Bonavero Discussion Group - Book Launch: The Cambridge Handbook of the Right to Freedom of Thought

On the 20th May 2025, we are delighted to host the Book Launch for The Cambridge Handbook of the Right to Freedom of Thought, edited by Partick O'Callaghan and Bethany Shiner. The right to freedom of thought features prominently in debates about emerging technologies, including neurotechnology and AI, but there is little understanding of its scope, content or application. The handbook presents the first attempt to set out how the right is protected, interpreted and applied globally. Eighteen jurisdictions are examined along with chapters describing context-setting, interdisciplinary approaches, and close analysis of the right in relation to specific challenges and conceptual difficulties. The handbook offers fresh perspectives to readers familiar with the right, and it allows those who are new readers to learn how it is part of the matrix of rights protecting autonomy, dignity, and privacy.

Patrick O’Callaghan is Senior Lecturer in Law at University College Cork and Principal Investigator of the Law and the Inner Self (LAWINSEL) project, funded by an Irish Research Council (Consolidator) Laureate grant (IRCLA/2022/2628). His main area of expertise is in the legal protection of personality rights as that concept is understood in the civilian legal tradition.

Bethany Shiner is Senior Lecturer in Law at Middlesex University, London, and is completing her PhD at the University of Oxford on the Right to Freedom of Thought. She is a trained solicitor-advocate with expertise in judicial review and human rights. She has published peer-reviewed research on the law related to data-driven political campaigns, military accountability, and the right to freedom of thought under the European Convention on Human Rights, and the American Convention on Human Rights. She co-convenes the Freedom of Thought Network (http://freedom-of-thought.org/).

Nina Keese is currently a legal officer at the Turkey Human Rights Litigation Support Project (TLSP) and was formerly a researcher for the British Academy Global Professorship project on ‘Addressing the Digital Realm through the Grammar of Human Rights Law’ at the Bonavero Institute of Human Rights, University of Oxford. She has co-authored a chapter titled ‘Online Manipulation as a Potential Interference with the Right to Freedom of Thought’ in The Cambridge Handbook of the Right to Freedom of Thought. She holds a Master’s in European and international human rights law from Leiden University, and a Bachelor in English and French Law from University College London. She was also a trainee at the European Court of Human Rights and at the European Parliament’s Subcommittee on Human Rights.

Konrad Ksiazek is a DPhil student at the University of Oxford, investigating the living instrument doctrine in the ECtHR, and a future Postdoctoral Fellow at the Three Generations of Digital Human Rights project. His academic interests include Human Rights Law, AI Ethics, as well as Jurisprudence and Legal Theory. His work on ECtHR's interpretive theory appeared in the European Human Rights Law Review, and his teaching experience includes delivering tutorials in Jurisprudence and Ethics of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Technologies at the University of Oxford. Since September 2022, he is the Co-Convenor of the Graduate Research Forum at the Bonavero Institute of Human Rights. Prior to his doctoral research, Konrad completed his LLB (Hons) and LLM at UCL.

Thiago Alves Pinto is currently a Departmental Lecturer in Legal Studies and Diplomatic Studies and the Director of Studies in Religion and Theology at the Department for Continuing Education, University of Oxford. Thiago’s research focuses on how international human rights courts and treaty bodies have addressed issues of blasphemy, apostasy, and censorship of expressions deemed offensive to religious belief. He has researched a wide range of public international law and human rights issues, including freedom of religion or belief, freedom of expression, freedom of assembly, privacy, prohibition of torture, the right to life, and non-discrimination. He holds a DPhil in Law from the University of Oxford. He has taught at several universities, including the University of Oxford, the University of Oslo, the Federal University of Uberlandia (Brazil), Bauchi State University (Nigeria), and the University of Notre Dame (UK). Thiago has also participated in human rights research at the Bonavero Institute of Human Rights (University of Oxford) and the Oslo Coalition on Freedom of Religion or Belief (University of Oslo), and continues to be associated with both institutes. He is also a fellow of Kellogg College.