Edinburgh online student journals
Congratulations first to the student editors of the on-line Edinburgh Student Law Review, who launched the first issue of their new product at the beginning of April 2009.
The journal, which is available through the Edinburgh Law School website, is edited by Craig Hawthorne, Paul Tominey and Keiran Wilson, ably supported by Rebecca Maslin, Rebecca Zahn, Karen Baston, Gemma Flynn, Julie Eveleigh and Clare Francis Moran. Lord Hope of Craighead provides a foreword as the new journal’s patron.
The contents of the first issue include papers on the codification of Scots property law by Carl Friedrich MacThibaut (apparently an Edinburgh LLB (Hons) graduate of 2006; the surname suggests no membership of any Scottish clan known to Scots Law News, but it is no surprise to the historically aware reader to find MacThibaut in favour generally of codification); the creation of a European Contract Code as a solution to the economic problems caused by divergent contract laws in the European Union by Andrew Bowker; the concept of personal data in data protection law by Stephen Allison; human rights in Nigeria by Rebecca Zahn; the ECHR decision on DH v Czech Republic by Alastair Stewart; and two notes by Rebecca Young and Rebecca MacLeod, on stay of proceedings in international criminal courts and personality rights respectively. The journal is thus pleasingly eclectic and anything but parochial in its coverage.
While we are in this area, we should also congratulate another student-led online law journal from Edinburgh on its fifth birthday, celebrated with an impressive two-day conference in the Playfair Library, Old College, University of Edinburgh on 30 and 31 March 2009. This is SCRIPT-ed, which specialises in Law, Technology and Society. The editors, Shawn Harmon and Wiebke Abel, showed in their conference organisation that their considerable organisational skills extend well beyond merely putting together a quarterly journal with an international set of contributors.
Scots Law News is delighted to salute both journals and the dynamic student culture which lies behind them both.