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Professor Roger Cotterrell, LLD MSc (Soc) (Lond) FBA

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Anniversary Professor of Legal Theory

Location: Mile End
email: r.b.m.cotterrell@qmul.ac.uk
Phone: +44 (0)20 7882 3946
Fax: +44 (0)207 882 7042

Roger Cotterrell studied law and sociology at the University of London and taught at Leicester University before joining the Queen Mary faculty where he has been Anniversary Professor of Legal Theory since 2005. He was Acting Head and Head of the College's Department of Law between 1989 and 1991, Dean of the Faculty of Laws from 1993 to 1996 and Professor of Legal Theory from 1990 to 2005. He was elected as a Fellow of the British Academy in 2005.

In addition to the key publications noted below, Professor Cotterrell has published many articles and essays related to his primary specialisms, sociolegal theory and jurisprudence, as well as on the law of trusts, comparative law, criminology and public law.

Professor Cotterrell has held visiting academic positions at the University of Texas at Austin, Lund University, the Catholic University of Brussels, the University of California at Berkeley, the Onati Institute for the Sociology of Law, the European University Institute and the University of Hong Kong. He is a member of the advisory boards of the Journal of Law and Society [UK], Sociologia del Diritto [Italy], International Journal of Law in Context [UK/USA], Griffith Law Review [Australia], Droit et Société [France], Clio & Themis [France], Studies in Law, Politics and Society [USA], Property Law Review [Australia] and Journal of Comparative Law [UK]. He was Trustee of the Law and Society Association (USA) (1996–9), an expert assessor for the Flemish Interuniversity Council (2006-7) and for the Danish National Research Foundation (2011), and a member of the UK national Research Assessment Exercise Law Panel (1999–2001) and the RAE Law Sub-panel (2006-8).

Professor Cotterrell's primary current research interests are in legal theory exploring the nature of transnational law, the relations of law, trust, community and culture, the legal sociology of Emile Durkheim and the 'Durkheim School', and relations between the fields of comparative law and sociology of law.

Publications:

Roger Cotterrell's SSRN page

Full list of publications [PDF 101KB]

Roger Cotterrell's full CV [PDF 38kb]

Podcast

Podcast: Professor Roger Cotterrell interviewed by Cybernorms.net as part of their series of lectures on Sociology of Law.

Key publications

  • ‘What is Transnational Law?’ (2012) 37 Law and Social Inquiry (forthcoming)
  • ‘Justice, Dignity, Torture, Headscarves: Can Durkheim’s Sociology Clarify Legal Values?’ (2011) 20 Social & Legal Studies 3-20.
  • Emile Durkheim: Justice, Morality, Politics (ed) (Ashgate, 2010).
  • ‘Spectres of Transnationalism: Changing Terrains of Sociology of Law’ (2009) 36 Journal of Law and Society 481-500.
  • ‘The Struggle for Law: Some Dilemmas of Cultural Legality’ (2009) 4 International Journal of Law in Context 373-84.
  • 'Transnational Communities and the Concept of Law' Ratio Juris, 2008.
  • Living Law: Studies in Legal and Social Theory (Ashgate, 2008)
  • Law, Culture and Society: Legal Ideas in the Mirror of Social Theory (Ashgate, 2006)
  • Law in Social Theory (ed) (Ashgate, 2006)
  • The Politics of Jurisprudence (2nd edition, Oxford University Press, 2003
  • Sociological Perspectives on Law (ed) (2 vols) (Ashgate, 2001)
  • Emile Durkheim: Law In a Moral Domain (Stanford University Press/ Edinburgh University Press, 1999)
  • Law's Community: Legal Theory in Sociological Perspective (Oxford University Press, 1995)
  • The Sociology of Law: An Introduction (2nd edition, Oxford University Press, 1992)

Podcast

‘Second Annual International Journal of Law in Context Lecture, Georgetown University, Washington DC, January 17th 2008’.

Research interests:

Professor Cotterrell's primary current research interests are in the fields of legal theory exploring the relations of law, trust, community and culture; the history and contemporary significance of the legal sociology of Emile Durkheim and the 'Durkheim School' and relations between the fields of comparative law and sociology of law.

Supervision:

Professor Cotterrell welcomes proposals for postgraduate supervision in the fields of sociological (and sociologically-oriented) jurisprudence and legal theory, law and social theory, modern history of legal theory, and sociolegal theory.

Undergraduate teaching:

  • LAW6021 Jurisprudence and Legal Theory
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