Professor Ilias Trispiotis

Profile

I am Professor of Human Rights Law in the School of Law. I hold a PhD and LLM (distinction) from University College London (UCL) Faculty of Laws, and an LLB from the University of Athens. Before joining Leeds, I was a Visiting Scholar at Harvard Law School and a Teaching Fellow at UCL Laws. I have been a Fellow of the UK Higher Education Academy since March 2014.

My research spans international and European human rights law, equality law and legal theory. My recent work focuses on the aims, functions and scope of the legal prohibition of wrongful discrimination on grounds of religion or belief under the ECHR, and UK and EU equality law. I am currently working on a monograph which analyses the moral wrongness of belief discrimination and clarifies its functions under human rights and discrimination law. My monograph is under contract with Oxford University Press.

Parts of my work have appeared in leading generalist and specialist academic journals, such as the Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, the Modern Law Review, the Cambridge Law Journal, Legal Studies, the Oxford Journal of Law and Religion, the Human Rights Law Review and the Columbia Journal of European Law.

I also work extensively on the appropriate legal responses to so-called ‘conversion therapy’ practices. As ‘conversion therapy’ is not yet banned in the UK (or in most European countries), I have advised UK MPs, as well as major UK and international NGOs and charities, on the scope and importance of legislative action in this area. I have given oral evidence to the House of Commons Women and Equalities Committee on the UK Government's proposed legislation against ‘conversion therapy’ (evidence session here). I have also given oral evidence to the New Zealand Parliament Justice Committee on the Conversion Practices Prohibition Legislation Bill.

My co-authored articles on ‘conversion therapy’, published Open Access in the Modern Law Review (here), the Oxford Journal of Legal Studies (here) and Legal Studies (here) have been widely cited – including in research published by the EU Parliament, the UK Parliamentary Office for Science and Technology (POST) and the UK House of Commons Library – and have informed numerous NGO reports, including the Cooper Report. I have received multiple external grants to support this research and policy engagement, including two UKRI Research England Policy Support Grants (2022 and 2025) and an ESRC Impact Acceleration Award (2024). My edited collection (with Craig Purshouse), Banning ‘Conversion Therapy’, is published with Hart Publishing.

In 2022, my work on ‘conversion therapy’ won first prize in the ‘Making a Positive Contribution to Society’ category of the inaugural Engaged for Impact Awards of the University of Leeds. In 2023, my work was shortlisted for the Socio-Legal Studies Association (SLSA) Impact Prize.

From 2017 to 2019, I was Co-Investigator on a major EU Commission DG Justice Action Grant (JUST/2015/RRAC/AG) on countering Islamophobia through the development of counter-narratives in several EU Member States, working with sociologists, political scientists and journalists. I contributed to the ‘Counter-Islamophobia Toolkit’ for EU Member States and disseminated findings in two workshops at the EU Parliament, as well as in the edited collection ‘Countering Islamophobia in Europe’ (Palgrave Macmillan 2019).

I am a member of the ESRC Peer Review College. I sit on the Editorial Board of the International Journal of Discrimination and the Law. I also sit on the Steering Group of the Ban Conversion Practices Coalition in the UK.

Responsibilities

• Deputy Head of School

• Is informed consent to LGBTQ+ ‘conversion therapy’ compatible with UK and International Human Rights Law?
• Understanding Conversion Practices in the UK: A Study Exploring Conversion Practices Arising in Cases of Domestic and Sexual Violence and Other Forms of Abuse

Qualifications

• PhD (UCL)
• LLM (UCL)
• LLB (Athens)

Student education

I teach International Human Rights Law (LLB) and Comparative Human Rights Law (LLM).

Research groups and institutes

• Centre for Law and Social Justice

Current postgraduate researchers

• Ms Erika Moranduzzo (she/her)