Gareth Davies

Board member

Biography by Gareth Davies

My research has mostly been on constitutional aspects of the EU and on the Court of Justice but is increasingly on questions of methods in European legal research. I am also one of the editors of European Papers.

While a doctrinal lawyer by training, many years of working on projects with empirical political scientists have changed how I look at the EU and law, made me realise the enormous possibilities of co-operation between those with different methodological backgrounds. At its best, the combination of doctrinal and empirical expertise opens doors that neither can pass through on their own.

I am now fascinated by the way that empirical research is changing the way lawyers approach their subject, and by the different roles that empirical research – of all kinds – is being given in the legal world. I think that ELS can be a disruptive force, in a positive sense, forcing both traditional lawyers and empirical researchers to re-examine their assumptions and refresh their fields. One of my ambitions is to encourage critical and constructive dialogue between researchers of different methodologies, while in education I would like to see lawyers far more exposed to the insights of empirical science, something that I try to do in my own teaching.