Undergraduate LLB (Hons)
Law and Politics
Study the closely related fields of law and politics and gain the skills to make a difference
Study the closely related fields of law and politics and gain the skills to make a difference
Kent Law School brings the study of law to life and prepares you for a successful career in law. Our LLB in Law develops your critical and analytical skills, enables you to think about the role of law in society, and provides hands-on experience through opportunities to work on real cases in our Law Clinic. A law degree from Kent prepares you for a career in law and opens doors to many other professions.
You'll gain a solid grounding in politics, both national and international, and are able to choose modules that reflect your interests from the extensive range on offer. Our modules reflect current and relevant issues including conflict resolution, federalism, comparative politics, European integration, ethnic conflict, terrorism, the theory of international relations, political theory, and the politics of countries such as China, Japan, Russia and the USA.
Our research-led teaching encourages you to take a critical view of politics and the law, engaging with the latest research undertaken by expert academics. Our diverse, international community of staff and students provides a dynamic and engaging environment to gain the professional legal skills and political knowledge you need to change the world we live in.
Helping students to make career choices, understand the legal working world or to navigate the application process for both work and study.
for research quality in The Complete University Guide 2025.
A partnership between students, academics, solicitors and barristers providing free legal advice and representation to those unable to afford it.
Shape your degree outside of the classroom through our Politics and IR Society and Kent Model UN. Or get involved in any other of our 250+ societies!
Take part in co-curricular activities including lawyering skills modules in Mooting, Mock Trial Advocacy, and Negotiation.
The University will consider applications from students offering a wide range of qualifications. All applications are assessed on an individual basis but some of our typical requirements are listed below. Students offering qualifications not listed are welcome to contact our Admissions Team for further advice. Please also see our general entry requirements.
Law with a Foundation Year is an excellent conversion course for applicants who don't meet the academic requirements for direct entry but have shown academic ability in non-science subjects.
AAB
DDD
136 Tariff points from your IB Diploma, Typically H6, H6, H6 or equivalent
English Language at grade C/4
Pass the University of Kent International Foundation Programme.
The University will consider applicants holding T level qualifications in subjects closely aligned to the course.
Pass the Access to HE Diploma with 45 credits at level 3, of which 30 should be passed at Distinction, 12 at Merit, and 3 at Pass; or 33 at Distinction, 6 at Merit, and 6 at Pass.
The following modules are what students typically study, but this may change year to year in response to new developments and innovations.
What should a democracy look like? Can an unequal society be just? When is it legitimate to resist a government? By introducing you to debates regarding these foundational issues in political theory, this module will help you develop your knowledge of foundational ideas and thinkers. You'll also develop the ability to critically reflect upon, and construct arguments to defend, your own answers to crucial questions about the nature of politics.
Lectures introduce these ideas and provide opportunities for you to debate their significance. Workshops provide opportunities for you to become familiar with the reading, critically discuss its significance, and develop the writing skills required to successfully engage in arguments on political theory.
By the end of the module, you'll have developed knowledge of key concepts in political theory and gained experience of applying them in academic and non-academic contexts.
What are the institutions that make up the English legal system? Who are the participants in these institutions, and what are their roles? Do these institutions ensure that justice is done in individual cases?
You'll engage with a critical introduction to the main institutions of the English legal system. Explore how these structures and institutions are the result of historically contingent events, and what their limitations are. You'll also learn about legal method. Law, like other disciplines, has its own method which its practitioners apply in their working lives, for example constructing legal arguments based on the reading and interpretation of key texts and sources.
Throughout the module, you'll see how law is an interpretative exercise, and you'll be provided with key skills needed for your legal studies. This includes how to read, understand and summarise a legal case and Acts of Parliament, and how to conduct legal research. You'll complete the module with the fundamentals in legal method and legal skills you will be expected to know and build on for the rest of your degree.
What is law? What is its relationship with society? How does it operate? What is the source of its authority? The ‘common sense’ or ‘liberal’ view of law, often represented by legal institutions and legal actors, is that law is neutral, rational, objective, fair, and independent of political, economic or social imperatives.
In this module you'll learn about this fundamental liberal account of the nature of law. But you'll also learn about alternative ‘critical’ claims about law, which challenge this legal ‘common sense’ by highlighting its contexts, contradictions, omissions and limitations. These critical arguments step outside law’s own, internal viewpoint in order to reveal how its rules, procedures and enforcement are informed and shaped by relationships of power. The module introduces you to the critical legal approach, its methods and the foundational conceptual tools that will underpin your study of law at Kent.
What is the legal structure of the state in the United Kingdom? How is the power of the state encoded? What is the authority of government to act and what are the legal limits on those powers?
You'll gain an understanding of the fundamentals of public law, the key legal concepts deployed in this field and an insight into the procedural requirements that deliver accountability. Engaging in a critical introduction to the key features of the state, you'll learn about the legal powers government exercises. You'll also develop your ability to identify the key concepts of the constitution through your study and analysis of major constitutional cases, academic literature and parliamentary documents. Learning to interpret the open-ended nature of constitutional reasoning in an uncodified constitution, you'll also enhance your ability to critique the reasoning and conclusions of judgments in the cases that you analyse. This will equip you with an understanding of the mechanisms of legal accountability of public bodies and provide you with a repertoire of key legal concepts in the public law domain.
From commonplace, simple transactions, such as purchasing a bus ticket or a chocolate bar from a vending machine, to high-stakes commercial agreements, contracts govern countless interactions. You'll undertake a comprehensive study of the law of contract and its pervasive and essential role in our daily lives. You'll develop knowledge and understanding of the principles and theory of contract law and their application.
This module begins by introducing you to the law of contract, locating it within private law and looking at the historical development and its functions in the modern world. Thereafter, you'll explore the doctrine and problem-solving in contract law by considering the lifecycle of contracts, e.g., the formation of a contract, requirements for its enforceability, its terms and policing of bargaining behaviour, potential performance issues, its subsequent discharge, and remedies. You'll then focus on contract theory (e.g. freedom of contract and its limits), overlaying the doctrine studied with a basic theoretical framework and ground your understanding of contract law and contractual relationships.
Crime. It’s in the news. It’s on our screens. It’s happening all around us, sometimes to us, and sometimes by us. But what makes a crime a crime? As one of the foundations of legal knowledge, you'll master the core principles of criminal law and explore a range of offences tried in our courts on a daily basis. You'll be able to break down offences such as murder and theft into their constituent parts and apply them to an array of factual scenarios. You'll form the analytical skills necessary to advise parties on criminal liability and defences. While applying statutes and case law, you'll effectively communicate cogent arguments both orally and in writing. At the end of this module, you'll be able to evaluate the effectiveness of criminal law in the context of our criminal justice system as a whole and be equipped with the building blocks to analyse and evaluate any criminal offence.
What is property? What is the distinct character and effect of property rights compared to contractual and other personal rights? You'll be introduced to the nature of property generally, and then go on to focus on one particular form of property - ‘real’ property, or land, as distinguished from personal property. You'll examine the system of land registration in English law, and how this shapes the ability to enforce interests in land against others.
Various types of interests in land will be studied, to enable you to develop an in-depth understanding of English land law and an ability to apply your knowledge to legal problems relating to interests in land. You'll be encouraged to consider the politics of real property law and the impact of economic logics in this area of law. Exploring how property and land law shape relationships between people, you'll consider challenging subjects such as squatting, leases, and the financing of the family home.
What is equity? Does equity still have a role in modern law? What is a trust? How have trusts changed to meet changing social and economic needs? Do equitable doctrines and remedies and trusts law protect the vulnerable or protect the powerful?
Equity is a distinctive legal tradition in common law systems, with its own concepts, techniques, doctrines and remedies. You'll learn about the historical emergence of ‘equity’ rooted in the concept of ‘conscience’ and examine the fate of equity in the English legal system and other common law jurisdictions. You'll discover developments in equitable remedies concerned with remedying unconscionable conduct and abuses of power in private transactions, and the social, political and economic contexts of these developments. Arguably equity’s most important contribution is the trust. You'll learn the anatomy of the trust, how to create valid trusts, the obligations that trustees are subject to, and how these have changed to meet the evolving needs and desires of property owners and markets. In considering these transformations, you'll develop your ability to understand and critically assess the role of equity and trusts in contemporary law and society and reflect on the nature of private law.
How much power does the EU really have over its member states? When national interests and EU law clash, who should ultimately have the final say? You'll be introduced to EU law, by examining its foundational principles, key doctrines, and the institutions that shape its operation. In exploring the core aspects of EU law, you will gain a deeper understanding of:
Through analysing these substantive areas, you'll develop essential skills in applying legal principles, presenting complex arguments effectively, and evaluating the broader social, economic, and legal implications of EU law.
Global institutions and regimes have become increasingly important in a world facing problems that cross borders and require multilateral action. This module examines the institutions, norms, processes, actors, and consequences of global and regional governance across a range of issue areas. It further addresses a number of questions, including the extent to which cooperation is possible and multilateral governance effective, while examining the roles played by states, international organisations (such as the United Nations, or regional groupings such as the European Union or the Association of Southeast Asian Nations), international non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and other actors. Specific areas you may explore include security, human rights, the environment, and regional integration, amongst others. Building an understanding of these institutions is crucial is you want to launch your career at an NGO or similar organisation.
Approximately 75 percent of the world’s legal systems do not belong to the common law tradition but to the civil law tradition, which means that they were shaped not by English law but by Roman law, either directly (e.g.: France, Germany, Spain) or through colonisation (e.g.: Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico). Students aiming to operate on the international scene in whatever capacity are bound to come into contact with the civil law tradition.
You're introduced to the very different ways in which civil law governments, judges, lawyers and law professors think about the law. The materials and coursework are designed for those destined to spend time in a civil law jurisdiction, whether during a year abroad as part of your studies or in your future working life. It is also intended for students enrolling in the module out of an interest in foreign and/or comparative law.
How are work relationships regulated? You will gain a solid understanding of the principles of individual labour law as well as the importance of the employment relationship and the employment contract in the current social, political and economic context. As well as developing a detailed knowledge of fundamental aspects of labour law, you will be introduced to broader conceptual, critical and evaluative perspectives on the labour market and workplace regulation. You will integrate legal analysis and practical legal skills with a contextual and interdisciplinary understanding of debates around labour regulation. Key aspects of the modern employment relationship covered in the module will include the contract of employment (for example, its formation and its content, and the importance of employment status) and statutory employment protections (for example, unfair dismissal and redundancy protection regulations).
How is medical practice and decision-making influenced by bioethics, law and health policy? This module considers the legal regulation of medical practice in its ethical, socio-economic, and historical contexts. It draws on a range of critical, contextual, and interdisciplinary perspectives. You’ll learn about dominant traditions of bioethical theory and the major principles of medical law. Your knowledge and critical legal abilities will develop through discussions of ethical concepts and theories like consequentialism, virtue ethics, altruism, care ethics, deontology, justice, autonomy, beneficence, and non-maleficence. You’ll learn to critically analyse legal, social, and ethical tensions found in issues such as medical malpractice, consent to treatment and capacity, confidentiality, and clinical research. Module content will respond to changes in law, health policy and bioethics and to changes in health care services resulting from, for example, pandemics, NHS resourcing issues, national inquiries, and emerging clinical developments.
Addressing KLS in November 2021, the President of the UK Supreme Court, Lord Reed, identified jurisprudence as one of only three modules necessary for a future-proof law degree. Why? Because jurisprudence is immensely practical. It seeks to understand and consider the internal point of view of judges, practitioners and other legal actors, who want not predictions of the legal claims they will make, but arguments about what the law requires them to do and why. The subject matter is therefore not tort law, or contract, or crime, but law itself, seen from the inside, and located critically in historical and cultural context. In this way, Jurisprudence builds on and draws together all of the core modules, exploring the philosophical reasons why judges disagree within and across judgments. The grasp of the strikingly different and often hidden commitments jurisprudence reveals will benefit you in deeper understanding of your discipline and degree, in your ability to better comprehend legal materials, and in your production of more persuasive legal arguments in education and practice.
Justice is one of the most important concepts in legal and political thought, but what is justice and why does it matter? Is there just one type of justice? Is going to court the only or best option for achieving justice? You will tackle these questions and many more through an in-depth examination of the concept justice, exploring law’s ability and suitability to respond to issues of justice and reflecting on alternative ways of responding to injustice.
You will start by exploring theoretical accounts of justice, such as those by Rawls, Nielsen, Sandel and Nussbaum and different approaches such as corrective, distributive and restorative justice. You will then apply this theoretical foundation to a series of case studies that identify examples of injustice; critically evaluating possible responses such as court-based action, social justice movements, and restorative justice projects. You'll build on the critical examination of law and legal systems undertaken in your earlier studies and take these ideas further, offering a new method of critical study. Focusing on one concept, justice, allows a more detailed and in-depth examination of this fundamental legal concept, creating space for engagement with a wider variety of theoretical approaches to justice and the opportunity to develop stronger skills of critique essential for success in your degree.
Devoted entirely to developing your practical skill in argument, your engagement and practice in this module builds ability and understanding that will benefit you in successful legal professional practice - and across many other areas of employment and everyday activity. Despite frequent mention in educational and employment contexts (where the skill is often tested as part of an interview process), few graduates have received the formal training needed to present knowledgeable, winning argument consistently and with self-belief. You gain a critical edge, empowering you to engage in argument effectively in any situation, both by developing the skill of presenting a compelling case and by sharpening your awareness of when poor or underhand arguments are being used against you, enabling you to call these out wherever they arise. Requiring no previous knowledge of any area of law, you will develop expertise in strategy, logic, fallacy identification and rhetoric from the ground up, in the only pure skills module in the law curriculum.
From war, poverty and genocide to decolonisation, trade and climate change, an understanding of the fundamentals of international law is essential to anyone wishing to make sense of the biggest challenges our world is facing. You'll be led step-by-step through international law’s foundational principles, sources and institutions, as developed, demanded, violated and enforced by states and various non-state actors. The aim is to familiarise you with the distinctive logic of international law – a logic that underpins every one of its specific regimes (such as international humanitarian law, the law of the sea or international investment law) and conditions the response of states, international courts and multilateral institutions to the problems these regimes address. You’ll learn how to apply this logic, bringing international law to bear on real-world politics, economics and history. But we’ll also reverse this relationship, bringing politics, economics and history to bear on international law in order to contextualise and think more critically about a discipline whose benevolence often goes unquestioned. Is international law always ‘part of the solution’, or might it be implicated in the very problems it is called upon to solve?
Why study Animal Law? Animal Law is a fast-developing field of study, scholarship and practice. Studying one of only a few courses if its type currently offered at a UK law school, you'll be introduced to important domestic, European and international legal instruments governing the treatment of non-human animals. You are encouraged to critically assess key theories developed in moral philosophy and ethics that have been a source of inspiration for many animal rights lawyers. You will explore and discuss, through a range of concrete examples, the extent to which ethical, historical, socio-economic, political, religious and other factors have shaped the development of Animal Law in the UK and around the world.
Can justice only be delivered in a court room? Is justice delayed, justice denied? What is the alternative? With an increasing demand on our civil justice system to deliver timely and cost-effective justice, you will evaluate whether there is a more appropriate way of resolving disputes to limit some of the damage caused by choosing only to litigate. You will master the core principles of appropriate dispute resolution (ADR) and using case law, identify how shifting judicial attitudes have led to an alternative to the court room. You will explore how ADR informs our understanding of broader themes of justice and learn how to advise a client as to the merits of ADR. By the end of this module, you will also develop the necessary practical skills to analyse and resolve a dispute through an understanding of various alternative dispute resolution processes such as mediation and negotiation before learning how to conduct a successful arbitration.
Can juries understand complex scientific evidence? A new technique for matching ear prints is developed - who decides when this new technique is sufficiently reliable to be used in court – scientists or judges? Does the CSI Effect really exist?
You will be examining these questions and more during the term, considering how criminal law makes use of science during the trial process. Forensic evidence is a rapidly developing area, new techniques such as digital biometric data are increasingly presented as evidence. This rapid expansion from fingerprints to DNA through to digital data has resulted in forensic evidence becoming increasingly debated in both the media and by the courts – from articles hailing DNA profiling as uncovering miscarriages of justice to those questioning a jury’s ability to understand highly complex scientific evidence.
You will critically investigate how different forms of forensic evidence are used, the reliability of scientific techniques, and their value and place within the criminal justice system. We will develop these ideas through engaging with contemporary issues of forensic evidence, placing them within the wider social and transnational context. This has included studies of the use of facial recognition technology, the idea of the CSI Effect, probabilities in a legal context, and sharing evidence across jurisdictions.
Explore the politics of the global climate crisis at the international, national and local level. Whether it is global climate change governance, national or local climate adaptation policy making and plans, or individual attitudes and behaviour, we need to understand what motivates actors and how a combination of motivations and structure translate into climate action in various contexts and societies. You'll gain the tools to explain the politics of the global climate crisis at the international, national and local level. You'll draw from a variety of debates from political science, international relations, human geography and urban studies. In addition to an overview of key policy documents driving the discourse, you'll explore interdisciplinary theorisations across the social and natural sciences that help rethink the arguments in renewed ways. This includes the critical role of cities and an understanding of how key concepts such as the Anthropocene and adaptation and mitigation shape the global climate emergency agenda.
Why did a diverse group of states embark on a process that has led to the world’s most extensive example of international integration, the European Union? Since its inception the European Union has grappled with changes in global politics as well as economic and political challenges, many of these multiplying in recent years. There has never been a more important and interesting time to learn about the EU and its politics. You'll learn and understand how the European Union has reached where it is today, how its political system works, how it makes policy, its strengths and weaknesses and how it has been driven by the politics and economics of its member states as well as its place in the international system. In exploring these elements, you'll develop your own answers to the questions of why states pursue cooperation and integration at the European level and what the EU’s future might be.
What is democracy? How can it be measured? Is populism a threat to democracy? Is democracy likely to survive? You'll consider these questions by first exploring the nature of democracy as a form of government and reviewing the way it has been conceptualised and measured across countries and over time. Review how and why some countries have become democratic while other have not and what factors can explain variation between countries. Assess to what extent democracy is under threat, the nature of threats such as populism, their roots and how they could be countered. Conclude by trying to predict its likely trajectory in the foreseeable future. You'll gain an analysis of the past, present,and future of democracy and its significance in contemporary politics.
With the world's largest economy and most powerful armed forces, the United States sets the world stage. Yet, according to many critics, the US’s own political system is in crisis and turmoil, polarised on hot-button culture issues but also witnessing an attack on democracy itself by an ex-president and his loyal acolytes. Trump challenged both our notions of who could be elected to the most powerful job and our long-established theories about how the US government can and should work and Biden has struggled to make significant legislative reforms in the face of implacable Republican opposition in Congress.
The US, like many other nations, faces serious public policy questions on the economy, health, energy, education, guns, crime, poverty and immigration, among others, but can its seemingly dysfunctional political system rise to the challenge? You'll take a critical look at US politics and formulate your own answer to this and other questions through this comprehensive introduction to the politics and government of the United States.
How should the relationship between economic forces and world politics be understood? This module explores change and continuity in the world economy and gives you the tools to understand the nature of the link between economics and international relations. Through the lens of political economy, which pertains to the complex relationships between society, the state and the market, you'll debate and analyse the economic dimensions of contemporary international relations.
Major themes of the module include: governance; globalisation; institutions; interdependence; power; conflict; cooperation; hegemony; and crisis. Specific content may shift year-to-year depending on current events, possibly covering: trade; development; poverty; global health; the financial sector; foreign investment; hunger; the energy sector; climate change; and the relationship between political economy and conflict. Across these topics, you will critically examine the interests, relationships and conflicts of individual actors in the global political economy. This allows you to better to economic issues on a national stage into an international context, so you are better able to asses situations with all of the contributing factors to them, giving you the insight to find solutions.
What dynamics shape foreign policy, and how does foreign policy shape international relations? You’ll examine the foreign policies of nation-states and in doing so learn how to study foreign policy in a rapidly changing international environment. Investigate the dynamics of foreign policymaking in the context of major events and crises in international politics. Specific case studies will vary from year to year, but are likely to cover issues of diplomacy, war and security, economic competition, and institutional cooperation.
You'll gain insight into the complex relationship between the analysis and practice of foreign policy. Cases are explored via different international actors (including states but also examining the role of specific leaders), the foreign policy environments they inhabit (internal and external, structural and institutional), and the motivations that inform policymakers’ actions and interactions. You’ll compare and contrast different theories, enabling you to critically assess your advantages and weaknesses by applying them to real world examples. This application of your knowledge and skills demonstrates to employers that you are able to take complex theory and put it into practice, a valuable skill in a fast paced, ever changing international landscape.
What does the modern state look like? How has the legitimacy of the state, as an institution, been justified in the history of political thought? How have ideas shaped and influenced revolutionary movements? How have revolutions in turn shaped the thinking of those who lived through them? When are revolutions ever justified?
By critically analysing the key thinkers and texts in the history of political thought, you’ll gain the key tools needed to think through two of the most important forces that have shaped modern politics: the rise of the state, and the revolutions that followed it. This allows you to better understand the process that has led to the nation states of today, and explore the question as to what will happen next, will revolutions and their ideals 'wither away'? Or is there another stage to come?
What does it mean to say that someone is ‘negligent’? How do you know when liability for negligence arises? You'll explore in depth tort law’s most important tort: the tort of negligence, looking at its specific elements and legal concepts related to it. You'll develop proficiency in the use of case law-based arguments as a way of determining liability in tort. Through an in-depth focus on modern decided cases you will:
You'll also consider the role played by statutes in tortious liability, including in defences to tort claims, and the liability of occupiers of land, manufacturers and/or publishers. You'll learn how tort protects interests in land and the person.
Explore the relationship between tort law and its social context to explain its shape and contemporary debates about its scope. By observing where the lines of liability are currently drawn, you'll consider what this reveals about private rights and obligations, the balance between responsibility for harm and freedom of action, and access to justice.
Negotiations are essential in building and sustaining international cooperation and peace. You'll gain a comprehensive understanding of negotiation concepts and the practical skills essential for effective negotiation in professional and personal contexts. Through a combination of theoretical insights, case studies, and interactive exercises, you'll explore key negotiation theories, strategies and techniques. These include bargaining strategies, power dynamics, communication skills, and ethical considerations.
You'll engage in simulated negotiation scenarios to apply theoretical concepts in practice, honing your negotiation skills and developing your ability to analyse and navigate complex negotiation situations. By the end of the module, you'll have gained valuable insights into negotiation theory and acquired practical negotiation skills that are applicable across a wide range of fields and industries.
How does property law respond to new forms and conceptions of property in contemporary society? What do those responses say about property as a legal institution, and the role of power? Building on Property Law you'll look at property in its many different forms. You will be encouraged to question the common-sense understanding of property as privately owned 'things’, which the law merely recognises and protects. You will explore the active, constructive and political role of law in constituting the relationships which make up property in particular historical, philosophical and/or cultural contexts. Each week, you will engage with case studies and theoretical readings from a wide range of topics, such as: claims of ownership of human bodies and bodily materials; the contribution of property law to racialisation and the formation of social identities; the role of property interests in both exacerbating and responding to climate change; and emerging categories of property, including data derived from social media use. By examining how property law responds to developments and innovations in contemporary society, you'll will provide you with the critical thinking skills required for reflective and creative professional practice.
Your lecturers go on strike. Junior doctors stage a walkout. Do they have a legal right to do so? Why? You'll focus on the legal framework on collective bargaining and the right to strike. The Equality Act 2010 provides a legal framework that seeks to protect people from discrimination, including in the workplace. You'll consider how anti-discrimination legislation shapes the employment relationship. You will develop a detailed knowledge of key aspects of collective labour law and anti-discrimination legislation. Develop your capacity to integrate legal analysis and practical legal skills with a contextual and interdisciplinary understanding of human rights and equality regulation at work. You will examine freedom of association, a central feature of human rights and selected aspects of collective labour law such as the role and status of trade unions, the legal regulation of collective bargaining and the regulation of industrial conflict. You will study anti-discrimination legislation, particularly the Equality Act 2010, related to areas such as sex, ethnic origin, disability, sexual orientation, religion or belief and age, as well as provisions for reconciling work and family life, such as pregnancy protection and parental leave.
What is the purpose of banking law? Why are banks subject to distinct forms of regulatory supervision? You will learn about UK banking law and about the broader social, economic, and political issues and controversies that have surrounded banking in the years since the Global Financial Crisis of 2008. You will appraise and analyse the role of banks in money creation. You will explore the relationship between banks and the UK’s banking regulators, including the Bank of England. You will learn about the bank-customer relationship, the role of banks in the payments system and the anti-money laundering regime with which banks must comply. You will explore the lending of money by banks to their customers and the security taken for the loans granted. Throughout this module, you will be encouraged to consider and evaluate the tensions and controversies that banks and banking regulators face as they pursue their sometimes complementary, sometimes conflicting objectives.
How and why do states use law to regulate international trade and investment? How can international economic disputes be resolved? What are the implications for corporations and individuals? How have the answers to these questions changed over time?
You'll use a critical sociolegal approach to systematically explore the legal texts, social contexts and moral subtexts that make up international economic law. Focus is on trade and investment as two core economic activities, on multinational corporations and states as key actors and on regulatory systems such as contracts and treaties, including treaty-based international organisations such as the World Trade Organisation. You will explore the interplay between economic principles and international law principles, in times of calm and in times of crisis. You will engage with podcasts and films to bring to life multiple perspectives from, for example, the public, private, and third sectors; the relatively poor and relatively rich; and from local, national, regional and global levels.
When you bake a cake, you need a list of ingredients and a recipe. Imagine the adversarial trial is a cake. If the substantive law provides the ingredients, then it is the law of evidence that provides the recipe and teaches you how to bake.
You will be asked to think like a lawyer. You will develop skills in inferential reasoning and apply them to various scenarios. You will be able to assess whether certain pieces of evidence have relevance, sufficient weight and probative value that outweighs prejudicial effect. You will be able to apply various exclusionary rules and discretions, whilst also critically examining these rules in their social and political contexts.
Armed with the knowledge and skills obtained in this module, you will be in a great position not only to undertake the first steps towards qualifying as a barrister or solicitor, but also have the skills to be able logically and coherently analyse, reason and argue in all sorts of other contexts. The law of evidence is a compulsory subject for both the SQE and BSB (Bar Standards Board) Central examinations.
What other topic in the study of law can boast of being as inevitable as death? Tax law pervades the world of business and also has a major impact on decisions taken in the private sphere. It is highly political, having vastly greater redistributive effects than almost any other direct exercise of the power of the state. But it is not about numbers or computations. It is about questions of legal doctrine, the structure and meaning of people's dealings with each other and (putting the two together, as with other areas of law) the application of the law to the facts.
You will become familiar with several major topics in tax law, such as the taxation of business profits, the taxation of employment income, the taxation of capital gains and VAT. You will explore important questions of principle and you will consider the policy debates that arise from them. Underpinning it all it, you will acquire some of the insights that the study of tax law provides into the seemingly unending three-way struggle between human populations, privately held wealth and the coercive power of the state.
How does law institute and regulate material spaces? How do spatial configurations intersect with law? In this interdisciplinary module you will examine how the understanding of law, regulation and policy can be improved by studying the spaces and spatial orders that the law institutes and regulates, as well as the ways in which spatial configurations generate materialisations of and resistances to law. You'll draw from urban planning, urban law, architecture, urban governance, socio-legal and critical legal studies, legal geography, and spatial approaches across disciplines.
Case studies may include: prisons, ghettos, slums, social housing, homelessness, refugee camps, immigration detention facilities, modern, future, utopian cities, street art, activism and occupations, digital and virtual spaces, ecocide and the protection of oceans, coastlines, and forests, the availability and uses of public spaces and non-western cultures of spatial relations. Drawing on contemporary events and examples and methods from the social sciences and the humanities you will be introduced to dominant paradigms of understanding the intersection of law, space and power, and consider ways in which they can be challenged.
We live in an era when legal decision-making seems both increasingly influenced and increasingly challenged, by science and technology. How can we make sense of the relationships between law and the fast-changing world of science and technology? How do we pay attention to the risks, inequalities, and injustices that may be produced when states uncritically use new technologies, or fail to acknowledge the inherent limitations, or blind spots, of global scientific knowledge? You'll be introduced to several interrelated fields including law, socio-legal studies, Science and Technology Studies (STS), anthropology and sociology, to think about these questions. You will critically engage with contemporary examples such as public health regulations; climate change; law and scientific expertise; the regulation of reproductive technologies; science in the courtroom; and the use of technologies in legal decision-making. You will use the literature to not only frame debates but to find ways of challenging the dominant paradigms through which the relationship between law and scientific knowledge tends to be understood. Cross-cutting themes for the module will include: legal decision-making and scientific uncertainty; the role of expertise in legal decision-making; the interface between law, power and technoscience; notions of objectivity and truth both in law and science; global science, postcolonialism and global inequalities.
The day you have been dreading for two years has arrived. You always knew that you would have to go to court and tell them what happened. You’re scared, you’re young, you have a disability and you can’t communicate well. You are vulnerable. How will the court hear your evidence? Will the cross-examination be ‘like a wounded animal being tortured in court’? Who are you? Are you the victim or are you the defendant?
You will examine what it means to be a vulnerable person in the criminal trial. You will critically evaluate the laws and processes that exist to help vulnerable witnesses give the best evidence they can. You will appraise the role of different stakeholders, whether that be the defence advocate cross-examining, the judge ruling in a ‘ground rules’ hearing or an intermediary advising the court on what measures a witness or defendant needs.
You will consider the debates surrounding rape myths and sexual offence trial reforms. You will gain an understanding of how young offenders are treated in the criminal justice system, and whether their vulnerabilities are taken into account. You will examine these debates from a range of different perspectives.
What is privacy? Why does it matter and how can we protect it? How can data be protected in a digital era where everything seems to be shared? You will focus on answering these questions and more through looking at the way the law defines and constructs privacy, cybersecurity threats, and digital surveillance in the UK, EU and elsewhere and how the law regulates data protection, freedom of information, and consent for digital and personal information collection. This will allow you to explore rapidly changing privacy and data protection issues including the ‘right to be forgotten’, the Internet of Things (IoT), AI, cybersecurity law post-Snowden and how we approach developments in digital surveillance such as facial recognition technology (FRT) and the use of AI.
You will be asked to critically examine whether privacy protection laws, consent, and confidentiality measures are fit for purpose. You will engage in critical analysis of how personal, health, and economic transactional data are managed, who has access to this information, and for what purposes. This is placed within the broader context of the digital and cyber landscape, considering hacking and transnational cybercrimes. You will be required to assess emerging legal, regulatory, data protection and personal privacy issues raised by widespread access to personal information, responding to changes in data protection law and changes in the cyber landscape.
Privacy, Data Protection and Cyber Law raised detailed questions which you have the opportunity to explore. These may include questions such as: Is privacy furthered or reduced by developments in AI and the metaverse? Who benefits from data generated in smart homes and how and where is it regulated?
You will build on the understanding developed in Privacy, Data Protection and Cybersecurity Law, which introduces you to the key concepts and issues in the regulatory framework governing privacy, data protection and developments in cyber-crime and cyber security. You will engage in far more in-depth, critical enquiry and insight in the subject area using current issues and case studies as a platform for developing more specialist knowledge and ideas.
You will be adopting a research and scholarship led approach allowing you to make a more tightly focused analysis of emerging current issues in the area of data and cyber law than is possible in the earlier Privacy, Data Protection and Cybersecurity Law module.
The specific topics considered will be revised annually to engage with current issues in data protection and cyber law, for example transnational cyber crime, developments in AI and data in a world of constantly emerging technology.
What is the interrelationship between political theory and law in our times? Drawing upon a broad range of political theory, you will explore key concepts of political relevance to law, such as: sovereignty, power, community, the subject and resistance. You will build a solid understanding of political theory in relation to these key concepts and then use this understanding to examine contemporary political and juridical questions, such as those of: democracy and citizenship, multiculturalism, bio-politics, secularism, terrorism, post-colonialism and contemporary formations of Empire. In so doing, you will gain the intellectual tools necessary to apply insights from political theory and philosophy to the study of law and its relevant problems.
Why is music as an art form controlled and occasionally criminalised by the state? What are the potential implications for artistic expression and cultural freedom within society? You will approach the relationship between music and law from two main points of view: one theoretical, and the other critical and sociological. You will first explore how music and the soundscape have been theorised as a specific legal and political problem in the field of Law and the Humanities. Drawing on these theoretical principles, you will go on to examine state intervention in censoring or controlling music and the attempt at criminalising specific genres of music. A specific focus will be the use of rap music in criminal trials in the UK and US, and the use of lawsuits as a weapon to criminalise heavy metal bands.
Millions of people have been forced to cross the borders of their home state and seek asylum. How do legal systems (national and international) provide or deny protection to asylum seekers and refugees and why? In this module you will engage critically with the matter of asylum and refugeehood in both a national and international context. You will be introduced to the sources of asylum and refugee law and a critical consideration of the relevant case law in the UK and internationally. You will employ interdisciplinary material to aid understanding and reflection on the historical and socio-cultural evolution of the governance and regulation of asylum and refugee subjects. In addition, you will devote critical attention to key contemporary problems in asylum and refugee law, and refugee studies more broadly, including current national and international developments and scholarly and practitioner reflections in the field.
You'll have already considered questions about the applicability of bioethical theories and concepts to legal decision-making and health care policy in your studies. Now you have the opportunity to explore and deepen your knowledge and critical legal abilities by exploring further questions such as how advances in genetic medicine challenge assisted reproductive regulation and the delivery of personalised medicine and whether social and ethical values about assisted dying, abortion, and public versus private medicine should be drivers for legal and regulatory change. You will build on the understanding developed in Law and Medical Ethics. You will engage in more in-depth and critical enquiry and will gain greater insight into bioethical, clinical, and legal tensions by examining current issues, regulatory developments, and case studies as a platform for developing specialist knowledge, ideas, and awareness. You will be adopting a research and scholarship led approach allowing you to make a more sustained, critical, and directed analysis of emerging issues in bioethics, health policy and medical law, such as pandemics, developments in genetics, xenotransplantation and the effects of ableism and structural racism.
When is a wedding a legal marriage? How does the law define domestic abuse? When can the state remove children from their parents’ care? Why is someone considered a legal parent in the first place?
You will consider these questions and more by learning about how law interacts with important aspects of personal life in the legal construction of families and responses to family problems. English family law is an exciting and fast-paced area of law. Many issues have undergone significant reform in recent years (marriage, civil partnerships, domestic abuse, child protection, adoption, divorce, child arrangements) and/or are currently the subject of major debates or reform proposals (cohabitation, weddings law, surrogacy, financial separation, child arrangements – again!). You will not only learn about what the law is, but also examine its underpinning policies and the socio-political context in which it operates.
Recurring themes and concepts will run throughout, such as the role of state intervention versus private ordering; individual or family autonomy; equality, rights and responsibilities within families; the priority and meaning given to child welfare; and strong norms and expectations attaching to gender, biology and heterosexual relationships. The extent to which English family law is inclusive of minority or disadvantaged groups in society will also be examined.
Many of the political ideas we take to be the most important were developed in early modern, or even ancient periods. Can concepts like democracy, liberty and justice help us understand the distinct political problems posed by issues such as global warming, artificial intelligence, or decolonisation?
You’re introduced to a range of cutting edge issues within political theory, and your ability to use theory to respond to pressing political issues is developed. You’ll explore how political theorists are conceptualising contemporary political questions and shaping the way that we are responding to them. In doing so you will gain knowledge of contemporary political thought and develop your ability to understand how theorists make sense of rapidly changing circumstances in politics. You’ll become familiar with advanced work at the forefront of the discipline of political theory, while being encouraged to consider how these ideas might be applied and communicated in non-academic contexts. This development of critical insight and the knowledge on how to apply it is crucial as you step into a career focused on finding solutions to contemporary problems.
Advanced democracies face a range of policy challenges that need to be dealt with to ensure prosperity, sustainability, civic engagement and the effective operation of the political system. Analyse the current policy challenges facing Britain, and explore what solutions might be implemented to address these challenges.
You’ll consider a range of different pressure-points facing the country, which might include issues around territorial governance (eg. the integrity of the UK; the UK’s place in the international system), complex policy issues (eg. environmental protection; economic fairness) and patterns of citizen behaviour (eg. levels of political engagement). For each pressure-point, you’ll explore the nature of the policy challenge, identifying potential policy solutions and assessing the costs and benefits associated with these solutions. Through coverage and assessment, you’ll enhance your ability to identify, analyse and solve complex policy problems facing British politics today.
In democratic systems, policy decisions are supposed to reflect citizens’ opinions or preferences. The nature of public beliefs is thus a central concern of policy-makers and a focus for political analysis. Yet what are citizen opinions and how are they formed? The democratic ideal sees expressions of public opinion as reflecting citizens’ true preferences and a ‘rational’ processing of information. Yet people’s opinions may not meet these ideals. Instead, individual opinions may be shaped by a range of external influences, and information may be interpreted in a selective and one-sided manner.
If so, this raises questions about whether people’s opinions can be manipulated, and suggests the presence of biased beliefs and potentially of misinformation. Public debate in countries like Britain and the US shows many signs of belief manipulation, partisan biases and misinformation. You’ll explore why public discourse might suffer from these problems and what might be done to overcome them. In doing so, you’ll grow your understanding of the role of citizens in contemporary democratic systems, and enhance your evaluative and analytical skills.
Dictatorships are rising around the world. According to the Varieties of Democracy Institute, in 2022 just over one quarter of the world’s population were living in a full democracy, a number that has fallen dramatically in the 21st century. But what is dictatorship, autocracy, authoritarianism?
You will analyse the different forms that non-democratic rule takes and will examine the rise of these kinds of regimes and their leaders, as well as the support and the resistance of their citizens. Explore how dictatorships persist, why they fall, and the role of the international community. You’ll use case studies of dictatorship from China to Iraq, and draw on films, documentaries, books, and cutting-edge political science studies. With the rise of dictatorships, your understanding of them will help you work across the globe in politics or international relations, and your experience will be increasingly relevant and valuable to employers.
What does the future look like? Who is it for? What do emerging technologies, such as social media, artificial intelligence, and changes in working conditions mean for the future of political institutions?
Many texts of literature and political theory - from dystopia, to utopia - make claims about what the future will look like, even if speculatively. You’ll be introduced to recent developments in political theory, utopian and dystopian literature and science fiction which have made claims about the future, developing your ability to think critically about these claims, and allowing you to creatively consider how political thought might help us understand the relationship between the past, present and future of political events.
How does who we are influence how we understand and engage with politics? Is identity always political? Should political decision making take our identities into account? Evaluate contemporary debates about identity politics, and develop your own responses to these and other questions.
You will explore scholarly literature on identity politics as well as certain key texts from a range of approaches that explore the significance of identity with the field of Politics and International Relations. Bringing these together, you will then be able to assess how these traditions may inform contemporary debates about ‘who we think we are’ while also investigate ways in which we may think about ourselves at the limits of, or even outside of, those traditions.
You will be encouraged to apply this material in two ways: as a framework for reflecting upon your own identity and as a way of critically understanding how or if we should judge the identity of others. You’ll develop your knowledge of identity politics and the relationship between them with a view to being able to apply these to your own sense of identity in relation to other people. This makes you a far better communicator across issues where identity is key, allowing you to help bring new solutions to these problems and drive positive change.
How can we understand the Middle East? Why have states in the region experienced conflict and instability? Should the solution to violence come from outside the region, or can problems only be resolved from the inside? You’ll answer these questions through understanding of the societies, cultures, spaces and political systems of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), with their diversity, histories and complexities.
You’ll explore different themes related to MENA politics, using different states and societies from the region as case studies. Gain insights into the root causes of conflicts; the persistence of authoritarian regimes; the rise of youth protest movements; tradition versus modernity; and urbanism versus periphery. An interdisciplinary approach is applied to the study of the region, bringing in insights and methods from politics, geography and anthropology. You’ll take a comparative approach, placing the MENA region in a broader context and applying lessons from other parts of the world to better understand the region. Your ability to study the region and put it in the context of the rest of the world and across different disciplines and approaches demonstrates to employers that you are able to make critical insights to a wide range of issues and offer new insights and solutions to enduring problems and questions.
The Indo-Pacific is arguably the world’s most economically and politically dynamic region. But despite nuclear, territorial, and historical tensions, growing superpower competition, and cross-border threats from crime to the environment, the region has remained relatively peaceful and stable since 1945.
You'll seek to understand the most urgent security issues in the Indo-Pacific region and develop the knowledge and skills to provide nuanced and concise policy advice on them. You’ll begin by exploring the puzzle of the region’s stability by practically applying lessons from international relations theories and analyse what rising US-China competition means for regional states and the future of the region. Move on to analyse three key security challenges in the region in depth: the risk of war over the Taiwan Straits; nuclear proliferation on the Korean peninsula; and territorial disputes in the South China Sea. You’ll develop skills delivering policy advice about these challenges through group exercises about hypothetical and real-life crises, as well as developing your own written policy memos and briefings. This experience helps you demonstrate to a wide range of employers that you not only have knowledge of international relations, but that you also have the skills to apply that knowledge and find solutions to emerging problems.
Politics and International Relations is a fast moving, dynamic field of study. You’ll gain the opportunity to work at the cutting edge of the discipline by studying emerging issues and problems. Learning is structured around a topic or topics that draw on current research from one or more of the school’s main, informal pathways: behaviour and institutions, the world, and political ideas.
You’ll be encouraged to take a lead in your own learning by making sense of issues which are either not fully understood, under dispute, or that have unclear significance. In doing so you will establish yourself as a critical independent learner who can engage with emerging issues within the field. Being at the forefront of new developing problems gives you the ability to explore new urgent issues in future. This adaptability and critical insight makes you stand out to employers and opens the door to a wide range of careers.
Kent Law School emphasises research-led teaching, which means that the modules taught are at the leading edge of new legal and policy developments.
Through diverse and timely assessments tailored to each course level, we aim to support the development and demonstration of legal knowledge, critical approaches, and both general and legal skills. Our progressive assessment approach builds and connects knowledge, providing constructive and timely feedback to enhance student learning throughout the course.
For a student studying full time, each academic year of the programme will comprise 1200 learning hours which include both direct contact hours and private study hours. The precise breakdown of hours will be subject dependent and will vary according to modules.
Methods of assessment will vary according to subject specialism and individual modules.
Please refer to the individual module details under Course Structure.
For course aims and learning outcomes, including for Joint Honours courses and for Law with a Foundation Year, please see the course specification.
The University has an excellent employment record, with Kent Law School graduates commanding some of the highest starting salaries in the UK. Law graduates can go into a variety of careers, including:
Through your study of politics you will gain the confidence and skills in areas such as negotiation, leadership and analysis to kickstart a career in any field, be the difference you want to see in politics and effect change in the places you want to see it.
Unique, inspiring, progressive – Kent is a place that makes you want to be better.
*The Government announced on 4 November 2024 that tuition fees in England for Home students will increase to £9,535 from £9,250 for the academic year 2025/26. This increase requires Parliamentary approval, which is expected to be given in early/mid 2025.
Tuition fees may be increased in the second and subsequent years of your course. Detailed information on possible future increases in tuition fees is contained in the Tuition Fees Increase Policy.
The University will assess your fee status as part of the application process. If you are uncertain about your fee status you may wish to seek advice from UKCISA before applying.
For details of when and how to pay fees and charges, please see our Student Finance Guide.
Students will require regular access to a desktop computer/laptop with an internet connection to use the University of Kent’s online resources and systems. Please see information about the minimum computer requirements for study.
Students may be required to visit a local court as part of their studies. Costs (if any) would relate to travel to and from a local court.
Find out more about accommodation and living costs, plus general additional costs that you may pay when studying at Kent.
Kent offers generous financial support schemes to assist eligible undergraduate students during their studies. See our funding page for more details.
We have a range of subject-specific awards and scholarships for academic, sporting and musical achievement.
Next steps
Any applicant to Law (this includes all Law courses, including all joint courses) who is currently studying or has previously studied law at university level, even if the qualification was only partly completed or is incomplete, must state this clearly in the qualifications section of the UCAS form, and provide transcripts detailing this study direct to the University where available.
If you are from the UK or Ireland, you must apply for this course through UCAS. If you are not from the UK or Ireland, you can choose to apply through UCAS or directly on our website.
We welcome applications from students all around the world with a wide range of international qualifications.
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