Mr Richard Edwards

Richard read history at the University of Southampton, where he took a special interest in British political history and the Crusades. He retains an on-going interest in British political history, particularly the life and career of Sir Winston Churchill. Thereafter, Richard took a further degree in Law at Southampton before attending Corpus Christi College, Oxford where he read for the BCL.

Richard has a long-standing research interest in human rights law, constitutional law and reform, devolution, free speech and aspects of criminal justice. Richard's work has been referred to by the Law Lords, the High Court of Northern Ireland, the House of Lords and the Northern Ireland Law Commission. Richard particularly enjoys teaching, seeing it as the heart of academic life and the most direct way to pass on the excitement of law to the next generation.

Richard has extensive experience in academic leadership. He served as Head of Exeter Law School (2016–2019) and Deputy Head (2015–2016), during which time the School expanded its teaching at the Penryn campus and developed new joint programmes with Exeter Business School, as well as partnerships with the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) and the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK). Before joining Exeter, he was Associate Head of Department at UWE, Bristol (2011–2014).

Alongside his legal scholarship, Richard contributed to the Strategy and Security Institute at Exeter as a Crisis Watch Tutor (2014–2015), where he led a group on Russia and the crisis in Ukraine after the 2014 invasion. He continues to follow these developments closely. The experience reinforced his continuing engagement with the intersection of law, history, geopolitics, and international security.

He has also contributed to the wider discipline through long service on the Executive Committee of the Society of Legal Scholars (2002–2016) and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts in 2012.

For Richard's research outputs please visit: