Graduate Research case studies 26 Centre for Legal Research / Annual Report 2013/2014 Overview of the Centre for Legal Research 2013-2014 The Centre for Legal Research (CLR) was established by the University in October 2002. It promotes and co-ordinates the research activity within the School of Law. The CLR is fortunate to be home to a large number of scholars, research associates and postgraduate students who specialise in a wide range of subject areas and legal disciplines. We are passionate about the law, its ability to change people’s lives and the ways in which our own work can affect change regionally, nationally and across international borders. CLR scholars are at the forefront of many legal and policy debates, knowledge exchange and public engagement activities. Our scholarship informs national and international legal developments, impacting on the lives of people in the wider community, as well as government and business. The CLR and its research is organised into five subject-based research units covering: Commercial Law; Criminal Justice; Environmental Law; Family, Gender & Equality and International Law & Human Rights. As you will see from the unit events detailed in this report, 2013-14 has been a very busy year for the CLR. Its members have been engaged in a wide variety of research, seminar and conference activities. We have hosted speakers from around the world, and provided a forum for debate and public engagement. Our work has impacted on policy debates within government, the scholarly community, businesses, charities and the voluntary sector. This year, CLR scholars have engaged in a great deal of consultancy work with external 3 partners and have attracted research funding from a variety of sources including: the British Academy, Public Health England, ESRC, Avon and Somerset Constabulary, College of Policing and the European Union. This year has seen the CLR’s best ever record for funding bids and research income in its history. The previous record was 12 bids in a year, but this year we achieved 30 bids. Of those, 13 were successful and generated bid income of £424,382 for the law school. The combination of high class scholarship and research-led teaching is an important element in our commitment to teaching and to our students. In addition to this, the CLR has a number of talented undergraduate and postgraduate student members. As Centre director, I am delighted to be able to present two case studies featuring postgraduate students and their research. These case studies illustrate the passion our students have for their own areas of research and how colleagues within the CLR assist and support their research. I hope you enjoy reading about our achievements as much as I have enjoyed working with colleagues who have done so much to promote understanding, research excellence and community impact over the last 12 months. Professor Phil Rumney Director, Centre for Legal Research Centre for Legal Research / Annual Report 2013/2014 The overall purpose of the Centre for Legal Research The Centre for Legal Research (CLR) aims to support the research policy of the Bristol Law School by working to further improve the research reputation of the School, to broaden the base of active researchers and to increase the level of research funding. It seeks to do this by providing a mechanism for securing external recognition for the research capabilities of the School, to assist the research units to develop their own identities and reputations, and by providing a supportive structure for research active staff whether or not they are members of a research unit. Key aims of the CLR • improve the quality of research and publications in the Law School • increase the level of funding secured for research, and from other research-related activities such as conferences • develop the public profile of the CLR • improve the internal profile of the CLR, and knowledge and appreciation of research activity within the School • increase the rate of citations of work published by centre members and develop other esteem indicators 4 Research units The CLR comprises five research units headed by a research active academics: Commercial Law; Criminal Justice; Environmental Law; Family, Gender & Equality and International Law & Human Rights. Members of these research units include colleagues from other faculties, as well as undergraduate, LLM and PhD students in the School of Law. Aims of research units • to act as a subject focus for research and research funding bidding and to develop experienced bidding teams reflecting areas of research expertise • to facilitate more effective management of research, and to encourage research expertise across the School • to help fulfil the goal of widening participation in esearchr through the provision of a more specific focus for subject-related research activities • to organise research specialism and publications for the next REF • to raise the external profile of the Law School’s research activities Centre for Legal Research / Annual Report 2013/2014 Criminal Justice Unit Annual Report Introduction The Criminal Justice Unit provides a forum for criminal justice research activity within UWE. We support our members in the development and implementation of their research and other scholarly activity. We actively support research funding applications and encourage collaboration both within the unit and in the wider academy. The CJU provides a platform for members to present their research, and has in the past 12 months held several meetings at which at least one research paper was presented by a member of staff; this allowed for discussion and development of ideas to ensue so that presenters could get the most out of their paper and feedback and discussion. The papers presented included topics such as money laundering in Laos PDR, and giving evidence to governments on violence against women. There is clear cross-disciplinary appeal as regards the research presented. Unit reports The unit has gained several new members this year, all based in law, which has allowed not only for the expansion of the Unit and for some interesting research papers to be given, but also for Unit members to get a better idea of what each other are researching so that dovetailing interests and collaborative opportunities may be identified. The Unit has members from Law, BILP, Education, Criminology, Public Health, and HAS, and it is hoped that the Unit will continue to grow and involve active membership from members from a wide range of disciplines. The Unit aims to provide a platform for external speakers to come to UWE in order to present on an aspect of criminal justice and encourage debate and knowledge transfer 5 and exchange. Unit events over the past 12 months have included two which related to human trafficking, and a forthcoming event focuses on the prison system. It is anticipated that more events, and more diverse events will be run through/with the Unit, as members are periodically asked whether they would like run an event or invite a guest speaker to the University. Events Half-day event: “Current Issues in Human Trafficking” (December 2014) Our speakers at this event, Bernie Gravett and Andrew Desmond, have direct experience in the fight against trafficking and came to UWE to offer unique perspectives on their roles in anti-trafficking with the police. Guest Speaker: Bernie Gravett (April 2014) Bernie Gravett was invited to UWE to speak about his experiences of combatting human trafficking with the London Met police. Bernie is an ex-Superintendent of the London Metropolitan Police, and led the first Bernie Gravett EU Joint Investigation Team partnered with Romania investigating child trafficking Advocacy workshop on Violence Against Women (May 2014) On 23 May 2014, CAWN (Central America Women’s Network), based in London, came to UWE to provide a free all-day advocacy and campaigning workshop to up to 20 UWE law students. The theme of the workshop was ‘Promoting Women’s Rights for a Life Free from Violence’. Centre for Legal Research / Annual Report 2013/2014 Consultancy and submissions to official bodies Report compiled by attendees at a conference in Onati, organised by Jackie Jones and Evadne Grant: ‘Human Trafficking: Challenges and Opportunities for the 21st Century: OUTCOMES AND PROPOSALS’. The following is copied verbatim from the report: “A human trafficking expert workshop took place over a two-day period from 26-27 June 2014 at the Onati International Institute for the Sociology of Law. Experts from across the globe attended to provide insights into different aspects of human trafficking and how it related to the EU experience. Contributions from Canada (capacity building), California (supply chain), Argentina (policies in action), Spain (forced labour), the Balkans (trafficker interviews), the UK (identification of victims; criminalisation of victims) all brought fresh views from the front line as well as research results that fed into a panel with contributions from the EU Commission Anti-Trafficking Office, the EU Fundamental Rights Agency and GRETA. The entire second day was devoted to discussions between participants, divided into two groups to look at the challenges and opportunities for the future. The groups were successful in putting forward recommendations to the Unit reports EU on two themes: victim protection and possible changes to the EU Anti-Trafficking Directive.” Funding and fellowships Dr Lauren Devine of UWE Bristol Law School was awarded over £200,000 from the ESRC for an innovative project to rethink key elements of child protection policy.