Acknowledgements
This book began life as a DPhil thesis at the University of Oxford, between 2018 and 2021. I am deeply grateful to my supervisor, Professor Sandy Fredman, and the Oxford Human Rights Research Group (RG), where its arguments took form, shape and flesh.
Sandy was with the project from its beginning - as a thousand-word outpouring of vague thoughts misleadingly labelled as a ‘proposal’ - to its end, as the book that you now hold in your hands. At RG, Tom Lowenthal, Jason Brickhill, Nomfundo Ramalekana, Sanya Samtani, Tristan Cummings, Rishika Sahgal, Gauri Pillai, Farrah Raza, Monica Arango, Meghan Campbell, Njodi Ndeunyema, Anjali Rawat, Sarah Horsch Carsley and Lydia Mugambe were all extraordinarily generous with their time, going over multiple drafts and iterations of every argument. They were encouraging when they needed to be and tough when it was merited, but always entirely constructive.Professors Ann Davies and Alan Bogg examined the thesis with rigour, kindness and generosity. They provided immensely helpful feedback about how to improve its arguments. Their comments formed the basis upon which I converted the thesis into a book manuscript. I am deeply grateful to them.
Meghan Finn read the thesis and provided invaluable comments on my engagement with South African law. Walter Khobe did the same for Kenyan law. I am grateful to both of them for their time, freely given.
‘He would walk into my mind as if it were a town, and he a torchlight procession of one, lighting up the streets’, said Norman MacCaig about Hugh MacDiarmid. I can think of no better description for Madhubala P’s intellectual contribution at the final steps of this project, in helping me move somewhat closer to the clarity of thought and language that we all hope to attain.
Through the five years of this project, my parents have been engaged interlocutors from the beginning to the end. Their confidence in me - which is far greater than my confidence in myself - ensured that the PhD-and-book process never got too lonely or too frightening.
The copy of the book that you hold in your hands exists because of the work of many individuals at Hart Publishing: editorial director Sinead Moloney, who was my first contact at Hart; Sasha Jawed, who has handled the process until the end; Chris Myers, who copy-edited the manuscript; Grace Ridge, the cover designer; Tom Adams, the production manager; and many others, whose work is invisible, but not unacknowledged. I am grateful to all of them.
Perhaps the truest form of academic tribute is the footnotes section. I am grateful to all those whose work and writing have shaped and influenced my own thoughts for the better, whom I have argued with and against, and whose imprints are visible throughout this book.