TriCON

More about TriCON

The Trinity Centre for Constitutional Governance (TriCON) provides a focal point for research, seminars, lectures, and events on the Irish Constitution, comparative constitutional law and public law, as well as EU and international law.  It brings together expertise from across the Law School, including Professors Aileen Kavanagh, Oran Doyle, David Kenny, Rachael Walsh, Roisin Costello, Suryapratim Roy, Mark Bell, Christiane Ahlborn and Mike Becker. Founded in 2020 by Inaugural Director of the Centre, Professor Aileen Kavanagh, TriCON has gone from strength to strength in recent years and has become a hub for cutting-edge scholarship and lively events in constitutional and public law.   

In 2025, we hosted a number of prestigious events, including a visit from members of the German Federal Constitutional Court (FCC) in May 2025.  We held a public event in the Law Society of Ireland where the German judges were joined in discussion by Chief Justice Donal O’Donnell and Mr. Justice Gerard Hogan of the Irish Supreme Court.  Other events include a conference on the Future of Law Reform in Ireland in September 2025 to mark the 50th Anniversary of the Law Reform Commission in Ireland.  We also partnered with the student Law Society to host a visit from Lord Sales of the UK Supreme Court, who gave a lecture on ‘A Constitution without a Written Constitution’, followed by reflections from Chief Justice O’Donnell and Justice Gerard Hogan, chaired by our Director, Professor Aileen Kavanagh.  As part of our Early Career Scholars event - ‘New Voices in Constitutional Law’ - we hosted Professor Leah Trueblood from the University of Surrey who gave a lecture on ‘Referendums as Representative Democracy’.  Other notable events included a talk by Jacques deLisle – Professor of Law and Political Science at the University of Pennsylvania – on the rule of law in Hong Kong; and a visit from Prof Hannah Birkenkoetter speaking about her new book on The Rule of Law in Germany: Bringing the Rechtstaat into the 21st Century (Hart Publishing, 2025). 

We have many more exciting events planned for 2026, including the inaugural TriCON Verdon Lecture on April 23rd 2026 on ‘Campus Free Speech’ by Professor Cass Sunstein.  Cass R. Sunstein is currently the Robert Walmsley University Professor at Harvard Law School, where he is the founder and director of the Program on Behavioral Economics and Public Policy. He is one of the most influential and prolific legal scholars in the world.  In 2018, he received the Holberg Prize from the government of Norway, sometimes described as the equivalent of the Nobel Prize for law and the humanities.  His TriCON Verdon Lecture 2026 will be on ‘Campus Free Speech’, drawing on his recent book of the same title.  The lecture will be open to the public and we welcome alumni who may wish to attend. 

We gratefully acknowledge the support of Law School alumnus Craig Verdon (LLB 1991) whose generous gift supports TriCON activities has made this lecture possible.  He is pictured here with TriCON Director Professor Aileen Kavanagh and then Head of School, Professor David Kenny.