LLM Specialisms 2011/12
Human Rights Law
[please note: links below are to the 2010/11 course guides; they will be updated when new guides are made available during the summer vacation]
Human rights issues have generated heightened public debate in recent years, and these public concerns are central to the interests of the LSE. The taught courses reflect the wide-ranging academic expertise of staff members, who also have a wide spectrum of experience in human rights legal advocacy, activism and work with governments and within international organisations. The numerous intergovernmental and non-governmental organisations and networks in London allow for distinguished guest speakers in lectures and seminars. The LSE Centre for the Study of Human Rights provides a specialised interdisciplinary human rights degree. Members of the Law Department are involved in the Centre's activities and there is constant exchange between other Law Department staff and those attached to the Centre. The Centre has an exciting and regular public outreach programme that brings together leading academics and practitioners in human rights from the UK and abroad for debate and discussion of critical issues in human rights.
Advanced Issues of European Union Law (LL4B2): study of the central themes and challenges posed by the development of European Union citizenship, governance and constitutionalism.
Approaches to Human Rights (SO424 ): an interdisciplinary course which engages with human rights disciplinary reasoning, methods and practice from four perspectives: philosophy, sociology, international law and domestic law.
Climate Change: Ethics, Development and International Law (H) (LL4A6): the goal of this course is to explore the international law dealing with climate change with a view to assessing how risks and uncertainties caused by climate change are governed and allocated. Projected seminars include: climate change science; politics; ethics; theory of international law; international environmental law; trade and investment law; human rights law; international development; energy security; food security.
Comparative Constitutional Law (LL4F7): builds on knowledge students have acquired from having taken courses such as public law, administrative law, EU law and public international law at undergraduate level. This full unit course is formed from the MT half unit LL4Z6 Comparative Constitutional Law: Institutions and the LT half LL4Z7 Comparative Constitutional Law: Rights; please see these Course Guides for course content.
Comparative Constitutional Law: Institutions (H) (LL4Z6): builds on knowledge students have acquired from having taken courses such as public law, administrative law, EU law and public international law at undergraduate level. This course examines the central issues in comparative constitutional law across a range of jurisdictions and from a variety of perspectives. Although precise topics to be covered may vary from year to year, the main sections of the course will deal with: constitution-making, constitutional forms, constitutional adjudication, and constitutional borrowings. The overarching objectives of the course will be to analyse the methodological and conceptual challenges posed by comparative study of constitutions, and to reflect on the cultural, ideological and transformative dimensions of contemporary constitutional discourse (in relation to methodology, legislative change, and institutional design).
Comparative Constitutional Law: Rights (H) (LL4Z7): this course examines a range of important and controversial topics in constitutional rights law from a comparative perspective. The topics to be discussed include: abortion; euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide; gay sex and sodomy; religion in the public sphere; non-discrimination; affirmative action; hate speech and denial of the holocaust; obscenity. The materials come from a broad range of jurisdictions, including but not limited to the U.S., Canada, South Africa, the European Convention on Human Rights, the U.K. and Germany.
Constitutional Theory (LL444): an inquiry into the nature, functions and significance of constitutions.
Digital Rights, Privacy and Security (H) (LL4S4): the protection of individual privacy is now a key concern in the information society. With personal data being a valuable and tradable commodity the amount of data being gathered stored and processed is expanding exponentially. Further as individual data moves into the cloud and as so called “mouse droppings” track our every online movement the concept of personal data privacy now seems out of date and even quaint. This course looks at the rebalancing of personal and data privacy through ICT and examines the legal frameworks designed to protect personal and data privacy. It questions their effectiveness and asks whether new offline techniques (to be implemented through the Internet of Things) are adequately regulated. The course will take a critical approach and will introduce students to techniques and technologies for monitoring and gathering personal data and the legal regulatory framework for controlling the data industry. [not offered 2011/12]
Human Rights in the Developing World (LL409): the application of global human rights standards through the national legal systems of post-colonial states, with an emphasis on the judicial application of constitutional bills of rights in culturally diverse and often economically disadvantaged societies.
Human Rights Law in the UK (LL4B6): a review of the theory and practice of the European Convention on Human Rights together with (in the second and thirds terms) a study of the UK Human Rights Act, set in its political and comparative as well as legal context..
Human Rights Law: The European Convention on Human Rights (H)(LL468): this course provides a comprehensive analaysis of the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, together with an appraisal of the case-law of the European Court of Human Rights. It locates the Convention in its regional and international context.
Human Rights Law: The Human Rights Act (H) (LL469): this course provides a detailed study of the UK Human Rights Act together with an assessment of the political context in which the Act operates. It also has a comparative dimension, assessing the Act by reference to other rights' instruments
Human Rights of Women (LL454): an introduction to a gender-based analysis of the mainstream normative and institutional frameworks for human rights, including a study of the international guarantees of the civil, political, social and economic rights of women, with particular focus on the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination, refugee women, violence against women in armed conflict and in peacetime, and the economic and social rights of women.
Human Rights in the Workplace (H) (LL4H9): the sources and application of human rights in the workplace, including international and European laws and conventions. Civil liberties of employees. Social and economic rights of workers. Protection from discrimination in the labour market and employment. As well as detailed examination of legal materials, the approach involves discussion of theories of human rights and comparisons between legal systems.
International Criminal Law (LL445): the protection of individuals and the punishment of States and individuals by international criminal law, including the standards of protection and procedures for their enforcement.
International Human Rights (LL453): a comprehensive introduction to the rapidly expanding international law of human rights and institutions both at a universal and regional level.
International Law and the Use of Force (H) (LL4A8): this half-unit course examines the law relating to when it is permissible to use force (jus ad bellum). The course can be taken alone or (when available) together with LL4A9: Law in War (jus in bello), as a full unit course. The aim of this course is to develop an understanding of the principles of international law that regulate the use of force in international society. It concentrates on the prohibition of resort to force in Article 2(4) of the United Nations Charter and the exceptions to that prohibition. It looks in detail at the right of self-defence, humanitarian intervention, pro-democratic intervention, and protection of nationals. The use of force by or with the authorization of the United Nations is also considered.
The International Law of Armed Conflict and the Use of Force (LL452): the international legal regulation of the use of force, including the law regarding resort to force contained in the United Nations Charter and customary international law, and the regulation of the conduct of hostilities by the law of armed conflict (international humanitarian law).
International Law and the Protection of Refugees, Displaced Persons and Migrants (LL460): the international framework, and the problems, policies and standards which apply in the protection of refugees and refugee women, internally displaced persons and migrants.
The International Law of Self-Determination (H) (LL4K4): this course will provide a general introduction to the doctrine of self-determination. The doctrine will be historically contextualised and its contemporary content explored. Self-determination's relationship to state formation, minority rights, aboriginal rights, women's rights and the nascent right to democratic governance will be central topics. Upon completion of the course students will be in a position to legally analyse contemporary fact patterns and to identify both strengths and weaknesses in the existing legal framework. Students will have considered new and novel approaches to self-determination and will have an appreciation for the doctrine's particular contribution to political and economic liberty.
Jurisprudence and Legal Theory (LL400): mainstream and alternative theoretical approaches to understanding the phenomenon of law, with particular emphasis on the work of important schools and individual theorists.
Law and the Holocaust (H) (LL4L4): this course investigates key concepts of law and legal thought by reference to the concrete events that marked the Nazi persecution of the Jews. Students study such topics as the lessons for legal theory and practice arising from Hitler’s rise to power, the legislation of the Nazi racial-biological worldview, the challenge to our conceptions of legal and moral responsibility that is presented by the idea of ‘administrative massacre’, and how the Nazi legal era has been represented in debates of legal philosophy.
Law and Social Theory (LL465): an introduction to the study of law through the perspective of modern social theory with particular emphasis on contemporary critical European thought.
Law in War (jus in bello) (H) (LL4A9): his half-unit course covers the law governing the conduct of hostilities (jus in bello, also known as the law of armed conflict or international humanitarian law). This course can be taken alone or (when available) together with LL4A8: International Law and the Use of Force, as a full unit course. The course will take a critical approach to the international regulation and facilitation of armed conflict. As well as the laws governing the means and methods of warfare ('Hague' law) and the 'protected' groups hors de combat ('Geneva' law), the course will cover 'lawfare' more generally: the recourse to law as a means of waging war. It will also look at the law of belligerent occupation. The course will emphasise critical and historical perspectives on the use of law in situations of violent conflict, rather than preparing students to apply them in practice.
Regulating New Medical Technologies (LL416): the course addresses regulatory responses to new medical technologies. It focuses upon the legal and ethical dilemmas which arise as a result of novel and/or controversial medical practices.
Terrorism and the Rule of Law (H) (LL475): a theoretical and historical introduction to the concept of terrorism. It will critically consider definitions of terrorism, and analyse the relationship between terrorism and the right to rebel, and the right to engage in civil disobedience. The role of international law generally and international human rights law in particular in the context of terrorism and anti-terrorism action will be considered in detail.
Theory of Human Rights Law (H) (LL4L6): the course will provide an introduction to the philosophy of human rights and theoretical issues in human rights law. The emphasis is on a combination of law and theory; to this end, each seminar will rely on a mixture of cases from various jurisdictions and theoretical and philosophical materials.
World Poverty and Human Rights (H) (LL4C2): looks at the topical issues of world poverty and development, inequality between states, and the roles and duties of states and other actors from the perspective of the international law of human rights. [not offered 2011/12]
