Joan Loughrey

Research interests: corporate law, corporate governance, the regulation of the legal profession

Professor Joan Loughrey joined the School of Law in February 2022 after eighteen years at Leeds where her roles included Director of the Centre for Business Law and Practice, then Deputy Head of School from 2013, and from January 2020-May 2021 Interim Head of School. She was also chair of the School Equality Diversity and Inclusion committee and member of Faculty Equalty Diversity and Inclusion committee, and Athena Swan School lead and member of Faculty Athena Swan working group at Leeds.

After obtaining her degree in Jurisprudence from Somerville College, Oxford University, Joan Loughrey qualified as a solicitor in England and Wales and then in Hong Kong. She practiced commercial litigation in both jurisdictions before joining the University of Central Lancashire as a lecturer on their Legal Practice Programme and undergraduate degree.

Her research interests are in corporate law and corporate governance-particularly the regulation of directors and enforcement of directors' duties, shareholder litigation, and the regulation of the legal profession. She has published widely in these areas in peer reviewed journals including the Modern Law Review, the Law Quarterly Review, Legal Studies and the Journal of Law and Society. Her monograph, Corporate Lawyers and Corporate Governance was published by Cambridge University Press in 2011.

She has been the Principal Investigator on a £281,517 interdisciplinary AHRC funded project 'Business Judgment and the Courts' working with colleagues in the School of Law, Leeds, and the Management School, Liverpool University, and a Co-Investigator on an £325k ESRC/Newton Fund award for a project entitled 'Developing financial systems to support sustainable growth in China' led by Professor Gerard McCormick (Leeds). She was previously the editor of the Corporate Governance chapter in Gore-Browne in EU Company Law.

She is a member of the Advisory Board of University of Exeter’s Post Office Project, examining the role of lawyers in the Office scandal in the light of the on-going Inquiry, and an Associate of the Legal Professions Research Group, based at the School of Law, University of Leeds. Previously (2014-2015) she was advisor on the Solicitors Regulation Authority's project on professionalism and law firms, and she is a recognised expert in the regulation of professional ethics.

She has also been a referee for Legal Ethics, Legal Studies, Journal of Law and Society, Law and Social Inquiry, Journal of Corporate Law Studies, a peer reviewer for the ESRC and WellcomeTrust and is a member of International Advisory Board of the International Journal of the Legal Profession.

She is currently conducting research into legal professional privilege and lawyer's ethics and separately an invited contribution to a collection of essays on company law. She welcomes PhD students in both fields of study.