For much of the second half of the twentieth century, HM Seervai was a leading advocate of the Bombay High Court. He argued some of the most important constitutional cases decided by the Supreme Court of India and eventually resolved in 1970 to write his Constitutional Law of India. It became the leading text on Indian constitutional law. It is still in widespread use. Many instances of recent citations are quoted. But it is not the usual commentary on the text of the Indian constitutional and case law. Instead, the book contains a running discussion on the shifts in direction as well as sharp criticisms where Seervai felt that the courts had strayed from correct constitutional doctrine. Seervai died in 1996 as the fourth edition was just completed. In this paper, originally given as a lecture in Mumbai in 2007 on the centenary of Seervai’s birth, the author questions Seervai’s testamentary prohibition on posthumous editions of his text. He urges that a new edition should be produced to keep Seervai’s legacy alive not only in India but in other constitutional democracies where Indian judicial authority is increasingly cited.

In the Republic of Ireland nearly all primary schools are state-funded but the vast majority of these schools are owned and managed by religious bodies. There is no system of state-run schools. This paper discusses the protection of freedom of religion within this unique system of schooling. In particular, it examines the notion of ‘the integrated curriculum’ whereby all schools in receipt of state funding are legally obliged to ensure that a religious spirit informs and vivifies the whole work of the school. The paper identifies the international human rights standards relevant to the teaching of religion in schools. Through empirical evidence based on interviews with parents, teachers and pupils, an assessment is made of how far Irish law and practice respect these standards. The outcome of this evaluation of the use of religious bodies in non-state service provision is discussed.

English law has recently recognised a tort of misuse of private information through the development of the tort of breach of confidence. This paper considers the conceptual issues that arise in the particular context of cases contesting the privacy of information exchanged in an intimate relationship. The courts have said that the purpose of protecting privacy through the tort is the promotion of individual autonomy. Examining what is entailed in this approach, it is argued that cases involving shared privacies can only be understood as involving the indirect promotion of autonomy through the protection of certain socially sanctioned relationships. A framework of analysis is developed under which the underlying issues are laid bare and through which the reasoning of the courts may be understood and criticised.

In Campbell v MGN Ltd, the House of Lords endorsed an expansive interpretation of the breach of confidence action to protect privacy interests. The scope and content of this transformed cause of action have already been subject to considerable judicial consideration and academic discussion. This paper focuses on the remedial consequences of privacy breaches. It undertakes an analysis of the principles which govern awards for pecuniary and non-pecuniary loss, the availability of gain-based relief, in particular an account of profits, and exemplary damages.

Even in its traditional scope, the monetary remedies for breach of confidence raise complex issues, mainly resulting from the fact that this doctrine draws on multiple jurisdictional sources such as equity, contract and property law. The difficulties of determining the appropriate remedial principles are now compounded by the fact that English law also aims to integrate its obligation to protect the right to privacy under Art 8 of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms 1950 into the conceptual framework of the breach of confidence action.

The analysis provided in this paper supports the contention that not only the scope of the cause of action but also important remedial issues are likely to remain in doubt until the wrong of ‘misuse of private information’ is freed from the constraints of the traditional action for breach of confidence. A separate tort would be able to deal more coherently and comprehensively with all wrongs commonly regarded as privacy breaches.

This paper explores connections between jurisprudential discussion of pain and violence and the methodology of law and literature. Starting with Robert Cover’s work on law’s ‘field of pain and death’, it argues that the theory on which he relied in rejecting literary approaches to law can equally justify a turn to fiction in understanding violence. It then considers the experiential dimension of Austin Sarat’s and Thomas Kearns’s jurisprudence of violence and argues that interdisciplinary perspectives, including relevant fiction, can assist in engaging with the challenges of capturing such experience in textual form. Situating the argument in relation to broader law and literature rationales, the paper finds relevant illustrations in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, The Secret Agent and Under Western Eyes. It argues that Conrad’s stories represent dimensions of pain and violence that might otherwise be irreducible to non-fictional textual discourse, whilst also expressing the limits of that representation.

The rhetoric of partnership appears to have played a central justificatory role in policy change and law reform during the past decade, especially in the field of industrial relations. We investigate in this paper its implications for higher education. We do so in the context of the 2006 pay dispute with reference both to recent developments in the higher education sector and to the legal framework within which the dispute was conducted. We argue that despite the government’s suggestion that this was only a dispute between universities as employers and their employees, its particular version of partnership shaped the contours of the dispute and determined its outcome.

Much of the legal attention surrounding human embryonic stem (ES) cell research within the UK has, to date, focused on cloning techniques. Whilst this is both understandable and appropriate given litigation on this topic, there has been less focus on other areas. This paper identifies and analyses areas of incoherence and deficiency within the regulatory architecture governing human ES cell derivation and research within the UK. This is not merely a theoretical exercise, as there are indications that many of the policy objectives currently being pursued in this area have, at best, a shaky jurisdictional basis. It is all too easy to recall that lobby groups have challenged the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 1990, the legislative foundation for embryo research and most infertility treatment, on the basis of jurisdictional uncertainty and statutory interpretation. Whilst many pro-life campaigners are opposed to ES cell research on ethical grounds, the arguments utilised thus far in relation to litigation have been entirely legal, involving issues of statutory interpretation and whether the regulator, the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA), or the Department of Health have acted ultra vires the 1990 Act. This paper will reveal that there are a number of further areas which might be open to attack on this basis.