Brice Dickson

Having served from 1999 to 2005 as the first Chief Commissioner of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, a body set up as a result of the Belfast (Good Friday) Agreement, Brice Dickson was employed in the School of Law at Queen’s University from 2005 to 2017 as a Professor of International and Comparative Law. From 2008 to 2011 he was Director of Research in Human Rights and Director of the School’s Human Rights Centre. He also spent time as a visiting research professor at Fordham University New York, the University of New South Wales and the University of Melbourne.

Although he retired from full-time employment at Queen’s in 2017, Brice Dickson has continued to engage in legal research as an Emeritus Professor. In 2020 he was awarded an LLD by the University for his research portfolio on ‘Judicial Activism in the UK and Ireland, with particular reference to Apex Courts and Human Rights’. In the same year he was granted an Emeritus Fellowship by the Leverhulme Trust for research on international human rights monitoring mechanisms.

Brice Dickson still takes a keen interest in the work of the Human Rights Centre in the School of Law and remains a Research Associate at the Institute of Irish Studies at Queen’s and an Emeritus Fellow of the University’s Senator George J Mitchell Institute for Global Peace, Security and Justice.

Brice Dickson’s recent books include the following:

• International Human Rights Monitoring Mechanisms: A Study of their Impact in the UK (Edward Elgar Publishing, forthcoming 2022).
• Law in Northern Ireland (Hart Publishing, 4th edn, forthcoming 2022).
• The Judicial Mind: A Festschrift for Lord Kerr of Tonaghmore (Hart Publishing, 2021, co-ed with Conor McCormick).
• Writing the United Kingdom Constitution (Manchester University Press, 2019).
• The Irish Supreme Court: Historical and Comparative Perspectives (Oxford University Press, 2019).
• Electoral Rights in Europe: Advances and Challenges (Routledge, 2017, co-ed with Helen Hardman).
• Human Rights in Northern Ireland: The CAJ Handbook (Hart Publishing, 2014, co-ed with Brian Gormally).
• Human Rights and the United Kingdom Supreme Court (Oxford University Press, 2013).
• The European Convention on Human Rights and the Conflict in Northern Ireland (Oxford University Press, 2010).
• Judicial House of Lords 1876–2009 (Oxford University Press, 2009, co-ed with Sir Louis Blom-Cooper QC and Gavin Drewry).
• Judicial Activism in Common Law Supreme Courts (Oxford University Press, 2007, ed).

Brice Dickson’s recent book chapters and journal articles include:

• ‘The “Gay Cake” Case and the Scope of Discrimination Law’ in Daniel Clarry (ed), The UK Supreme Court Yearbook 2018-19 (Appellate Press, 2021) 225-247.
• ‘Northern Ireland Dimensions to the First Decade of the United Kingdom Supreme Court’ (2020) 83 Modern Law Review 1133-1167 (with C McCormick).
• ‘Common Law and Constitutional Rights at the Devolved Level’ in Mark Elliott and Kirsty Hughes (eds), Common Law Constitutional Rights (Hart Publishing, 2020) ch 12.
• ‘The Limitations of a Criminal Law Approach in a Transitional Justice Context’ in Laurens Lavrysen and Natasa Mavronicola (eds), Coercive Human Rights: Positive Duties to Mobilise the Criminal Law under the ECHR (Hart Publishing, 2020) ch 11.
• ‘Barriers to the Appointment of High Court Judges in Northern Ireland’ (2020) 71 Northern Ireland Legal Quarterly479-501 (with J Morison and A Godden).
• ‘Apex Courts and the Development of the Common Law’ in Paul Daly (ed), Apex Courts and the Common Law(University of Toronto Press, 2019) ch 2.
• ‘Work in Progress: A Country Study of Constitutional Asymmetry in the United Kingdom’ in Patricia Popelier and Maja Sahadžić (eds), Constitutional Asymmetry and Multinationalism: Managing Multinationalism in Multi-tiered Systems (Palgrave Macmillan, 2019).
• ‘La diffamation and United Kingdom Judges’ in Laurence Burgorgue-Larsen and G Calvès (eds), La diffamation saisie par les juges en Europe (Éditions Pedone, 2019) 95-108.
• ‘The ECHR’s Influence on Convergence between Common Law and Civil Law Systems’ in Marko Novakovic (ed), Common Law and Civil Law Today: Convergence and Divergence (Vernon Press, 2019) ch 14.
• ‘The Problems with Human Rights’ (2019) 70 Northern Ireland Legal Quarterly 467-477.
• ‘Devolution in Northern Ireland’ in Jeffrey Jowell and Colm O’Cinneide (eds), The Changing Constitution (Oxford University Press, 2019, 9th edn) ch 9.
• ‘How Does Today’s Supreme Court Conceptualise Human Rights?’ (2019) 1 Irish Supreme Court Review 15-30.
• ‘Taking the Politics out of Human Rights in Conflict Resolution: Northern Ireland and Beyond’ in O Grech (ed), Contemporary Issues in Conflict Resolution (Centre for the Study and Practice of Conflict Resolution, Malta, 2018)) 18-28.  
• ‘The Constitutional Governance of Counter-Terrorism’ in Genevieve Lennon, Colin King and Carole McCartney (eds), Counter-terrorism, Constitutionalism and Miscarriages of Justice: A Festschrift for Professor Clive Walker(Hart Publishing, 2018) ch 2.
• ‘The European Convention in Conflicted Societies: The Experience of Northern Ireland and Turkey’ (2017) 66 International and Comparative Law Quarterly 263-294 (with Onder Bakircioglu).
• ‘The Planning and Control of Operations Involving the Use of Lethal Force’ in Lawrence Early et al (eds), The Right to Life Under Article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rights: Twenty Years of Legal Developments Since McCann v the United Kingdom: In Honour of Michael O'Boyle (Wolf Legal, 2016) 47-59.
• ‘The Extra-Territorial Obligations of European States Regarding Human Rights in the Context of Terrorism’ in Federico Fabbrini and Vicki Jackson, Constitutionalism Across Borders in the Struggle Against Terrorism (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2016) 213-232.
• ‘The Right to Education for Humanity’ (2016) 67 Northern Ireland Legal Quarterly 409-432 (with C McCormick).
• ‘Terrorism and Legal Accountability’ in Genevieve Lennon and Clive Walker (eds), Routledge Handbook of Law and Terrorism (Routledge, 2015) 116-130.
• ‘Criminal Justice Reforms in Northern Ireland: The Agents of Change’ in Anne-Marie McAlinden and Clare Dwyer (eds), Criminal Justice in Transition: The Northern Ireland Context (Hart Publishing, 2015) 67-86.
• ‘The EU Charter of Fundamental Rights in the case Law of the European Court of Human Rights’ [2015] European Human Rights Law Review 27-40.