Bachelor of Civil Law (BCL) and Magister Juris (MJur) Options

Advanced Administrative Law will address particularly challenging, often very current, problems in the law relating to executive decision-makers and other public authorities (other than Parliament), and to institutions and processes for empowering them, regulating and investigating their conduct, and providing redress. The course is divided into four ‘blocks,’ each containing three or four seminars connected with a broader theme.  

1. Bringing claims against public authorities I: covering different aspects of the application for judicial review procedure as it operates in the legal system of England and Wales 
2. Judicial review and the constitution: considering a series of legal areas in which, in engaging in judicial review, courts interact with features of the UK’s constitutional set up including prerogative power, common law rights and the principle of ‘dualism’  
3. Bringing claims against public authorities II: looking at routes for raising complaints about or seeking redress from public authorities beyond judicial review  
4. Taking public administration seriously: exploring the importance and variety of public administration, and its modes of operation, and its relationship with judicial review 

The course is on the administrative law of England and Wales. 

Assessment will be by three-hour examination during the BCL/MJur examination period at the end of the course. 

The course aims to engage with deep and difficult issues in criminal law through a blend of practical, theoretical, normative and comparative reasoningThe course aims to engage with deep and difficult issues in criminal law through a blend of practical, theoretical, normative and comparative reasoning. 

The course explores the foundations of property and trusts. It also explores practical developments in property and trusts law going beyond the topics typically explored in core or undergraduate courses. The course combines conceptual and functional analysis of doctrine with more abstract theoretical enquiry. The teaching practice introduces and makes use of a range of ideas and techniques, including formal analysis of rights and the application of economic perspectives, and it draws on comparative and jurisprudential analyses, as well as history and moral and political philosophy. The course thus gives students an opportunity to study some fundamental institutions of our private law, joining the techniques of jurisprudence with the social sciences and humanities. It gives fresh insights into questions arising from undergraduate studies, broadens the knowledge of those planning to go into or return to practice, and equips those thinking of further graduate study with valuable analytical tools.

Some knowledge of the legal details of property in one or other legal system will be essential for students taking the course; a knowledge of trusts and equity jurisprudence is desirable but not essential. Much use will be made of English law and other common law systems, but we will also draw upon civilian and civilian-derived legal systems in our explorations. Students will be exposed to the widest possible range of research and teaching in property law and trusts drawing on visiting scholars as well as Oxford faculty. The topics discussed are all ripe for exploration as areas of future research.

The option will be assessed by a submission (coursework) at the end of the course. Candidates will be required to answer three essay questions from a wide choice of topics, which may cut across themes covered in the course. Candidates will be expected to show a detailed knowledge of relevant theoretical debates and also applicable legal materials, including judgments in cases, and statutory and constitutional provisions. They will also need to display an ability to synthesise complex materials and to present their own analyses of the arguments.

The effect of AI on law and regulation grows as AI shapes critical decisions in areas such as finance, criminal justice, employment, healthcare, housing, and online platforms. As generative AI demonstrates, AI both facilitates significant innovation and raises concerns across domains. This option challenges the notion that AI law is merely about AI-specific regulations, such as the AI Act. Fundamentally, it connects AI, which is created and shaped by data, to the regulation of data, and it illustrates that the concerns that AI raises across domains are largely common. This option will take a comparative approach in all seminars.

This option is divided in two parts. The first is a series of seminars that connect AI, which is created and shaped by data, to the regulation of data. It examines data protection law by focusing on the information economy, including domestic and international legislation, case law, regulatory strategies across jurisdictions, and reform proposals. We will engage critically with the fundamentals of data protection across jurisdictions, the impact of AI on these principles, and the rethinking of harm under data protection law in the age of AI. Students will learn (a) data protection law, which increases in importance as data takes over aspects of social and economic life, and (b) what the successes and failures of regulating personal information teach us about regulating AI.

In seminars during the second part, we will engage with case studies highlighting different legal domains affected by AI. We will explore both how AI impacts these different areas of law in similar ways and how these areas, not designed with AI in mind, effectively regulate AI. We will examine interrelated legal questions broader than AI-specific Acts, while also including specific legislation such as the AI Act. Topics will include, for example: discrimination; transparency; measurement; AI-human interactions; and responsibility. Most sessions will include: (a) an introduction to the factual and technological context, (b) a review of legal aspects, and (c) an interactive discussion or exercise analyzing how the law does and should apply.

The option will be assessed by coursework submission.

On 8 October 2021 over 130 countries agreed to reform the international business tax system in the most meaningful way since its foundations were set in the 1920s. This was the culmination of a lengthy process of reform that was by sparked by public anger at the tax planning practices of multinationals, dissatisfaction with the way multinationals’ profit was shared among countries for tax purposes, and concern that competition among states was leading to a race to the bottom. There is little doubt that the system was in desperate need of reform, but only time will tell if the German Finance Minister was justified in claiming that this “agreement which will really change the world”.

This process of reform, and the political and public debates that accompanied it, showed that business taxation is more than a technical area of law with practical significance. It is an area of law that raises economic, political, and justice questions of fundamental importance. These questions have become even more acute at a time of widespread concerns with rising economic inequality, and an increased need for tax revenue post-pandemic.

This course provides a rounded view of business taxation in a global economy. It combines a rigorous analysis of law with an understanding of concepts from economics and other disciplines that are indispensable to engage with these broader economic, political and justice questions. 

This option is assessed by an examination at the end of the course.

The aim of this option is to (i) introduce students to a conceptual approach to negotiation and mediation (negotiations assisted by a neutral third-party) and to the most important economic, game theoretic, psychological and legal issues and findings regarding the resolution of commercial disputes by means of negotiation and mediation; (ii) develop students’ skills in negotiating and mediating such disputes by engaging in role plays and other practical exercises, highlighting also the intercultural dimension of dispute resolution; and (iii) let students benefit from the experience of seasoned practitioners in the field who report on specific problems that arose during negotiated and/or mediated cases and provide feedback on students’ negotiation and mediation performance. 

By attending the course, students will gain the theoretical insights and practical skills to resolve commercial disputes by way of negotiation and/or mediation. The course will be taught by a combination of lectures, seminars, and tutorials, and will also feature practical workshops involving negotiation and mediation role play exercises. 

Assessment will be via examination at the end of the course. 

This course aims to provide an in-depth understanding of remedies in a commercial context, interpreting that phrase in a wide sense. It will cover remedies for civil wrongs (i.e., breach of contract, tort, and equitable wrongs) but will exclude any direct consideration of damages for personal injury and death. The course will build on knowledge which all law undergraduates ought to have and enable students to look in greater depth at matters dealt with at an undergraduate level as well as explore topics that are not dealt with on an undergraduate syllabus. The approach will be avowedly traditional in that the focus will be on case analysis and doctrine. It is also worth noting that this course focuses on English domestic law. Foreign authorities are only referred to by way of comparison or to the extent that they may provide persuasive accounts of the law as it is, or should be, in England and Wales.

In addition to the doctrinal questions raised by each topic, this course also engages with a number of theoretical questions. In particular, as we progress through each week we will consider what, exactly, is a remedy. Is it just any response intended to solve a legal problem? Secondary obligations arising upon breach of primary obligations? Or a certain kind of court order? Another common theme throughout this course is whether the range of considerations that are relevant at the remedial stage (the ‘public interest’, ‘legitimate interests’, ‘hardship’, ‘mistake’, and so on) differ from those that apply at the substantive law stage. Are remedies in some way distinctive compared to the rights generated by the substantive law? As part of this debate, we will also consider whether certain kinds of remedies are ‘discretionary’ and if so, in what sense of the word, and whether this can be justified.

Assessment will be by examination at the end of the course. 

This course is designed to explore all of the essential aspects of the law of express trusts in an advanced, comparative, and international perspective. The comparator systems will be chosen so that it will not be necessary for students to be able to read any materials except in English. This still provides rich possibilities. First, there is comparison within trust laws that broadly follow the common law tradition. This includes US law, which has diverged in interesting ways from English trust law, and also the laws of many offshore jurisdictions, which have made multiple important statutory modifications in the last decades. It is also possible to study civilian implementations of trusts in English. This can be done through the so-called ‘mixed’ jurisdictions such as Scotland (which has recently passed important trust law legislation), South Africa (where many court decisions and much scholarship are in English), and Quebec (where all legislation, and decisions of the Supreme Court of Canada, are officially bilingual, and where much scholarship is in English). In addition to this, there are materials in English that speak to the French fiducie, the German Treuhand, the Italian experience with trusts governed by non-Italian law, the implementation of trusts in Japan and China, and much more besides. In relation to ‘international’ law as distinct from comparative law, there will be a seminar on the private international law of trusts.

The course will presuppose an understanding of the common law trust. Background reading will be provided for MJur students who are new to this field. 

Assessment will be by examination at the end of the course. 

This course critically examines the legal structure of constitutions in comparative perspective. It focuses on the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada, and Germany, and students will be expected to acquire general knowledge of these constitutional systems and in-depth understanding of certain aspects that will be emphasised in the readings. The aim of the course is two-fold. The first is to understand how the above four constitutional systems structure, allocate, and limit legal and political powers, and how constitutional mechanisms for deliberation and decision-making operate in practice. The second is to gain general understanding of the nature of constitutions and constitutional law, in particular with respect to the following topics.  

1. Constitutional design and constitution-making
2. Federalism, subsidiarity and devolution
3. Representation and electoral systems
4. Executive power and form of government (considering parliamentary, presidential and hybrid systems)
5. Constitutions and the administrative state (considering various approaches to the independence of the administration from elected institutions, and to structuring judicial review through ordinary courts or special administrative courts)
6. Judicial review of rights and other constitutional provisions
7. Constitutional change: amendments, constitutional conventions, and revolutions

We will also consider the question of the methodology of studying comparative constitutional law. While the course considers the structure and justification of judicial review and examples of constitutional rights cases, there will be no extensive focus on case outcomes or legal doctrine in regard to constitutional rights. The course aims to increase understanding of the structures that produce case law on constitutional rights, but not to study that case law in depth. The selection of topics above is designed to complement (to a certain degree) the types of issues studied in the Constitutional Theory course. 

This half-option offers a comparative perspective on the law of copyright, with a particular focus on common law and EU/civil law jurisdictions. In it, we consider copyright as an example of the wider shift in legal mindset brought about by developments in technology, globalisation, Europeanisation, and constitutionalisation. We study some of the technical differences among copyright systems and their philosophical and historical bases, and the shift towards a more comparative approach among copyright scholars and lawmakers. 

The course is arranged around certain “hard cases” involving core issues of copyright: Who is entitled to copyright (conceptions of authorship, rights of ownership), and what types of subject matter does copyright protect (conceptions of [authorial] works, and requirements of originality)? What economic and moral rights does copyright confer, and how do they interact with other rights, e.g., of freedom of expression, personal property, contract, and design protection? What actions do moral and economic rights of authors and copyright owners restrict in the digital/online and physical worlds? The course should appeal to people interested in IP, the Internet and generative AI, fundamental rights, property law and theory, comparative law, harmonisation, and EU law.

Assessment is by way of examination at the end of the course. 

The course offers an analytical framework and a comparative study of corporate governance and corporate law in major economies. Corporate governance, broadly defined, is the set of legal and non-legal tools that can be used to ensure that companies are run consistently with their purposes. In many jurisdictions, this has traditionally meant making sure that those in charge of making day-to-day and strategic decisions on behalf of the company act in the interests of shareholders. More recently, a ‘multi-stakeholder’ view of corporations has started to become mainstream: these are organizations whose actions affect the welfare not only of shareholders but also of creditors, employees, local communities and society more generally.

While the emphasis in the teaching will be on legal institutions, and corporate law specifically, the course materials will also cover the ways in which corporate culture, market pressures, reputational constraints, and so on, affect corporate governance and corporate law in action.

The course will be comparative, providing students with knowledge about corporate governance and corporate law core features in major jurisdictions and asking why governance regimes in most countries display some common features and why they diverge in other respects. Closer attention will be given to the UK, the US and continental European jurisdictions, but an attempt will be made to include readings covering newly emerged countries such as India, Brazil and others.

This option will not be available in 2025-26.

The right to equality is ubiquitous in human rights instruments in jurisdictions throughout the world. Yet the meaning of equality and non-discrimination are contested. Is equality formal or substantive, and if the latter, what does substantive equality entail? Which groups should be protected from discrimination and how do we decide? How do we capture conceptualisations of equality in legal terms and when should equality give way to other priorities, such as conflicting freedoms or cost? The aim of this course is to examine these and other key issues through the prism of comparative law. Given the growing exchange of ideas across different jurisdictions, the comparative technique is a valuable analytic tool to illuminate this field. At the same time, the course pays attention to the importance of social, legal and historical context to the development of legal concepts and their impact.

The first half of the course approaches the subject thematically, while the second half of the course addresses individual grounds, ending with a consideration of remedial structures. Theory is integrated throughout the course, and the relationship between grounds of discrimination and other human rights is explored. The course will be predominantly based on materials from the US, Canada, South Africa, India, the UK, EU, and ECHR, although some materials from other Commonwealth countries or individual European countries will be included. International human rights instruments are also examined. Employment related discrimination is generally dealt with in the Human Rights at Work course. The course does not require previous knowledge of equality or discrimination law. Students are encouraged to participate in the activities of the Oxford Human Rights Hub, which is directed by Professor Fredman. The Hub website features daily blogs on cutting edge new developments in human rights and equality law, and students on the course are encouraged both to read and to contribute to the blog. The Hub also produces webinars and podcasts on pressing current issues in comparative human rights and equality law.

Constitutional Principles of the EU

The purpose of this course is to provide an advanced understanding of the constitutional questions of the EU. We pose the general question whether the law of the European Union can make sense as a coherent order of principles. The subject matter is EU Law as it stands today, in light of the case law of the European Court of Justice and general principles at can be borrowed from domestic constitutional theory or public international law. The readings will constitute mostly of cases of the ECJ and opinions of the Advocate General, combined with some cases from the United Kingdom and suitable readings in law and jurisprudence. Topics will include the nature of the EU as a constitutional state in the making or a sui generis international organisation; the ECJ doctrine of the ‘autonomy’ of EU law; the principle of direct effect; the principle of supremacy; non-discrimination; citizenship; human rights; remedies and procedural autonomy. We shall discuss the diverse approaches in the works of scholars such as Lenaerts, Von Bogdandy, Kumm, Habermas, Weiler, MacCormick, Wyatt, Weatherill, Craig, Hartley, Kirchoff and others. We shall also examine the constitutional implications of the Eurozone crisis and its aftermath.

This option is not offered in 2025-26.

This course is the study of constitutionalism in Asia from a comparative and interdisciplinary perspective. It has three features:

First, the course examines a variety of constitutionalism in Asia: liberal (e.g., India, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan); hybrid (e.g., Hong Kong, Malaysia, and Singapore); socialist (e.g., China and Vietnam); and tradition/religion-based (Confucian, Buddhist, Islamic).

Second, the course situates Asian constitutions in politics and society. This course explores questions such as: what the constitutions do; how authoritarian constitutions and authoritarian constitutionalism look like in Asia; how and why the constitutions are made and changed; how the constitutions respond to the divided and plural societies; how local citizens participate in constitutional change; how various sectors of the international community involve in constitutional reform in Asia; how political parties and social movements influence constitutional change; how the basic structure doctrine diffuses across the region; and how courts shape and are shaped by state-building and social change; and how constitutionalism in Asia is informed by transnational norms.

Third, the course both sets Asia in general conversations on constitutionalism (general comparison) and compares constitutional systems within Asia (intra-Asia comparison).

Assessment is by way of examination at the end of the course.

The insolvency of a company gives rise to a number of fascinating questions.  Why are formal (state-supplied) procedures needed for the treatment of distressed companies?  When should such procedures be triggered, and for whose benefit should they be conducted?  To what extent should they be geared towards the rescue of the company or its business? What rights should those to whom the company is indebted - its creditors - have over the conduct of the proceedings? In what order of priority should their claims be paid? How should the managers of the distressed company be dealt with, in and outside of formal insolvency proceedings?  Where an insolvency has one or more foreign elements (assets or creditors abroad, or liabilities governed by foreign law), in which jurisdiction, and subject to which law, should the debtor’s insolvency be treated?

In this course, students explore these questions in three ways: first, by reading and evaluating theoretical and empirical literature on the purposes and design of corporate insolvency laws in general; second, by a close study of the formal procedures available under English law for the treatment of a distressed corporate debtor, considering their operation in both purely domestic cases and in those with one or more cross-border elements; third, by exploring some of the core features of the insolvency laws of other jurisdictions, with a view to evaluating the procedures available under English law from a comparative and functional perspective.

Students taking the course can thus expect to acquire:

• an advanced understanding of English corporate insolvency law;

• knowledge of some of the core features of the corporate insolvency laws of other jurisdictions,  including US and German law;

• knowledge of the special difficulties that arise in cross-border insolvency cases, and of the core features of the European Insolvency Regulation as well as knowledge of the rules of English law that govern the treatment of cross-border insolvencies in English courts; 

• advanced understanding of seminal literature on the purposes and design of corporate insolvency laws, and the ability to draw on this literature to critique the laws studied in the course, or any other corporate insolvency system. 

Many students taking the course intend to embark upon or continue a career in corporate or commercial law, where an advanced understanding of English corporate insolvency law (on which the insolvency laws of many other jurisdictions are modelled) is particularly valuable.  However, the course has also proven to be of interest to students who are interested more generally in understanding the purposes of mandatory corporate law rules, and their impact on the cost and availability of finance.  No prior knowledge of corporate insolvency law is required, nor is it necessary to have studied company law, though the latter is of some advantage.

Assessment is by way of examination at the end of the year. 

A BCL, MJur or MLF student can offer a dissertation, in lieu of one law option. The dissertation must be written in English. It must not exceed 12,500 words which includes notes, but which does not include tables of cases or other legal sources. The subject must be approved by the Graduate Studies Committee. The Committee will take account of the subject matter and the availability of appropriate supervision. Candidates must submit the proposed title and description of the dissertation in not more than 500 words, not later than Monday, Week Minus Two of Michaelmas Term  to the Academic Administrator (Paul Burns).

You should be aware that the demand for supervision for such dissertations may exceed the supply, especially from particular Faculty members, and where this is the case a potential supervisor may elect to supervise only those dissertations which he or she judges most promising. Although in principle the option of offering a dissertation is open to all BCL, MJur and MLF students, therefore, in practice it is possible that some students who wish to offer a dissertation will be unable to do so, as a suitable supervisor with spare capacity cannot be found.

The dissertation (two copies) must be submitted online not later than noon on the Friday of fifth week of the Trinity Full Term in which the examination is to be taken.

The topic of your dissertation may (and often will) be within the area of one or more of your taught courses, and/or in an area which you have studied previously. But any part of the dissertation which you have previously submitted or intend to submit in connection with any other degree must be excluded from consideration by the BCL, MJur and MLF Examiners.

Although BCL students cannot take the List III courses, they are allowed to offer a dissertation within these fields. BCL students may offer a dissertation which does not fall into the field of any BCL course, if a suitable supervisor within the Faculty can be found. 

This is a course in advanced employment and labour law, with a particular focus on the human rights dimensions of the subject. 

The course examines how the idea of human rights benchmarks, guides, constitutes, and regulates the legal rules and standards governing work. Human rights perspectives have become increasingly popular in the field in recent years because of a perceived need to find a way of guaranteeing basic protections for working people against the pressures arising first from globalisation and more recently from technological change. However, the approach is not uncontroversial: why should rights drafted with states in mind be applied to employers, and do employers themselves have rights the law should protect? We address these and other controversies at various points during the course. 

Our strategy is to examine a number of different rights in depth, to illustrate the complex interplay between international, regional, and national norms, and between various forms and sources of protection. These rights include freedom of association, the right to strike, the right to privacy, freedom of expression, freedom of religion, freedom from slavery, forced labour and trafficking, and equality rights across various protected characteristics. We also explore a number of cross-cutting themes, such as the rise of the gig economy and the possibility that many jobs may become obsolete because of automation. 

In addition, the course critically examines the various mechanisms for protecting rights, which range from judicial enforcement, through international conventions with various mechanisms of interpretation, to self-regulation by employers through corporate codes of conduct.

The course ranges widely across international, regional and national law, though it reflects the expertise of those involved in teaching it and thus makes no claim to be global or universal in its coverage. Human rights of relevance to working people may be found in (a) international law, such as the UN Declaration of Human Rights and the ILO’s Declaration of the Fundamental Rights of Workers, and other ILO instruments; (b) regional human rights instruments (we focus particularly on the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU, the European Convention on Human Rights and the European Social Charter); (c) national constitutions and laws such as the UK Human Rights Act 1998. 

The course is expected to be by way of two take-home essays to be completed between weeks 6-8 of Trinity Term.

This half-option is concerned with how the law seeks to incentivise innovation. There is an emerging awareness among intellectual property scholars that we need to stop looking at the patent system in isolation. We need to understand how the IP system relates to other policy interventions that are designed to incentivise innovation, including R&D tax credits, and innovation prizes and rewards.

Faced with problems like climate change, antimicrobial resistance and sluggish economic growth, it is more important than ever that we get innovation policy right and this requires working beyond traditional disciplinary boundaries. The course will provide you not merely with a solid understanding of the patent system, but also how this system fits within a broader innovation policy landscape.

This half-option is distinctive of IP at Oxford and forms part of our commitment to rethinking how the subject is conceptualised, researched and taught.

Assessment is by way of coursework submission. 

This option discusses the methods and means of settling disputes in international law. It covers both so-called ‘diplomatic’ and 'adjudicatory’ methods of dispute settlement and focuses in particular on the process before international courts and tribunals. In the first part of the option, we cover diplomatic methods of dispute settlement and introduce the various courts and tribunals, with special emphasis on the International Court of Justice and the process before it. In the second part of the option, we take a comparative, bird’s eye view over the process before international courts and tribunals, with emphasis on mixed arbitration, including investment arbitration. In that second part we cover questions of access to courts and tribunals, jurisdiction, admissibility, provisional measures and other interim decisions, merits decisions, and the review and enforcement of decisions and awards.

The teaching also covers general international law topics, such as diplomatic protection and state responsibility. It aims to give students a general understanding of the operation of public international law in its practical application. Previous knowledge of public international law is desirable but not essential, as we will be revisiting basic concepts in the context of seminars, as required.

Assessment is by way of examination at the end of the course.

International Economic Law has been taught on the BCL/MJur in Oxford since 2003. The course introduces students to the principles and institutions of international economic law and focuses primarily on the institutions and substantive law of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), including notably the WTO dispute settlement mechanism and its substantive jurisprudence, but the course also considers, in briefer fashion, central key aspects of international investor-State arbitration (IIA).

The course considers the law contained in the main WTO Agreements, including those dealing with goods (GATT), services (GATS), the environment, subsidies, and other WTO agreements that are indispensable for a knowledge of the theory and practice (by governments, corporations, NGOS, and lawyers) of the subject area. In addition to introducing participants to the major legal disciplines under the GATT/WTO and the basic principles and cores concepts of the GATT/WTO (based on in-depth study of the relevant GATT/WTO case law), the course considers the underlying philosophy of free trade and a number of the controversies concerning the future evolution of the WTO and its relationship to globalisation, regionalism, and the attempt by States to achieve other policy objectives (such as protection of the environment). 

WTO dispute settlement and investor-State arbitration have been by far the most widely used – and in many respects most successful – mechanisms of international dispute settlement that have ever existed. The IEL course involves a focus on both mechanisms, but also provides a deeper understanding by situating them within the context of the substantive law which both mechanisms apply. 

Assessment is by way of examination at the end of the course. 

This course introduces students to the fundamental pillars of International environmental law, and international climate change law, in particular. The 2015 Paris Agreement,  the result of the most significant, high-stakes and high-profile multilateral negotiation in the last decade, reflects considerable innovation, with implications both for international environmental law, as well as for public international law more broadly. This course explores the conceptual architecture, principles, standards and rules of international environmental law, with a particular focus on the international law relating to climate change.

This course is divided into three parts. The first part focuses on the nature, evolution, sources and principles of international environmental law as well as key institutions and actors, tools and techniques, and compliance mechanisms. The second part engages in an in-depth case study of the climate change regime, and the third part is a practical component in multilateral environmental treaty-making.

This option will not be available in 2025-26.

The international law of human rights has evolved considerably in the last couple of decades. From its early focus on traditional civil liberties, the field has burgeoned to include the study of socio-economic rights, women’s rights, disability rights, rights of indigenous peoples and also includes thriving discourses on the doctrines, history, critiques and future of international human rights law. The field thus encompasses a wide and substantial range of issues in public international law today. These issues are both substantive and structural in nature: that is, they relate to specific topics to do with the substantive core of specific rights in international law (What are human rights in international law? Are they universal? Are they extraterritorial?); as well as, their situatedness within the larger structure or ‘constitution’ of the field of public international law (What are the sources of international human rights law? Are they different from sources of public international law? What are human rights obligations under international law? Who owes these obligations and to whom? How are the obligations enforced?).

This course critically examines both the substance and structure of the field of international human rights law. The main idea is to address the international law of human rights as a semi-autonomous (if not self-contained) regime within the legal order known as public international law. The course will encourage and facilitate academic intellectual engagement with the field of international human rights law, resisting the typical approaches of it being characterised as either overly descriptive or even normatively inert (as is sometimes the case in respect of ‘institutions’ of human rights, such as the European Court of Human Rights). It will thus blend conceptual and practical approaches to systematise the study of the field as a whole.

The course will allow students to develop a deep and critical understanding of the field of international human rights law. International instruments (both regional and international) will form the basis of exploration from both a theoretical (conceptual/normative) and a doctrinal (including practical) perspective. This is an advanced course, and thus the knowledge of public international law or human rights or both may be desirable, though not essential. 

This option will not be offered in 2025-26.

This option covers the range of international law rules that applies to states and others with regard to their conduct in armed conflict. In the first part of the option, we review the law on recourse to force (the jus ad bellum). In this part, we will examine the meaning and scope of the prohibition of the use of force before turning to the exceptions and claimed exceptions to that prohibition. We will consider individual and collective self-defence, including self defence in response to attacks by non-state armed groups; humanitarian intervention and the UN collective security scheme. 

In the second part of the option, we review the law applicable during armed conflict (the jus in bello or international humanitarian law), after discussing the classification of armed conflicts as international or non-international. This review will cover: (i) the law relating to detention of persons in armed conflict, including prisoner of war status and the protections accorded to detained civilians; and (ii) the law governing the conduct of hostilities especially the rules relating to targeting. 

The third part of the course will consider the application of human rights law in armed conflict. In this part, there will be consideration of the extraterritorial application of human rights treaties, the relationship between human rights law and international humanitarian law as well as the relationship between human rights law and the jus ad bellum.

Assessment is by way of examination at the end of the course.

The oceans are critical to State interests and human prosperity, being a highway for commerce, a shared resource and a conduit for threats to security. They cover 70% of the earth’s surface, account for 90% of the world’s international trade and provide 40% of the protein consumed in the developing world. 

In this context, the law of the sea is assuming a new prominence in international affairs, from questions of environmental protection and offshore resource exploitation to legal contests over polar resources and sea lanes rendered more accessible by global warming, and even regarding the risk of maritime terrorism and smuggling weapons of mass destruction. This course will approach the law of the sea in the context of these developments and concerns. It provides a comprehensive grounding in the subject, combining the study of maritime zones (such as the territorial sea, exclusive economic zone, continental shelf, and high seas), with the study of the main bodies of law regulating users of the seas (such as navigation, fishing, pollution, and military activities). It also aims to enhance general international law knowledge as the teaching relates the issues of the law of the sea to other relevant areas of general international law, primarily the law on state jurisdiction, but also including sources, the law of treaties, and state responsibility. 

Assessment is by way of examination at the end of the course. 

Issues relating to health and medicine affect people throughout their lives. They also raise complex legal and ethical issues. This course begins by providing a grounding in medical ethics, including an historical background to the development of medical and research ethics. It also explores the law and ethics around death and dying, including the philosophy of death and whether assisted dying should be lawful. Organ donation and the rules surrounding how body parts may be used, transferred and perhaps even sold, are critically examined. The course also offers an in-depth grounding in clinical negligence and confidentiality --- two areas which will be vital for those considering entering practice. The course also covers the contentious issue of resource allocation and rationing. The course is designed to cater to both those interested in academic and critical perspectives, and those looking for a grounding in the law they may encounter in practice. Students will gain a detailed knowledge of the law, as well as a thorough understanding of the various philosophical and legal academic debates in this area. 

Assessment is by way of examination at the end of the course.

This course, jointly offered by the Law Faculty and the Department of Computer Science, will introduce students from both backgrounds to the terrain at the boundaries of their two disciplines. The overarching theme is understanding law and computer science at their intersection.

Environmental law is the law of environmental problems. As issues such as climate change, air quality and the VW emissions scandal highlight, environmental problems raise operational and conceptual challenges for governments, businesses and communities. These challenges are often centre stage and not easily contained or managed. The failure to adequately deal with environmental problems has been disastrous for communities, businesses and governments.

Having legal expertise in environmental law matters, but environmental problems involve a level of complexity lawyers are not often used to. They involve many different people, changing physical conditions, a range of different socio-political values, and knowledge of them is often limited. Traditional legal doctrines and concepts have not been developed with problems like this in mind. As this is the case, environmental law has evolved as a complex body of law at the national and international level through adapting legal ideas and developing new concepts to respond to these problems.

This course aims to foster legal expertise in this area through a comparative study of environmental law techniques. Particular attention is given to: understanding environmental problems and the types of legal issues they give rise to; developing skills in navigating environmental legislation and case law; developing an appreciation for the interaction between local, national, international and transnational regimes; and developing a sophisticated appreciation for legal reasoning in this area.

This course will be of interest to: students who are wanting to deepen their environmental law knowledge through in-depth comparative study; students exploring law and society interrelationships; and students who want to develop their skills for dealing with environmental law in different areas of legal practice. No prior knowledge is needed to do the course. This option will not be offered in 2024-25.

This course considers issues around capacity throughout the life course.  This includes both establishing the tests for capacity; the weight attached to autonomous decisions; and how decisions are made for those who lack capacity.  The course will seek to explore the differences in the use of these tests for children, adults and older people.  It will examine whether there are theoretical justifications for using different tests at different stages of life.  The course will include critical perspectives on issues around capacity, including challenges using the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disability and radical children’s rights.

This course examines the modern development of English law and the common-law tradition across three periods: the “long eighteenth century” (1688-1830s), the Victorian era (1830s-1900) and the early 20th century (1900-1950) It also encompasses comparative, imperial and international dimensions, looking far beyond the English legal world. The focus of enquiry will include doctrinal and juristic development, but also a good deal of social-scientific elements, with themes from economics, economic history, political economy, political science and sociology providing frameworks for analysis.

Students with strengths in common-law or civilian styles of doctrinal analysis and interpretation will be challenged to think as historians about continuity and change in the legal system, paying careful attention to the interplay of internal and external influences that have made the modern law. Students will learn varied topics across the course, but may also specialize in tutorials, essays and assessment exercises in certain concentrated fields within the course, eg corporate and commercial law; or obligations; or public law; or law of persons, etc.

Our guiding philosophy is that historical consciousness of the law creates intellectual freedom for modern lawyers to move beyond the bounds of contemporary thought, to develop a creative awareness of the sources, choices and potentials within the law, and going beyond the law itself, to wield the resources of historical jurisprudence as a metric to investigate the social world. These goals put us squarely within longstanding traditions of legal history as practised by Maine, Maitland, Pollock, Salmond, Holdsworth, Milsom, Simpson, Atiyah, Horwitz, Baker, Brand, and Ibbetson (eight of these twelve having a strong Oxford nexus).

The core group of teachers for this course are each researchers in modern legal history, and we aim to join this subject to the distinguished traditions of ancient, medieval and early modern legal history already well established at Oxford.

Overview

Regulation is at the core of how modern states seek to govern the activities of individual citizens as well as corporate and governmental actors. Broadly defined it includes the use of legal and non-legal techniques to manage social and economic risks. Traditionally regulation is associated with prescriptive law, public agencies and criminal as well as administrative sanctions. But the politics of the shrinking state and deregulation have meant that intrusive and blunt forms of legal regulation have given way at times to facilitative, reflexive and procedural law which seeks to balance public and private interests. More recently public health crises, such as the Covid-19 pandemic and the climate crisis have lead to re-regulation and renewed interest in state intervention in private economic activity. Enduring policy debates address whether there is in practice too much, too little or the wrong type of regulation in different policy areas.

This course examines what role different forms of law play in contemporary regulatory regimes. It thereby analyses how legal regulation constructs specific relationships between law and society and how legal regulation is involved in mediating conflicts between private and public power.

The course discusses key conceptual approaches for understanding regulation. How can economic reasoning be employed in order to justify legal regulation? Does a focus on institutions help to understand the operation of regulatory regimes? What rationalities, and hence ‘governmentalities’ are involved in regulating through law? What role do emotions, such as fear of illness and trust in experts, play in regulatory interactions?

The conceptual approaches are then further analysed through reference to specific legal regulatory regimes 'in action'.  The course has been restructured: over both Michaelmas Term and Hilary Term a seminar on a specific conceptual approach is followed by a seminar that discusses how that approach may or may not explain how a specific regulatory regime works.  

The course thus provides an opportunity for students to examine the pervasive phenomenon of regulation with reference to different disciplinary perspectives, in particular law, sociology, politics and economics and to gain detailed knowledge of substantive regulatory law in relation to cutting-edge regulatory developments.

These cover, with reference to UK and EU law, the use of economic incentive regulation in emissions trading, how public interests inform EU regulation of energy generation, Chinese Social Credit systems as a distinct governmentality, as well as reliance on the regulatory capacity of technology.  The course should appeal to those interested in the theory and practice of regulation, jurisprudence, and selected fields of law that inform the case studies.

The course is assessed through two assessed essays in Trinity Term.

Relationship to “Law and Computer Science” option

Regulation differs from the BCL/MJur “Law and Computer Science” option in its focus on regulation and legal solutions to the challenges created by digital technologies rather than, as for Law and Computer Science, the effects of digital technology on the nature of legal work and how lawyers and computer scientists can work together to devise technical solutions to deal with them. The options will not overlap and may therefore be taken together. The ‘Regulation’ course is also well compatible with the ‘Law and Technology’ half-option.

 Convenor

Dr. Bettina Lange, Associate Professor in Law and Regulation

The course will provide students with a strong grounding in ethical, doctrinal, and practical approaches to how the law regulates relationships, with a particular focus on issues relating to intimacy and violence. Students will gain knowledge of debates and issues in relation to domestic abuse, obstetric violence, child abuse, and emerging forms of intimate abuse such as elder abuse and parental abuse. Students will also develop an understanding of how the law regulates adult-child and adult-adult relationships, including caring relationships, and how the law manages relationship breakdown.

The course aims to equip students with a strong grounding in ethical, doctrinal, and practical approaches to issues around reproduction and parenthood. It brings together topics and approaches from family law and medical law. Students will gain a detailed understanding of issues relating to Artificial Reproductive Technologies , surrogacy, embryo selection and PGD, abortion, wrongful life, birth and conception, and parenthood.

With the growth of international trade has come a growing recognition of the benefits to be obtained through the harmonization of international trade law. Transnational commercial law consists of that set of rules, from whatever source, which governs international commercial transactions and is common to a number of legal systems. Such commonality is increasingly derived from international instruments of various kinds; such as conventions, EC directives and model laws, and from codifications of international trade usage adopted by contract, as exemplified by the Uniform Customs and Practice for Documentary Credits published by the International Chamber of Commerce and the Model Arbitration Rules issued by the UN Commission on International Trade Law. Underpinning these are the general principles of commercial law (lex mercatoria) to be extracted from uncodified international trade usage, from standard-term contracts formulated by international organisation and from common principles developed by the courts and legislatures of different jurisdictions.

The first part of the course concentrates on the general framework, policies and problems of transnational commercial law, while in the second part these are examined in the context of specific international trade conventions, model laws and contractual codes, so that the student gains a perception of the way transnational law comes into being and helps to bridge the gap between different legal systems.

The course will be taught by Dr Thomas Krebs (convenor) and Professor Stefan Vogenauer. There will be eight lectures in Michaelmas Term. There will then be a weekly two-hour seminar in Hilary Term. There will also be four tutorials. The lectures and seminars will examine the following main areas: General issues of harmonisation; Recurrent problems in harmonisation through conventions; Harmonisation through specific binding instruments (Vienna Sales Convention); Harmonisation through contract and institutional rules; Harmonisation through model laws; The future development of transnational commercial law.

Note. This course is open to a maximum of twenty-four students in any one year. If applications exceed this number, a ballot will be held.

This option will not be available in 2025-6.