Events over the last few months might lead us to conclude that the tide is going out on equality, diversity and inclusion. Gains made are now being rolled back. In the United States, government agencies are investigating Kindergarten policies, university campuses and most recently Disney among others for ‘promoting diversity in a manner that does … Read more
What happens when wellness becomes a vehicle for mis/disinformation? Netflix’s Apple Cider Vinegar follows the rise of Australian wellness influencers Belle Gibson and Jess Ainscough, who gained fame promoting ‘alternative’ cancer cures like juicing and colonics. The show is based on true events, detailed in the 2017 book The Women who Fooled the World. Both … Read more
The judgment in For Women Scotland (FWS) Ltd v The Scottish Ministers [2025] UKSC 16 (‘FWS’) has sent a great many sectors across the UK scrambling to find out what, exactly, they are supposed to do in its aftermath. The UK Supreme Court, issuing a decision in the immediate context of specific guidance around legislation … Read more
Transforming Justice for Women presents an exploration of the Irish criminal justice system’s ongoing failure to adequately respond to the complex and often gender-specific needs of female offenders. Rooted in the context of post-crash Ireland, the book traces the trajectory of penal reform that emerged in response to economic austerity and prison overcrowding. While these … Read more
Every border implies the violence of its maintenance. It’s just that the border guards differ. Borders come in many kinds. The borders this statement brings to mind could be geographical, international. Perhaps they are otherwise spatial, or temporal. This is a post about sex and gender. – – – Last Wednesday, the United Kingdom Supreme … Read more
The representation of women in political life is both a measure and a driver of equality in society. In Northern Ireland, the number of women in elected roles has grown over the past few decades, but the pace of change remains slow, and significant barriers persist. This piece explores where we stand in terms of … Read more
For both France and Ireland, 2024 was a year of parliamentary elections. However, the context surrounding both elections could not be more different. While the Irish elections were expected by many political commentators, Emmanuel Macron’s decision to dissolve the French Assemblée nationale came as a surprise to the French people. The last French dissolution dates … Read more
“No set of legal institutions or prescriptions exists apart from the narratives that locate it and give it meaning.” “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.” Animal Farm: the play In the first week of December 2024, Lawyers on Stage Theatre Society (LOST) mounted four performances of Animal Farm for … Read more
This book is a decade-later follow-up to a 2013 monograph that argued tentatively for a human right to access genetic identity and ancestries, arising out of – perhaps existing quietly within – the connections of biological relatedness (‘A Law of Blood-ties: The ‘right’ to access genetic ancestry’). Genetic Stigma in Law & Literature(2024) looks less … Read more
It started with a phone call at dinnertime out of the blue, two weeks before Christmas. It was the Chairman of An Taisce asking me if I would put myself forward as An Taisce’s nominee for the Seanad. After years of asking, An Taisce had finally been approved as a nominating body and added to … Read more