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Cambridge AHRC Doctoral Training Partnership - Student Profiles

 

Biography

Richard completed his LL.B. (honours) in law with politics at Queen's University Belfast (2009-2012) and graduated LL.M. cum laude from Leiden University (2014-2015), where he specialized in public international law and developed an interest in the ontology of international law. This led Richard to complete his thesis entitled "Rejuvenating Normative Hierarchy in the Twenty-First Century". He has been awarded the Edgar Graham Scholarship by Queen's University School of Law (2014) and won first prize in the Clingendael-Igarapé Essay competition on reform of the UN Security Council (2014). 

Since completing his studies, Richard has worked on the defence team of Dr Radovan Karadzic at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (2015) and in the Appeals division of the International Criminal Court (2015-2016). More recently, Richard has worked as a policy and research assistant at the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission (2016). 

Building on both theoretical and professional experience at the ICC and ICTY, his Ph.D. thesis seeks to provide a theoretical framework in order to explain the unique features and patterns which exist within and between the structures of international criminal courts and tribunals. The research will touch upon themes of judicialisation, hegemony and tribunals' capacity to fulfil the 'emancipatory promise' of international criminal law. In doing so, it analyses the unique features of these judicial institutions, and the wider context in which they were formed and have subsequently developed, in order to better understand the potential limitations of such institutions as mechanisms for achieving global justice.

Department: Law Faculty
Supervisor: Dr Surabhi Ranganathan
College: Girton
AHRC Subject Area: Law
Title of Thesis: Theorising the institutional structures of the international criminal courts and tribunals
 Richard  Clements

Affiliations