External links
- Twining's page at UCL (Archived)
William Twining | |
|---|---|
| Born | 22 September 1934 |
| Died | 9 October 2025 (aged 91) |
| Academic work | |
| Discipline | Jurisprudence |
School or tradition | Law in Context |
| Institutions | Queen's University Belfast University of Warwick University College London |
Main interests | Law of evidence |
William Lawrence Twining (22 September 1934 – 9 October 2025) was a British legal scholar. He was the Quain Professor of Jurisprudence at the Faculty of Laws, University College London from 1983 until 1996 and then Research Professor of Law there from 1996 to 2004 before retiring as Quain Emeritus. He was a leading member of the Law in Context movement, and contributed especially to jurisprudence, evidence and proof, legal method, legal education, and intellectual history. Twining's work also focused on "globalization" and legal theory.
Twining was born on 22 September 1934. He was born in Kampala, in the Protectorate of Uganda, but spent his early childhood in British Mauritius. He was sent to England to be educated at Charterhouse, then went on to study Law at the University of Oxford (1952–1955). He then undertook further studies in law at the University of Chicago (1957–58).
Central themes of Twining's contributions to legal matters include the variety and complexity of legal phenomena; the proposition that many so-called “global” processes and patterns are sub-global, linked to empires, diasporas, alliances, and legal traditions; that diffusion, legal pluralism, and surface law are important topics for both analytical and empirical jurisprudence; that, in a world characterised by profound diversity of beliefs and radical poverty, the discipline of law needs to engage with problems of constructing just and workable supra-national institutions and practices; and that adopting a global perspective challenges some of the main working assumptions of Western traditions of academic law.
At the start of his career, Twining taught for seven years in Sudan and Tanzania. He maintained an interest in Eastern Africa, and more broadly the Commonwealth. He also studied and taught in several leading UK and American law schools, holding chairs at the universities of Belfast and Warwick.
He died on 9 October 2025, at the age of 91.
