Professor Robert Hazell
Professor of Government and the Constitution & Director of the Constitution Unit
- Name: Professor Robert Hazell
- Position: Professor of Government and the Constitution & Director of the Constitution Unit
- Room: B13
- Telephone: 0207 679 4971
- Fax: 0207 679 4978
- Email: r.hazell@ucl.ac.uk
Introduction
Professor Robert Hazell is Director of the Constitution Unit. He founded the Unit in 1995 as an independent think-tank specialising in constitutional reform. Before that he was Director of the Nuffield Foundation for six years, and before that a senior civil servant in the Home Office (1975-89). He started his career as a barrister (1973-75).
Robert’s research interests cover the whole of the constitutional reform agenda. They include devolution in Scotland, Wales and the English regions, freedom of information, parliamentary reform, Lords reform, a British bill of rights, referendums, electoral reform, the Crown and royal prerogative, constitutional watchdogs, and the process of constitutional reform. He is a great believer in collaborative research and leads research teams rather than conducting his own research. He was director of the 1999-2005 Leverhulme funded research programme into the Dynamics of Devolution, which had 12 projects and 25 partners. He is currently director of an ESRC funded project evaluating the impact of freedom of information (2007-2009), and an ESRC and government funded project monitoring the latest developments in devolution (2006-2008).
Robert welcomes applications from potential PhD students in any of his areas of interest. He was given a personal chair as Professor of Government and the Constitution at UCL in 1999, and in 2006 he was awarded the CBE for services to constitutional reform.
Research Projects
He has been awarded around 25 major research grants. These include four grants from the ESRC, and research funds totalling over £3m from the Ministry of Justice, Esmee Fairbairn Foundation, Gatsby Charitable Foundation, Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust, Joseph Rowntree Foundation, Leverhulme Trust, Nuffield Foundation, Nuffield Trust, Pilgrim Trust. He has acted as an adviser to government on freedom of information, and to parliamentary committees on freedom of information, constitutional watchdogs and Lords reform.
Current research projects
- Minority and Coalition Government (Institute for Government)
- Impact of Freedom of Information on Local Government 2009-2011 (ESRC)
- FOI & Parliament (Leverhulme Trust)
Teaching
Programme director for the Affiliate undergraduate programme in the Department of Political Science. Course tutor for:
Publications
Robert has written or edited eight books, and writes a lot for academic and professional journals and the media. Recent books include:
- The English Question (ed.), Manchester University Press, 2006
- Devolution, Law Making and the Constitution (ed.), Imprint Academic 2005
- And recent articles have been on the English Question, the dynamism of constitutional reform in the UK, Westminster as a three-in-one legislature, the absence of the courts in devolution disputes, the need for better parliamentary scrutiny of constitutional bills, and parliament as a constitutional guardian.
Robert's full publication list
Other Activities
- Anthony Sampson Memorial Lecture: Britain’s Constitutional Reforms: Trivial or Transforming? Robert Hazell's transcript (01.05.09)
- IACFS conference paper: Centralised Power and Decentralised Politics in the Devolved UK (29.09.08)
- Sunningdale Accountability lecture on The Acts of the Union - The Next Thirty Years (29.01.08)
- The Conservatives are in a Dreadful Muddle. Speeches from The Rt Hon Jack Straw MP and Roger Smith (Director, JUSTICE) and Robert Hazell on a British bill of rights and human rights (22.01.08)
- JUSTICE report on a British bill of rights (November 2007)
