Professor Veitch writes and teaches in the areas of legal, social and political theory. Educated in Scotland he has worked at universities in Australia and the United Kingdom, and was formerly Professor of Jurisprudence at the University of Glasgow. He has held visiting academic positions in South Africa, New Zealand, Belgium, France and the Basque country.
Professor Veitch’s area of research is jurisprudence broadly defined, and his work draws on historical, philosophical and sociological insights into law and legal institutions. More specifically it has dealt with the politics of domestic and international law; critical aspects of legal reasoning; the role of law in processes of transition and its bearing on reconciliation and memory; and the relations between legal concepts and political economy.
He is the author of numerous books, articles and chapters. Among his books are Jurisprudence: Themes and Concepts (3rd edition, with E Christodoulidis and M Goldoni ), Law, Obligation, Community (ed with Daniel Matthews), Law and Irresponsibility: On the legitimation of human suffering, Moral Conflict and Legal Reasoning (winner of the European Award for Legal Theory), and Law and the Politics of Reconciliation.
Current research includes a jurisprudential investigation into the role and nature of legal obligation; see eg ‘The Sense of Obligation’ (given as the inaugural Adam Smith Lecture in Jurisprudence at the University of Glasgow).
He supervises research students in the areas of Jurisprudence and Law and Social Theory.