Courts and the Body Politic

Lecture 1, Queen’s University Belfast: The Expanding Role of the Courts

Professor Catherine O’Regan, Bonavero Institute of Human Rights, Oxford University

This is the first of this year's Hamlyn Lectures, on the theme "Courts and the Body Politic". The speaker, Professor O'Regan, a former Judge of the South African Constitutional Court, is Director of the Bonavero Institute of Human Rights at the University of Oxford. Her Belfast lecture is titled "The Expanding Constitutional Role of the Courts". It will examine the place of courts in "new" constitutions and how to conceive of their role in adjudicating disputes between centre and regions in federal states, determining whether legislation has been passed in accordance with constitutionally mandated procedures, and deciding whether fundamental rights have been infringed by the state.