Academy of Social Sciences welcomes African Law and Society scholar as Fellow

A prolific scholar of law has been elected to the Fellowship of the Academy of Social Sciences this March.

Professor Ambreena Manjiof the School of Law and Politics is part of a cohort of 41 social scientists who will join the Fellowship this spring.

The Academy’s Fellowship comprises over 1,500 leading social scientists from academia, the public, private and third sectors. Their expertise covers the breadth of the social sciences, and their practice and research addresses some of the major challenges facing communities, society, places and economies. All Academy Fellows are selected through an independent peer review which recognises their excellence and impact, including their wider contributions to social sciences for public benefit.

Professor Manji joined the School of Law and Politics in 2014 as a Professor of Land Law and Development following a 4 year tenure in Nairobi as Director of the British Academy’s British Institute in Eastern Africa.

Professor Manji’s interdisciplinary research interest in African Law and Society includes work on land law reform, African legal education, law in African literature, African history, and women and the law.

At Cardiff, Professor Manji is the University’s Africa Dean and the Law and Global Justice Centre she co-founded is committed to engagement with southern scholars across the disciplines. The Centre launched its Socio-Legal Journals Global South Initiative in 2018, with writing workshops for early-career legal scholars in Recife, Bangalore, Accra and Nairobi.

Outside the university Professor Manji holds a range of varied roles including member of the governing Council of the AHRC and editor of the journal African Affairs. She was elected a Fellow of the Learned Society of Wales in 2020.

The full list of this spring’s Fellows can be found on the Academy of Social Sciences website.