Professor Rachel Murray
LL.B.(Leic.), LL.M.(Bristol), Ph.D.(W.England)
Current positions
Professor of International Human Rights
University of Bristol Law School
Contact
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Biography
Rachel Murray is Professor of International Human Rights Law at the University of Bristol and Director of its Human Rights Implementation Centre.
Rachel undertakes regular work on the African human rights system, implementation of human rights law, OPCAT and torture prevention, among other areas. She has written widely in these areas (e.g. Commentary on the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights (OUP); Implementation of the Findings of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, with Debbie Long, Cambridge University Press, 2015; The Optional Protocol to the UN Convention Against Torture, OUP, with Steinerte, Evans and Hallo de Wolf), and articles in leading legal human rights journals. She also advises and works with national, regional and international organisations, including the African Commission and Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights. She engages with governments, civil society organisations and individuals on human rights law and undertakes consultancies for regional and international organisations, including the UN and OSCE. She has held a number of grants, including a major grant from the UK Economic Social and Research Council on implementation which tracked decisions from the regional and UN treaty bodies to examine the extent to which the States have complied with them (http://www.bristol.ac.uk/law/hrlip/). She won the ESRC’s Outstanding International Impact Prize in 2023.
She was formally the Vice Chair of the Board of the Institute for Human Rights and Development in Africa, is currently a Fellow of the Human Rights Centre at the University of Essex, Global Distinguished Professor of Law at the Notre Dame London Law Programme, Visiting Professor at the University of Oxford and Deputy Leader of Doughty Street Chambers’ International team. She is also a magistrate sitting in Bristol.
Rachel undertakes regular work on the African human rights system, implementation of human rights law, OPCAT and torture prevention, among other areas. She has written widely in these areas (e.g. Commentary on the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights (OUP); Implementation of the Findings of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, with Debbie Long, Cambridge University Press, 2015; The Optional Protocol to the UN Convention Against Torture, OUP, with Steinerte, Evans and Hallo de Wolf), and articles in leading legal human rights journals. She also advises and works with national, regional and international organisations, including the African Commission and Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights. She engages with governments, civil society organisations and individuals on human rights law and undertakes consultancies for regional and international organisations, including the UN and OSCE. She has held a number of grants, including a major grant from the UK Economic Social and Research Council on implementation which tracked decisions from the regional and UN treaty bodies to examine the extent to which the States have complied with them (http://www.bristol.ac.uk/law/hrlip/). She won the ESRC’s Outstanding International Impact Prize in 2023.
She was formally the Vice Chair of the Board of the Institute for Human Rights and Development in Africa, is currently a Fellow of the Human Rights Centre at the University of Essex, Global Distinguished Professor of Law at the Notre Dame London Law Programme, Visiting Professor at the University of Oxford and Deputy Leader of Doughty Street Chambers’ International team. She is also a magistrate sitting in Bristol.
Research interests
Human Rights, particularly national human rights commissions and African systems; Public International Law.
Projects and supervisions
Research projects
Developing a Human Rights Training Programme
Principal Investigator
Description
To develop materials and webinars for human rights training programme for the Regulation and Quality Improvement Authority,Managing organisational unit
University of Bristol Law SchoolDates
01/12/2021 to 31/03/2022
Developing an inspection framework for places of detention in British Overseas Territories,
Principal Investigator
Description
Research to develop recommendations to strengthen the provision of oversight of places of detention in the British Overseas Territories.Managing organisational unit
University of Bristol Law SchoolDates
01/06/2021 to 31/03/2022
Implementing Participatory-action Research To Explore The Impact Of COVID On War-affected Disabled Populations, Including Ex-child Soldiers, In Uganda
Principal Investigator
Managing organisational unit
University of Bristol Law SchoolDates
01/02/2021 to 31/12/2021
Ireland OPCAT project
Principal Investigator
Description
Ireland signed the Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture (OPCAT) on 2nd October 2007 but has yet to ratify this instrument. Ten years on, the Irish Human Rights and…Managing organisational unit
University of Bristol Law SchoolDates
01/12/2015 to 01/10/2017
Implementation of Human Rights Law at the national level: An Analysis of Domestic Mechanisms for Implementation
Principal Investigator
Description
The ESRC funded Human Rights Implementation Project (HRLIP) is a collaborative project between four leading academic human rights Centres (Bristol, Essex, Middlesex and Pretoria) and the Open Society Justice Initiative.
The…Managing organisational unit
University of Bristol Law SchoolDates
01/09/2015 to 28/02/2019
Thesis supervisions
The contemporary counter-terrorism model of inter-state co-operation
Supervisors
How constitutional arrangements for the exercise of self-determination by the territory of Somaliland may impact Somaliland’s engagement with the international human rights system?
Supervisors
Postcolonial Feminist Theory and the Shortcomings of International Law in Providing Sufficient Protection for Girl Soldiers in Armed Conflict. Case studies from the Sri Lankan and Ugandan wars
Supervisors
Situating the use and follow-up of ‘soft law’ findings of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights and National Preventive Mechanisms within the discourse on implementation and compliance
Supervisors
The participation of amici curiae in the African human rights system
Supervisors
Revisiting the debate on the legal status of sustainable development in international law
Supervisors
The Protection of the Right to Silence in The Gambia
Supervisors
Beyond accommodations
Supervisors