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Dr. Desmond Ryan

Associate Professor (Law)
HOUSE 39, COLLEGE
      
Profile Photo

Dr. Desmond Ryan

Associate Professor (Law)
HOUSE 39, COLLEGE

 Desmond.Ryan@tcd.ie

 3531896 8572


     Constitutional Law   Employment and Labour Law   Tort and Personal Injury Law
Details Date
External Examiner in Tort Law and Advanced Obligations, University of Bristol Law School 1 Septmber 2022
Ministerial Nominee, Employment Law Review Group 1 December 2024
Convenor for Ireland, Society of Legal Scholars 2015-present
External Examiner in Tort Law, Law Society of Ireland 1 September 2014
Executive Committee Member, International Society of Labour and Social Security Law September 2023-present
Co-Editor, Dublin University Law Journal 2010
Peer Reviewer, Irish Supreme Court Review 2026
Peer Reviewer, Cambridge Law Journal 2024
Peer Reviewer - Legal Studies 2025
Member, Irish Judicial Studies Network 12 June 2025
Member of Editorial Board of the Irish Employment Law Journal 1 September 2021
Details Date From Date To
Member of the Bar of Ireland, appearing/advising in cases before the Workplace Relations Commission, Labour Court, and civil courts of all levels up to and including the Supreme Court and the Court of Justice of the European Union October 2006 present
Convenor for Ireland, Society of Legal Scholars 1 September 2016 1 September 2026
Founder and Convenor, Private Law Research Group, Trinity College Dublin 2012 present
Founding Member and Committee Member, Employment Law Association of Ireland 2011 present
European Employment Lawyers' Association 2011 present
Employment Bar Association 1 October 2010 present
CEDR (Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution)-accredited Mediator August 2018 present
Called to the Bar of England and Wales (Lincoln's Inn) 18 July 2019 prsent
Called to the Bar of Northern Ireland 22 March 2019 present
Health and Safety Lawyers' Association of Ireland 2012 present
Executive Committee Member, International Society for Labour and Social Security Law 2023 present
Desmond Ryan, Redmond on Dismissal Law: Fourth Edition, Fourth, Dublin, Bloomsbury Professional, 2026, 1-778pp, Book, IN_PRESS
"A Decade of Distinctive Doctrinal Developments in Tort Law in Ireland: Analysing the Case Law of the Court of Appeal in Comparative Perspective" in, editor(s)Dr. Mark Coen and Dr. Noel McGrath , The Irish Court of Appeal: The First Decade of an Intermediate Appellate Court, 2026, pp153 - 170, [Desmond Ryan], Book Chapter, PUBLISHED
Allison Silink and Desmond Ryan, Reassessing the scope of the Non-Delegable Duty to apply to intentional wrongdoing: an analysis of the High Court of Australia"s judgment in Trustees of the Roman Catholic Church for the Diocese of Maitland Newcastle v AA [2026] HCA 2, Doing Law Differently: Society of Legal Scholars Annual Conference 2026, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK, 2-4 September 2026, 2026, Conference Paper, PRESENTED
Desmond Ryan, Lifting the compensation cap and reducing the qualifying period: a new `ERA' for unfair dismissal rights and remedies?, King's Law Journal, 2026, Journal Article, PUBLISHED
Desmond Ryan, Of Principles and Principals: Reasonableness and Remedies in Unfair Dismissal: An Bord Banistíochta, Gaelscoil Moshíológ v the Labour Court [2024] IESC 38, Irish Supreme Court Review, 7, 2025, p59 - 74, Journal Article, PUBLISHED
Desmond Ryan, Esther McGuinness, Rory O'Connell, A Review of Employment Law in Ireland, North and South, Irish Studies in International Affairs, 2025, p1 - 29, Journal Article, IN_PRESS
Desmond Ryan, "The Power and Limits of Close Connection: Analysing the Legacy of Bazley v Curry through three international case studies", The Supreme Court Law Review (Canada), 2, (Third Series), 2024, p31 - 47, Journal Article, PUBLISHED
Desmond Ryan, Emerging institutional reforms of the labour law dispute resolution machinery in Ireland, and their implications for labour law norms, Labour Law Research Network, Warsaw, Poland, 24 June 2023, 2023, Conference Paper, PUBLISHED
Desmond Ryan, Damages for false imprisonment by the state: counterfactual and vindicatory approaches in comparative perspective, Obligations X, Banff, Canada, 14 July 2023, 2023, Conference Paper, PUBLISHED
Desmond Ryan, Marta Lasek-Markey, Andrea Mulligan, Linda Hogan, Bryana Tunder, Conscientious Objection in an Uncertain Time: New Challenges in Ireland, Religions, 14, 2023, p1 - 16, Journal Article, PUBLISHED  DOI
  

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Desmond Ryan, Recent Developments in Employment Case Law, Employment Bar Association Annual CPD Briefing, Law Library, Dublin, July 2025, 2025, Conference Paper, PUBLISHED
Desmond Ryan, Recent Developments in Employment Case Law, Employment Bar Association Annual CPD Briefing, Law Library, 2021, 2024, Conference Paper, PUBLISHED
Desmond Ryan, Recent Developments in Employment Case Law, Employment Bar Association Annual CPD Briefing, The Bar of Ireland, 2023, 2023, Conference Paper, PUBLISHED
Desmond Ryan, Recent Developments in Employment Case Law, Employment Bar Association Annual CPD Briefing, Bar of Ireland, 2022, 2022, Conference Paper, PUBLISHED
Desmond Ryan, Recent Developments in Employment Case Law, Employment Bar Association Annual CPD Briefing, 2021, 2021, Conference Paper, PUBLISHED
Desmond Ryan, Recent Developments in Employment Case Law, Employment Bar Association Annual CPD Briefing, Bar of Ireland, 2020, 2020, Conference Paper, PUBLISHED
Desmond Ryan, Recent Developments in Employment Case Law, Employment Bar Association CPD Briefing, The Bar of Ireland, 2019, 2019, Conference Paper, PUBLISHED
Desmond Ryan, Recent Developments in Employment Case Law, Employment Bar Association Annual CPD Briefing, The Bar of Ireland, 2018, 2018, Conference Paper, PUBLISHED
Employment Law in, editor(s)William Binchy Raymond Byrne , Annual Review of Irish Law 2016, Dublin, 2017, [Desmond Ryan], Book Chapter, PUBLISHED
Employment Law in, editor(s)William Binchy Raymond Byrne , Annual Review of Irish Law 2015, Dublin, 2016, [Desmond Ryan], Book Chapter, PUBLISHED

  


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Award Date
Elected a Fellow of Trinity College Dublin April 2018
Elected a Visiting Fellow, Exeter College Oxford October 2016-June 2017
Provost's Teaching Award, Trinity College Dublin, 2011 2011
Invited as Academic Visitor, University of Melbourne Law School Centre for Employment Law and Industrial Relations July-August 2017
Nominated for a Provost' Teaching Award (ineligible for application due to having received this award in 2011) 2014
Elected a Visiting Fellow, St Catherine's College, Oxford January 2024
Invited Visiting Scholar, University of Notre Dame School of Law March 2024
Elected a Foundation Scholar, Trinity College Dublin April 2002
Awarded Henry Hamilton Hunter Prize for First Place in Finals, LLB Degree June 2024
Awarded Government of Ireland Easter Week Commemoration Scholarship August 2000
Butterworths Law Prize for First Place in Junior Freshman Law Examinations June 2001
My research focuses on Employment Law and Tort Law, with a particular emphasis on the contract of employment, vicarious liability and dismissal law. I am particularly interested in the relationship between statute and common law in, and between, employment law and tort law. I am the Director of the Private Law Group at Trinity College Dublin (https://www.tcd.ie/law/research/groups/private-law/), responsible for leading a programme of international and national research activities including workshops, seminars and lectures. My research explores the nature of employers' liability for torts committed by employees and other persons; the role of both statute and common law in protecting individuals against unjustified termination of employment, and evolution in statutory and common law frameworks including the law on protected disclosures, employment equality, and implied contractual terms. My work is international and interdisciplinary in focus and includes collaborations with colleagues across the common law world. I have supervised several doctorates to successful completion and welcome approaches from doctoral candidates in the above and related areas. I am a member of several consortia supported by research funding including COALESCE funding from the Irish Research Council. My books and journal articles have been favourably cited and relied upon by several courts, including the High Court, Court of Appeal and Supreme Court of Ireland and the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom. I am the author of the leading work on dismissal law in Ireland which has been repeatedly cited and relied upon by the Workplace Relations Commission, Labour Court and Superior Courts. In December 2024 I was appointed by the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment to serve on the Employment Law Review Group, whose function is to monitor, review, and advise on all aspects of employment and redundancy law, with a specific focus on promoting good workplace relations in the State.