Law lecturer James Lee has been elected as an Academic Fellow of the Honourable Society of the Inner Temple. Along with Dr Andrew Francis (Keele University), Dr Catherine MacKenzie (University of Cambridge) and Dr Iyiola Solanke (University of Leeds), James is one of the first academics to be elected to this honorary three-year post.
The Academic Fellowship Scheme aims to recognise the outstanding contribution of legal teaching and research of early to mid-career academics to the Bar of England and Wales. It also aims to support their research and to build stronger ties between barristers and legal academia. As part of the scheme, James will give two lectures, one at the Inn and one at the Law School.
The Sub-Treasurer of the Inn, Patrick Maddams, said:
"Since its foundation, a core function of the Inner Temple has been legal education. Today, many of our leading legal academics are members of the Inn. We are delighted to welcome these four ‘academics to watch’ to the Inner Temple community and look forward to working with them in coming years. They will be joining some of the top senior barristers, judges and international leaders today."
James is the School’s Director of Careers and his research focuses upon jurisprudence and the law of obligations. The principal theme of his research is the examination of judicial reasoning in superior appellate courts, focusing in particular on the House of Lords and the new Supreme Court of the United Kingdom. James is the editor of a collection of essays on that subject, From House of Lords to Supreme Court: Judges, Jurists and the Process of Judging, to be published by Hart Publishing in December 2010. The collection comprises papers given at the Society of Legal Scholars Centenary Seminar, which James organised in London in November 2009. On accepting the appointment, James said
"I am delighted to have been elected as an Academic Fellow of the Inner Temple. I look forward to working in partnership with the Inn to increase the opportunities available to our students to learn more about careers at the Bar, and to encourage greater interaction between barristers and legal scholars."
The Academic Fellows Scheme was launched along with the 2011 Book Prize for outstanding legal authorship at a Reception, hosted by Sir John Laws, the Treasurer of the Inner Temple, on 1st November 2010.
Learn more:
- The Honourable Society of the Inner Temple