Founded in 1974, the Centre of European Law (CEL) at King’s College London is a leading hub for doctrinally grounded, policy-facing European law research. The Centre is one of the oldest of its kind and has traditionally pursued interdisciplinary approaches to the study of the law. Committed to public engagement, we provide an independent forum for the discussion of EU law and EU–UK relations, situated in London’s legal quarter.

The Centre’s distinction is reflected in the appointment of three of its members to the Court of Justice of the European Union: our founder, Judge Alec Chloros; our President, Sir Francis Jacobs, serving as Advocate General for seventeen years; and currently Professor Andrea Biondi, Advocate General since October 2024. Alongside this, the Centre shapes EU law and policy through public consultations and advisory work for governmental bodies, recognised also in the UK Research Excellence Framework.

Our research informs our teaching on the core and optional undergraduate EU law modules at King’s, our LLM in EU law, and the specialised postgraduate diplomas in Competition Law and Economics for Competition Law. Our work has been funded by the European Commission through various schemes, including, currently, through the inter-collegiate Jean Monnet Centre of Excellence (co-held with colleagues from KCL’s School for Social Science and Public Policy).

We address the defining challenges of our time: the pursuit of peace and justice, technological transformation, and environmental sustainability, across four inter-connected themes:

1. EU-UK Relations after Brexit

We examine EU-UK relations as a central UK policy priority, focusing on the balance between regulatory alignment and divergence and its implications for growth, resilience, and legal certainty across sectors such as trade, energy, security, and migration.

2. European Constitutional Governance

We analyse how European legal frameworks sustain peace through constitutional order and secure justice through fundamental rights and judicial protection, with a focus on EU institutional law, the rule of law crisis, and the interaction with the European Convention on Human Rights.

3. EU Economic Law: Competition, Tax, Trade, Finance and Digital Law

We place competition law at the core of our analysis of the EU’s economic constitution, drawing on one of the largest concentrations of competition law and regulatory expertise in UK legal academia. Our work extends to EU tax law, trade law (including subsidy control), financial regulation, and the governance of key regulated sectors. We engage with societal challenges including environmental protection and the green transition through the lens of economic regulation, and addressing the governance of the digital economy, from platform regulation to data-driven markets and AI.

4. Europe in the World: External Relations, Enlargement, Security and Migration

We explore how European law advances peace through international cooperation, enlargement, and security partnerships, and promotes justice in global governance - including through the EU’s external action, the use of economic statecraft such as sanctions as an instrument of foreign policy, responses to geopolitical instability, and challenges of migration.

Image above: Group picture from the 51^st CEL Annual Lecture with President Lenaerts of the CJEU.