The School of Law provides excellent quality research training, supervision and mentoring to students and junior faculty engaged in socio-legal research. The School performed very strongly in the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise and has expertise in a number of key areas of socio-legal studies, including criminal justice, criminology, human rights, security, development, regulation, mental health, family justice, and law & social theory.
The School benefits from a critical mass of socio-legal scholars, at varying career stages, and boasts a number of leading (and prize-winning) socio-legal researchers. Socio-legal research is an area recognised by the ESRC to be in need of capacity building for the future.
The School of Law has been working for some time to provide comprehensive methods training to its students in order to equip a new generation. With 54 research students and 238 students on taught Masters programmes, the School of Law boasts a vibrant postgraduate environment. A large number of graduates go on to pursue very successful careers in academic and policy research, as well as in legal practice.
Our graduates regularly go on to publish their PhD research, either in its entirety in the form of a monograph, or as a series of articles within peer-reviewed journals. During 2001-2007, 19 PhD students went on to hold lectureships in UK Universities.
Find out more about Socio-Legal Studies pathways