Dr Paolo Sandro

Profile

I joined the University of Leeds in November 2021 as a Lecturer in Law, having previously worked at the University of Salford (Manchester) and at Liverpool Hope University.

I hold a PhD in Legal Theory from the University of Edinburgh and one in Public Law from the University of Roma Tre (Rome). At Roma Tre I also completed my Laurea Triennale (2002-2005) and Laurea Specialistica (2005-2007) in Law. I am a Michael Beverley Innovation Fellow (23-24), a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, and have been a visiting postdoctoral fellow at the University of Bergamo (Italy).

Research interests

My main areas of research are:

• legal theory
• public law (UK and comparative)
• regulation theory
• political theory
• philosophy of language
• philosophy of action

My first monograph, entitled ‘The Making of Constitutional Democracy: From Creation to Application of Law’, was published by Hart Publishing/Bloomsbury in January 2022, as part of the prestigious Law and Practical Reason series. The book brings all my research interests together. It does so through an integrated jurisprudential methodology, which combines insights from different disciplines (including history, anthropology, political science, philosophy of language, and philosophy of action) while also casting new light on long-standing issues in jurisprudence and public law.

The book is now full Open Access (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) and can be freely downloaded from https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4562656.

You can find our more about the book in my interviews with the IACL-AIDC Blog and with Review of Democracy, as well as in this vlog for Diritti Comparati. You can also watch the recordings of my book presentations at the University of Oxford and University of Belgrade.

The book has received so far incredibly generous reviews by Felipe Jimenez in the American Journal of Jurisprudence, by Barbara Levenbook in Jotwell, by Sebastian Lewis in the Modern Law Review, and by Conor Crummey in Jurisprudence. It was also recommended by the Legal Theory Bookworm as one of the blog’s ten favourite books in 2022 and by RevDem as one of the five 2022 key books about the Rule of Law.

I regularly provide commentary on salient legal and constitutional issues in the UK and abroad on the UKCLA Blog, on Verfassungsblog, on ICONnect, and for UK in a Changing Europe.

My work has been published, among others, in edited collections in legal theory by Springer (open access here) and by Edward Elgar, in Res Publica, and in Rivista Italiana di Diritto Pubblico e Comunitario.

<h4>Research projects</h4> <p>Any research projects I'm currently working on will be listed below. Our list of all <a href="https://essl.leeds.ac.uk/dir/research-projects">research projects</a> allows you to view and search the full list of projects in the faculty.</p>

Qualifications

• PhD in Legal Theory (University of Edinburgh)
• PhD in Public Law (University of Roma Tre, Rome)
• Laurea Specialistica in Law (University of Roma Tre, Rome)
• Laurea Triennale in Law (University of Roma Tre, Rome)
• PG Cert in Teaching & Learning in HE (Liverpool Hope University)

Professional memberships

• Higher Education Academy
• Society of Legal Scholars
• UK Constitutional Law Association
• International Association of Legislation
• IVR - International Association of Legal and Social Philosophy

Student education

I teach undergraduate modules within the fields of public law and legal theory.

Research groups and institutes

• Centre for Law and Social Justice

<h4>Postgraduate research opportunities</h4> <p>The school welcomes enquiries from motivated and qualified applicants from all around the world who are interested in PhD study. Our <a href="https://phd.leeds.ac.uk">research opportunities</a> allow you to search for projects and scholarships.</p>