Staff Profiles

Alex teaches on a range of modules across the LLB programmes. 

Modules taught

Communication Skills for Lawyers (LLB Year One) 

Criminal Law (LLB Year One) 

Criminal Law (LLB Year Two) 

Criminal Law (GDL)

Understanding Criminal Justice (LLB Year Three)

Crime and Society (LLB Year Three) Module Leader 

International Human Rights Law (LLB Year Three) Module Leader 

Alex is an interdisciplinary researcher bringing together tools from a range of disciplines, including cultural studies, anthropology and sociology, to enhance understanding of legal issues. His research comprises two main strands: The first deploys queer and post-structuralist methodologies to understand, critique and evaluate the inter-relations of gender, sexuality and state administrative institutions. Alex's research within this strand particularly focuses on how state agencies, such as the Home Office, conceptualise sexual diversity and the forms of violence which can arise when this conceptualisation is not aligned with the self-conceptions of those coming into contact with state apparatus. The second strand focuses on how social and political discourses can shift, undermine and alter the function of legal entities. For example, Alex's 2019 Book Chapter '"The Will of the People": The UK Constitution, (Parliamentary) Sovereignty and Brexit' looked at how the political discourses of public sovereignty emerging from the 2016 EU referendum may work to undermine the centrality of Parliamentary Sovereignty to the UK constitution. 

Research grants and awards

City Doctoral Studentship 2017-2020 (City, University of London)

Journal articles

• Ashford C, Morris M, Powell A, 'Bareback sex in the age of preventative medication: Rethinking the "harms" of HIV transmission'
  Journal of Criminal Law 84 (6) (2020) pp.596-614
  ISSN: 0022-0183 eISSN: 1740-5580
  Abstract

  The experiences of People living with HIV have been transformed over recent years. Advances in medical science have made the virus a manageable chronic condition, while eliminating the risk of onward transmission for those with access to treatment, something referred to as TasP (treatment as prevention) or U=U (undetectable equals untransmissible). More recently, the availability of PrEP (pre-exposure prophylaxis), alongside PEP (post-exposure prophylaxis), through the NHS has created the conditions for condomless sexual encounters to take place without the fear of HIV transmission associated with previous decades. Despite this, the criminal law has continued to frame HIV in terms of personal responsibility and bodily autonomy within the dominant narratives of danger, disease, and out-dated science.  Doctrinal law has failed to keep pace with social and scientific change. Therefore, in this article, we provide a re-examination of the criminal issues relating to HIV transmission within this new landscape, arguing that it necessitates a shift in attitude, policy and doctrine. We specifically argue that HIV transmission does not meet the appropriate harm threshold to constitute GBH and that if criminal law is ultimately about preventing or regulating harm, the ongoing criminalisation of HIV transmission is counter to that aim.
  

  Website 

Book chapters

• Powell A, 'Normative Understandings: Sexual identity, Stereotypes, and Asylum Seeking' in Ashford C & Maine A (ed.), The Research Handbook on Gender, Sexuality and law , Edward Elgar (2020)
  ISBN: 9781788111140 eISBN: 9781788111157
  Abstract

  In the case of HJ and HT v Secretary of State for the Home Department, the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom ruled that the previous position which held that asylum claims would not be granted in situations where discretion or concealment of an individual’s LGBT identity could remove ‘well-founded fear of persecution’ was illegal. In passing this judgment, the court has refocused the attention of decision makers, from proving that there is a ‘well-founded fear of persecution’ to proving that the individual is a member of the ‘particular social group’ under which they make their claim. Since 1999, the UK has upheld the possibility of LGBT individuals making successful claims under the ‘Particular Social Group’ of the Refugee Convention (1951). However, this raises as many questions as it answers – most pressingly, who represents a member of particular social groups, such as ‘gay’ and ‘lesbian’. Hathaway and Pobjoy have argued that, in the HJ and HT decision, the ‘all embracing’ decision of Lord Roger expanded the scope of the convention too far, distorting the common relationship between refugee law and international human rights practice. This article argues that, on the contrary, the judges in HJ and HT did not go far enough. Indeed, in their haste to find a decision which avoided the deeply problematic ‘discretion’ criterion, it is argued that the judges reified problematic and limiting ideas of what it means to be a gay man. This is primarily because their understanding of terms such as gay is rooted within normative, western stereotypes. This article argues for a ‘queer’ understanding of how LGBT people fit within the ‘particular social group’ framework, demonstrating that the present situation undermines the aims of the convention.
  

  Website 
• Powell A, 'The Will of 'The People’: The UK Constitution, (Parliamentary) Sovereignty, and Brexit.' in Ahmed T & Fahey E (ed.), On Brexit: Law, Justices and Injustices Edward Elgar, Edward Elgar (2019)
  ISBN: 9781789903003 eISBN: 9781789903010
  Abstract

  ‘The Will of the People’ has become a key refrain of government ministers since the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union in June 2016. This chapter draws on the theoretical contributions of Carl Schmitt to suggest that the Brexit referendum was a manifestation of constituent power, the legitimacy of which undermines accepted norms of the UK’s unwritten constitution. Given the peculiarity of referendums within standard UK constitutional practice, the chapter focuses on the underappreciated power of rhetoric surrounding Brexit to justify executive actions contrary to established norms. Going on to examine the possibility of Parliament being stripped of its role as the final decision-maker within the UK’s constitutional setup, the chapter concludes by warning of the potential for new discourses around public sovereignty to make fundamental changes to the constitutional practice of the UK.
  

  Website 

In Progress: 

Powell A, 'Administrative Violence: First Instance Decision-Making in Sexual Diversity Asylum Claims' in Wheatle S & O'Loughlin E (eds) Diverse Voices in Public Law (Bristol University Press, Forthcoming)

Other Publications:

Powell A, 'Miller/Cherry and the Justiciability of the Prerogative Powers' (2020) 1 KSLR-TCLR 18-34.

Online Publications:

Powell A, "'It Felt Like They Were Looking For Something Very Specific": Stereotypes and Essentialism in the 2016 Asylum Policy Instruction' (SLSA Blog, 29 June 2020) http://slsablog.co.uk/blog/blog-posts/virtualslsa2020-it-felt-like-they-were-looking-for-something-very-specific-stereotypes-and-essentialism-in-the-sexual-orientation-asylum-policy-instruction/

Powell A, 'Interviews with Asylum Seekers Reveal why the Home Office Rejects so Many LGBT Claims' (The Conversation, 4 September 2019) https://theconversation.com/interviews-with-asylum-seekers-reveal-why-the-home-office-rejects-so-many-lgbt-claims-122905

Powell A, 'Work Ban Forces Asylum Seekers into Destitution – But We Now have a Chance to Change This Policy' (The Conversation, 22 February 2019) https://theconversation.com/work-ban-forces-asylum-seekers-into-destitution-but-we-now-have-a-chance-to-change-this-policy-112254

Powell A, 'Officials Working Within Hostile Government Departments are Not Free From Blame' (The Conversation, 6 July 2018) https://theconversation.com/officials-working-within-hostile-government-departments-are-not-free-from-blame-98741

Conferences

Powell A & Malagodi M, 'A Rose by Any Other Name Would Smell as Sweet: Third Gender and Constitutional Identity' SLSA Annual Conference, Cardiff University, 29 March- 1st April 2021. 

Malagodi M & Powell A, ‘A Rose by Any Other Name Would Smell as Sweet: Third Gender and Constitutional Identity in Nepal’ 8^th Asian Constitutional Law Forum, Vietnam National University, 6^th-7^th December 2019

Powell A, ‘I Want the Proof, the Whole Proof and Nothing but the Proof: Authenticity and Credibility in Sexual Identity Asylum Claims.’ Socio-Legal Studies Association Annual Conference, University of Leeds, 2-5 April 2019.

Powell A, ‘Law and the Cultural Imaginary: A Queer Discursive Analysis of “Victim” (1961)’ Socio-Legal Studies Association Annual Conference, University of Leeds 2-5 April 2019

Morris M & Powell A, ‘Queering “Reckless” Transmission: HIV Criminalization and Stigma in the Context of PrEP and TasP’ Socio-Legal Studies Association Annual Conference, University of Bristol, 25-27 March 2018.

Powell A, ‘Queering “Credibility”: How Law Constructs the Truth of Sexual identity’ Queer Identities and Philosophy, Kings College London, 24-25 March 2018. 

Invited Lectures: 

Powell A, ‘Not Gay Enough? Violence, Asylum, and the Problem of Identity. Kingston University, London (2020)

Powell A, ‘Law and Its Victims: Representations of Sexual Minorities in Law and Film’. University of Hong Kong (2019)

Powell A, ‘Law and Its Victims: Representations of Sexual Minorities in Law and Film’. City, University of London (2018)