Project Code

Project Title

Primary Supervisor

LAW-TJ-01

Historical Institutional Abuse and the Legacy of the Conflict

This project will look at the intersection between Historical Institutional Abuse and the experience of the Northern Ireland conflict, exploring for example the nature and scale of harm, overlapping experiences of victimhood, and how the conditions of conflict facilitated the denial and silence of institutional abuse.

Professor Cheryl Lawther

LAW-TJ-03

Community and victim/survivor-led truth recovery in Northern Ireland

This project will analyse the role of communities and victims and survivors of the conflict in Northern Ireland in the pursuit of truth about past violence. By reviewing non-official truth recovery processes, this research will recognise the value of work done by communities, grassroots groups, civil society and individuals and subsequently identify how it might inform the work of information retrieval processes in Northern Ireland and beyond. In line with the commitment to a sustainable peace for all through creating safer communities, this project centres the efforts of those impacted by the conflict and uses this to draw lessons for the future.

Dr Lauren Dempster

LAW-TJHR-01

The role of NGO archives in building peace: a comparative analysis

This project will explore and compare the role of the archives of (local and international) NGOs in Northern Ireland and other jurisdictions in relation to the establishment of truth regarding past violence and human rights violations, their potential as a tool of transitional justice, and ultimately their potential contribution to building a peaceful society. This will be a collaborative project, involving collaboration with relevant organisations in NI and the comparator sites. It is in line with the goal of building and sustaining a meaningful peace for everyone by analysing the value of these archives for those impacted by past conflict.

Dr Lauren Dempster

LAW-TJHR-02

Human rights litigation as a tool to address the legacies of past harm in NI (and beyond)

The avenues to address legacies of past harm in NI and elsewhere are framed not only by criminal law but - crucially - by human rights, including domestic and regional human rights instruments. This project will address the impact of regional human rights mechanisms such as the ECHR on investigating the past outside the constraints of criminal proceedings.

Dr Alice Panepinto

LAW-TJHR-03

The right to truth and the history curriculum: learning about the past as a human right

In deeply divided societies such as NI children learn about the past primarily through the interpretations offered by families, communities and schools. This can lead to differences in understanding and accommodating complexity, which in turn undermine the common ground required for the people of NI to flourish socially and economically. This project will explore how the state's duty to address past harm is not purely a juridical matter, but is grounded in the right to truth owed to society as a whole, including to children.

Dr Alice Panepinto

LAW-TJHR-04

Human rights solidarity after conflict: from Belfast to the world (and back)

Like in many other postconflict societies, human rights solidarity in NI often intersects with other struggles and calls for peace and justice around the world. This project looks at the cross-fertilisation of human rights initiatives (including organisation, litigation, activism and protest) between NI and other contexts, with a view to better understanding the centrality of human rights solidarity across issues and localities.

Dr Alice Panepinto

LAW-TJHR-05

Comparative study of access to justice initiatives to end/redress conflict-related sexual and gender-based violence in post-conflict Northern Ireland and ethnically divided societies in Asia: Cross-Cultural Lessons Across the Global North and South

The project will address the thematic areas of ending violence against women and girls. By examining comparative initiatives in both Northern Ireland and divided, conflict-affected societies in Asia, the study would gain better understanding of and promote knowledge transfer of the disproportionate impact of conflict on women and girls, and effective strategies and tactics to prevent and redress conflict-related sexual and gender-based violence.

Dr Nikhil Narayan

LAW-TJHR-06

Regulating post-adoption records, reunions, and rejections: a critical analysis of adoptee identity and health rights in Northern Ireland.

This project will analyse outcomes for a vulnerable sector of the population – adoptees – in light of the recent and ongoing digitization of patients’ health records (which does not fully take into account the lived experiences and challenges of adoptees e.g. there are still gaps in information on inherited conditions from natal relatives, etc).  

Dr Alice Diver

LAW-ICCJ-01

The role of Registered Intermediaries in securing Access to Justice for Children in Northern Ireland

This project will focus on ‘Registered Intermediaries’ which have operated in the Northern Ireland justice system since 2013 to work with vulnerable witnesses (mostly children) to help them communication within the justice system.  Research into the role would be necessarily ‘collaborative’ as it involves actors from the justice system and allied health professionals.  Intermediaries can enable vulnerable children to ‘engage fully in society’ as their needs are better recognised and accommodated. Specifically the project could look at the impact of intermediary work on justice outcomes for children, how the ‘best evidence’ of children can be secured but also more broadly, how the role impacts the priority of the ‘best interests of the child’ as per the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Dr John Taggart

LAW-ICCJ-02

The Role of Community Restorative Justice in Tackling Paramilitarism in Republican and Loyalist Communities

This project focuses on tackling paramilitarism has been a key objective of successive programmes for government (since 2015) and it remains so for the current Executive Programme for Government. Community Restorative Justice Ireland (CRJI) and Northern Ireland Alternatives (NIA) are the two organisations at the epicentre of the Executive’s efforts to use restorative justice to challenge paramilitary violence in republican and loyalist communities funded through the Executive Office and the Executive Programme on Paramilitarism, Criminality and Organised crime. 

Professor Kieran McEvoy

LAW-ICCJ-03

Digital Crime, Criminal Justice and Sexual Offences

This project will address online/digital forms of sexual violence against women and girls; AI-generated sexual harms; public discourse on sexual crime via new media; the use of digital evidence in sexual offence trials; algorithmic decision making in sexual offence cases.

Professor Anne-Marie McAlinden

LAW-ICCJ-04

Reforming Criminal Justice Responses to Sexual Violence in Northern Ireland

This project will critically explore the reform landscape following the 2019 high-profile Gillen Review into serious sexual offences with respect to reforms that are in place eg. remote evidence centres, sexual offences legal advisors, closed courtrooms, laws on technology -facilitated sexual abuse and/or forthcoming e.g. pre-trial legal representation, third party material disclosure applications. It aligns with the NI Government priority on Ending Violence Against Women and Girls, and improving victim, survivor, and public confidence in the justice system.

Dr Eithne Dowds