John Baldwin was Head of Birmingham Law School between August 2003 and August 2006. He was the Director of the Institute of Judicial Administration for over twenty years following his appointment in 1982. He was an Assistant Head of School with responsibility for coordinating research within the Birmingham Law School between 2001 and 2003. His main teaching interests have been in the area of criminal justice, penal policy, and socio-legal studies. His best known research includes studies of pre-trial criminal procedures (particularly prosecution processes, plea negotiation and police interrogation), trial by jury and small claims procedures. He has published over a dozen books and numerous articles in academic journals on these themes during the last thirty years. Most of his research has been empirical in character, and it has received a good deal of media attention and is widely cited in the academic literature.
Professor Baldwin has delivered hundreds of conference papers, lectures and seminars in this country and throughout the world. He has been a member of the Editorial Boards of a number of academic journals, and still sits on the Editorial Board of the Criminal Law Review and the Civil Justice Quarterly. In 1998, he was appointed by the Lord Chancellor's Department to a sub-committee to advise the Civil Justice Council on enforcement procedures in the civil courts. The recommendations made by this sub-committee were incorporated into a Green Paper and a White Paper which led to the 2007 Courts and Tribunals Act. In 2005, he submitted evidence to the House of Commons Constitutional Affairs Committee on small claims and this was published in the Committee’s report, The Courts: Small Claims (2005). In 2009, Professor Baldwin, in collaboration with Professor Paolo Caretti (University of Florence) and Professor Pasquale De Sena (University of Naples), carried out an assessment of a number of Italian research institutes under the auspices of the Consiglio Nazionale della Ricerche. (2005). In 2009, Professor Baldwin, in collaboration with Professor Paolo Caretti (University of Florence) and Professor Pasquale De Sena (University of Naples), carried out an assessment of a number of Italian research institutes under the auspices of the Consiglio Nazionale della Ricerche.