Professor Roberts is an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Law at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Among other themes, Professor Roberts’ research focuses on the historical evolution of public order legality in nineteenth and twentieth century Britain, the British Empire and the British settler colonial world; on the imperial, transnational and international evolution of ideas of human and workers’ rights in the early to mid-twentieth century; on the historical production, limitation and potential rejuvenation of the concept of forced labor; and on comparative institutional and procedural issues at human rights bodies. He is currently working on two books. The first is tentatively titled “From Emergency to Development: Colonial Governance and Anti-Colonial Resistance in the Interwar British Empire.” The second is tentatively titled “Interwar Regimes and the Origins of Human Rights.” Professor Roberts is the Chair of the Transnational Legal History Group within the Law Faculty’s Centre for Comparative and Transnational Law.

In addition to his academic work, Professor Roberts has worked as an expert legal consultant addressing issues such as constitutional and legal reform, the rule of law and human rights with intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations and mandate holders such as the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the United Nations Children’s Fund, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association, the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, the Fédération International pour les Droits Humains, Avocats Sans Frontières, the International Service for Human Rights, the International Refugee Assistance Project, the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies, the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, Transparency Maldives and others.