Law and Political Economy Series

The constitutive relationship of law and legal categories to global political economy is often overlooked, despite it being widely acknowledged that the law protects private property and profit more than it does citizens.  Furthermore, the legal categories constitutive of capitalist relations rely upon cultural narratives that regulate admission to the category of the human, as well what it means to suffer injury or be responsible for harm. 

Since 2021, the CGPE has hosted a series of events with prominent intellectuals exploring the relationship between law, capitalism and colonialism and the potential of legal strategies to be used in resisting exploitation and expropriation.

Past events

Imperial Inequalities 

27 Jan 2023
Gurminder K. Bhambra 
David Brown 
Laura Channing 
Alex Cobham 
Paul Gilbert 
Lyla Latif 
Andrew Mackillop 
Julia McClure 
Madeline Woker 

Workshop on colonial taxation and national welfare across European Empires.


Indigenous Justice/Justicia Runa

29 Nov 2022
Veronica Yuquilema
Paulo Illich Bacca
Franciso Ramírez Cuéllar
Mónica Chuji Gualinga

Webinar with Indigenous and anti-colonial lawyers from Ecuador and Colombia, co-sponsored with Sinchi Muyu Collective.

Organised by Helena Mullenbach Martinez. 


Abolition Geography

29 Sept 2022
Prof. Ruth Wilson Gilmore (City University New York)

Book webinar co-sponsored with Sussex Geography.


Resisting Killer Corporations: Strategic Use of Law Against Extractivism

30 June 2022

Gilberto Torres (Colombian former trade unionist)
Lara Montesinos Coleman (CGPE)
Sebastian Muñoz (War on Want)
Khetan Jha (Plan B, Lawyers for Nature)

Co-organised by Helena Mullenbach Martinez and Lotte Jaeger. 


The Morals of the Market: Human Rights and the Rise of Neoliberalism

4 May 2022
Assoc. Prof. Jessica Whyte (University of New South Wales)

Book webinar co-sponsored by with Sussex IR department, Sussex Law School and the Centre for Rights and Anti-Colonial Justice.


Uncommon Wealth: Britain and the Aftermath of Empire.

9 March 2022

Dr Kojo Koram (Birkbeck University of London)

Book talk co-sponsored with the Centre for Rights and Anti-Colonial Justice.


Law and Disorder: Sovereignty, Protest, Atmosphere

9 December 2021

Prof. Illan rua Wall, University of Warwick
Discussants: Swastee Ranjan and Lara Montesinos Coleman 

Book talk co-sponsored with Sussex Law Department.


Marketing Global Justice: The Political Economy of International Criminal Law

17 November 2021

Dr Christine Schwoebel-Patel, University of Warwick
Discussants: David Karp, IR,  and Lara Montesinos Coleman

Co-sponsored with the Sussex Law Department and Centre for Rights and Anti-Colonial Justice.


Capitalism as Civilization: A History of International Law

13 October 2021

Dr Ntina Tzouvala (ANU College of Law)

Online book talk co-sponsored by the Centre for Advanced International Theory.