Professor Steven Wheatley

Research Overview

Steven Wheatley was appointed Professor of International Law at the University of Lancaster in 2012. Before that he was Professor of International Law at Leeds University. He has two principal areas of research interest: human rights theory and democracy.

The Idea of International Human Rights Law (OUP, 2019) explains the emergence, evolution, and normative power of human rights through the lens of complexity theory. He has recently applied these insights to the work of the ECHR (HRLR, forthcoming).

Steven has also written on the problem of cyber operations targeting democratic elections, examining the issue through the lens of the non-intervention principle (Duke JCIL, 2020) and rule of sovereignty (Leiden JIL, 2023).

He retains an interest in foundational issues of international law and has written on the challenges posed by the doctrine of inter-temporal law (OJLS, 2021).