Dr Simon Lavis

Senior Lecturer In Law

simon.lavis@open.ac.uk

01908652903

Biography

Professional biography

I joined the Open University Law School in October 2013 as a lecturer and was promoted to senior lecturer in 2019. I have bachelor's and master's degrees in history and law and was awarded my PhD in law from the University of Nottingham in 2015. I am a qualified solicitor in England & Wales since 2009 (currently non-practising).

I am the university's Unit of Assessment Lead for Law for the Research Excellence Framework 2029.

Research interests

My research is interdisciplinary and integrates aspects of history, theory and law.

My main research interest is the nexus between law, history and theory in relation to Nazi Germany 1933-1949, including the history of the legal system in the Third Reich, its theoretical nature, and its implications for the concept and practice of law today; as well as the representation of Nazi law in academic legal and historical discourse. I am also interested the use of law by authoritarian regimes more generally and the theory and practice of the state of exception in constitutional law

My current research projects involve developing an overarching theory of the Nazi legal system that takes into account the ideological role of law in the Third Reich and exploring the constitutive role of Nazi law in constructing consent among so-called 'ordinary' Germans through archival research into the use of law in everyday life. I am also working on using the example of Nazi law to better udnerstand the relationship between law and non-law with reference to state of exception theory.

My PhD thesis, titled 'The Conundrum of Nazi Law: An historiographical Challenge to the Anglo-American Jurisprudential Representation of the Nazi Past' explores how legal scholars, and those from related disciplines, write about the Nazi past and the impact this has on the way in which this period is perceived and understood as having legal and historical significance.

I am an active member of the Legal Histories research cluster, whose activities include the annual Diversity, Dilemmas and Discoveries conference series which attracts international participation and which I have co-organised.

Teaching interests

My teaching interests include public law, criminal law, law and society, legal research and international law.

I am Module Chair of W211 Public Law and led the process of producing this module and I am a member of the team authoring a new LLM qualification. I have previously chaired W203 Public law and criminal law and W350 Exploring legal boundaries.

I am an associate lecturer (tutor) on W211 and W340 Law, society and culture and previously tutored on W203 Public law and criminal law, W350 and LLM module W821 Exploring the boundaries of international law. I previously taught public law and contract law part-time at the University of Nottingham while completing my PhD research.

Impact and engagement

I have acted as a peer reviewer for publishers for books and journal articles and been an expert reviewer on funding panels.

I was the academic consultant for series 2 of the OU/BBC co-production The Prosecutors, and authored some of the OpenLearn materials associated with this series.

I have written blog posts for different audiences, including:

- Representing Nazi Law: Historians, Lawyers and Interdisciplinary Discourse on the British Association for Holocaust Studies blog.
- Four vlogs on Judging Brexit with Professor Simon Lee, discussing the implications of the UK Supreme Court decision in R (on the application of Miller) v The Prime Minister [2019] UKSC 41
- Day 80, Year of #Mygration: Interdisciplinary Belonging Symposium on the OU's Year of Mygration project.
- The Prosecutors – Consulting on Series 2 and the Criminal Law Principle of Conspiracy on the OU's Open Justice blog.

I regularly share my research at conferences both domestically and internatioanlly and have presented at the Critical Legal Conference, Socio-Legal Studies Assocation conference, Society of Legal Scholars conference, European Society for Comparative Legal History conference, British and Irish Association for Holocaust Studies conference and Association of Law Teachers conference in recent years.