Joshua (Josh) Paine joined the University of Bristol as a Lecturer in Law in January 2020 and has been a Senior Lecturer in Law since January 2022. Josh is an international lawyer with a focus on international economic law (primary focus on international investment law, secondary focus on international trade law) and international dispute settlement. Josh’s research in these areas has been published in leading peer-reviewed journals including, among others, the European Journal of International Law, International & Comparative Law Quarterly, and the Journal of International Economic Law, and in edited volumes with leading publishers. His first book, The Functions of International Adjudication and International Environmental Litigation (Cambridge University Press, 2024), was awarded 2nd prize in the 2024 Society of Legal Scholars Brazier book prize for Outstanding Mid-Career Scholarship and received positive advance endorsements from eight eminent scholars.

For his research on a climate carve-out for investment treaties, Josh was awarded (with co-author Elizabeth Sheargold) the 2023 John H Jackson Prize of the Journal of International Economic Law. Josh has presented his research at major events involving policymakers, including twice at the OECD investment treaty conference and at the European Commission. He has given oral evidence to the Commons International Trade Committee and his written evidence has been cited extensively in reports of the International Trade Committee and House of Lords International Agreements Committee. He is a member of the Trade and Public Policy (TaPP) network and the Academic Forum on ISDS. Josh served as an Associate Editor of the Journal of World Investment & Trade from 2018–2023. In 2017 he was the winner of the European Society of International Law Young Scholar Prize.

Prior to coming to Bristol, Josh was a Senior Research Fellow (postdoc) at the Max Planck Institute Luxembourg for Procedural Law for three years. Josh holds a PhD in law from the University of Melbourne, an LLM in international law from the University of Cambridge, and a BA/LLB (Hons) from the Australian National University. He has previously taught various law units at the Universities of Luxembourg, Melbourne, Canberra, and the Australian National University, and worked as a judge’s associate in the Supreme Court of New South Wales. Josh is admitted as a lawyer in New South Wales, Australia. In 2014 Josh held a visiting fellowship at the Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law.