Find out more about studying Law with Human Rights LLM at Birkbeck, University of London? We've gathered all the key details, entry requirements, modules, fees, and more. Take the next step by booking an open day to explore it for yourself.
LLM - Master of Laws
Bloomsbury Campus
Full Time
Oct 2027
1 Year
Our LLM Law with Human Rights pathway is unique in its passionate engagement with the highly contested and, at best, scandalous nature of human rights law and discourse. Why choose this course? You will be taught by staff who are part of a proud tradition of critical scholarship in law who address issues of law through power and inequality and are led by principles of social, economic, political, environmental and racial justice. This course is designed for students who need to balance study with work, family or other commitments, but wish to study in an environment led by academic staff with extensive research expertise and publications in their field. Our students come from all over the world and include current and future legal practitioners, as well as practitioners from other fields, so you can look forward to a stimulating learning environment, alongside others with diverse backgrounds and professional experiences.
This module examines the contemporary significance of human rights and studies the historical, political and social reasons which have turned human rights into such a powerful discourse. It combines a theoretical and historical approach to the study of human rights with a more direct, practical and campaigning attitude. The first part of the module will examine the concepts and philosophies of human rights in the context of challenges to traditional international law in the last two or three decades. The liberal or ?humanitarian? theory of rights will be examined from non-liberal standpoints, grouped under the term ?liberationist? perspectives.
The module will introduce you to the debates on historicism and critique and will develop your critical abilities. It will introduce a number of philosophical and theoretical approaches, including Hegelian phenomenology, psychoanalysis, deconstruction and the ethics of alterity. The historical and philosophical approach to rights will allow you to understand and critique the problems of both positivistic and contextual approaches to law.
