Home
About TJI
Events
Mary O’Rawe
Mary graduated in 1990 with a first class honours degree in English and French Law from the University of Kent. She completed an LLM in Human Rights, Emergency Law and Discrimination at Queen’s University Belfast, before taking up practice at the Bar in Northern Ireland and, later, a lectureship at the University of Ulster. Mary is a long time member and former chair of the Committee on the Administration of Justice, and co-founder of the Northern Ireland Lawyers’ Section of Amnesty International. Over the past 15 years she has researched extensively in the field of criminal justice and human rights, with her current focus being on policing in societies in transition. Since 1999 she has acted as human rights consultant to An Garda Siochâna and currently sits on the National Strategic Human Rights Advisory Committee advising the Commissioner on human rights compliance. Mary has also acted as advisor to various international initiatives looking at policing, and as a consultant to the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, among other bodies. Mary is currently Senior Lecturer at the TJI where she has had responsibility for the development of a new LLM in Human Rights Law.
Research Interests
Mary’s current research examines policing in transitional societies – what policing means in these contexts, and how what happens in respect of policing reform impacts on the broader peace-building project. Her work draws on international experience and human rights norms, bringing these to bear on developments in Northern Ireland, and elsewhere. Through a focus on the Patten process and its outworkings over the past decade, her concern has been to advance lessons for any society where policing and state legitimacy have been contested. To this end, she has charted the development of new accountability structures such as the Police Ombudsman for Northern Ireland, and considered issues around police training and human rights education. Ongoing work is concerned with truth recovery relating to past police human rights abuses. She is also considering the potential impact of the recently established police Historical Enquiries Team set up to revisit over two thousand unsolved conflict-related murders. Her research will form the subject matter of a book on Northern Ireland’s policing transition. This will road-map human rights considerations necessary for any jurisdiction undertaking structural change in its policing arrangements, and point to the need for policing transformation rather than the reform of one or two institutions.Publications
| Books |
| Human Rights on Duty - Principles for Better Policing: International Lessons for Northern Ireland. Belfast: CAJ, 1997. (co-author with L Moore) |
| Peer Reviewed Articles |
| "Human Rights and Police Training in Transitional Societies: Exporting the Lessons from Northern Ireland." 27(3) Human Rights Quarterly (2005). |
| "Transitional Policing Arrangements in Northern Ireland: The Can't and Won't of the Change Dialectic." 26(4) Fordham International Law Journal (2003): 1015-73. |
| Book Chapters/Other Articles |
| "International Lessons for the Transformation of Policing in Northern Ireland." 2(4) International Journal of Human Rights (1998): 66-86 (co-author). |
| "Police Complaints in Northern Ireland." In Civil Liberties in Northern Ireland, edited by Brice Dickson and M O'Brien. Belfast: CAJ, 2003. |
| "A New Beginning for Policing in Northern Ireland?" In Human Rights, Equality and Democratic Renewal in Northern Ireland, edited by Colin Harvey, (co-authored with Dr Linda Moore). Oxford: Hart, 2001 (co author with L Moore). |
| "Accountability and Police Complaints in Northern Ireland: Leaving the Past Behind?" In Civilian Oversight of Policing: Governance, Democracy and Human Rights, edited by A Goldsmith and C. Lewis, Oxford: Hart, 2000 (co author with L Moore). |
| "The United Nations: Structure Versus Substance - Lessons from the Principal Treaties and Covenants." In Human Rights - an Agenda for the 21st Century, edited by A Hegarty and S Leonard: Cavendish, 1999. |
| "Human Rights." In Human Rights: Looking through the Violence, edited by B Heatherington. London: Peace Pledge Union, 1992. |
| Reports |
| "Justice and Human Rights." In Recognition and Reckoning: The Way Ahead on Victims' Issues, edited by B Hamber and R Wilson. Belfast: Democratic Dialogue, 2003. |
| "Human Rights in Police Training: Report 4 - Course for All." Belfast: Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, 2004. (co-author). |