Edinburgh Napier University

  The aim of this thesis is to demonstrate how my research promotes knowledge
exchange about my overarching research theme: the rights, status and capacity of
distinct categories of individuals in underdeveloped and emerging areas of law.
These categories include disempowered individuals (namely young people and
transsexuals) and persons of reduced or questionable legal capacity (to date,
children and disabled people).
The thesis is in two parts. Part 1 (Volume I) is a reflective commentary and Part 2
(Volume II) comprises the published work submitted. In the reflective commentary,
my published work is critically appraised and placed within a wider legal and
thematic framework. My overarching research theme is summarised and evaluated
with reference to the legal premises, methodology and the research outcomes of my
published work.
In particular, I present a critical reflection of eight of my publications, each of
which is concerned with the impact of the law, and issues surrounding legal reform,
upon the young and certain disempowered adults. I demonstrate that this body of
work forms a contribution to interdisciplinary sharing of novel and meaningful
research outputs both (i) within the academic arena and (ii) throughout the wider
professional community.
I argue that my published work is original, because it is concerned with important,
but largely neglected, areas of Scottish (and often wider UK) law. Furthermore, I
argue that my publications are independent and significant in that they provide a
distinct and critical evaluation of existing law and seek to promote the growth of
individual status and capacity. This, in turn, often generates greater provision for
individual rights, and the imposition in law of private law and state remedies.