Dr. David Prendergast

Dr David Prendergast is the Law School's Director of Postgraduate Teaching and Learning. He researches and teaches in jurisprudence (legal philosophy) and criminal law. David co-founded the Irish Jurisprudence Society and is a former co-editor of the Dublin University Law Journal and the Criminal Law and Practice Review. He received a Trinity Provost's Teaching Award (Early Career) in 2014. David's PhD provided a qualified defence of judicial review of electoral processes. His journal articles on substantive criminal law have been influential and cited in numerous academic texts and in judgments of the superior courts of Ireland. Current research involves investigating the structure of criminal liability, culpability, and criminal law defences. David has an LL.B. (First class) from Trinity College Dublin, an LL.M. (Distinction) from University College London and is a qualified, non-practising barrister. He worked as a legal researcher for the Law Reform Commission and was formerly Pathways to Law Liaison Officer with Trinity Access Programmes. He was formerly Director of Undergraduate Teaching and Learning and Deputy LLM Director in the Law School and is currently Director of Postgraduate Teaching and Learning.

  Constitutional law   Criminal law   criminal law theory   Jurisprudence   philosophy of criminal law

Research interests: I am interested in legal theory, broadly conceived. By legal theory I mean the sustained reflection on, investigation of, and creative analysis of how law works, its distinctive contribution as a normative order that overlaps and links with other normative orders such as morality. Criminal law constitutes a primary focus for this theoretical reflection on law because it displays both transposition of moral norms as well as artificial regulatory norms. My research seeks to contribute to accurate description and deepened understanding; published papers to date have done so for criminal defences, strict liability, Mens Rea and culpability, legality, elements of criminal liability. I have also worked substantially on constitutional law and theory where it concerns the control of substantive criminal law and in other areas including judicial review and electoral processes. As a legal theorist I maintain sustained reading in general jurisprudence. My research interest is interdisciplinary between law and philosophy. As to the value and direction of this research: There is a dual purpose and contribution running through my published works: (1) developing legal theory's conceptualisations and distinctions and thus contributing to the academic literature where my writing also serves (2) to contribute to progressing towards more practically workable aspects of doctrinal law. For example, a recent paper on the provocation defence to murder articulates a new contemporary rationalisation for the defence that in turn points towards adjusting its application a certain way in the courts. This paper is a contribution to criminal law theory and also a ready-made guide to judges and lawyers, in the absence of legislative reform, to shift towards a more coherent practice. My contribution here, as typically, is to make sense of apparent puzzles and contradictions in the law. I don't purport to have all the answers as to what the law ought to be; I don't argue from a particular political morality. Rather, my work is analytical and technical. It through adding clarity to concepts and tools in law that I aim to contribute to the advancement of knowledge and benefit the practice of law. The growing level of sophistication and capaciousness of analysis of law and its increasing impact on the literature and in practice is commensurate with academic promotion.