England's dreaming equity, trust and conscience - alastairhudson.com

England’s DreamingProfessor Alastair Hudson[Inauguration, especially of a building]OVERTUREI was appointed Professor of Law in 2004. It occurred to me that by the age ofretirement, assuming the retirement age will indeed be put back to 70, I willhave spent as much of my life as a professor of law as I have spent not being aprofessor of law. So, I thought I should use my inaugural lecture to describethe ideas which have informed me so far and to describe my project for thefuture in occupying this chair.I will borrow a definition of the verb “to inaugurate” from Conor Gearty: thatis, ‘to open to the public, especially of a building’. What I shall be describingtonight, then, are my blueprints for my building as a professor of law.What I will be considering in this lecture are different conceptions of equity:1. first, the rules applied by the Courts of Chancery (particularly inrelation to the law of trusts);2. secondly, the general concept of a legal equity as understood byAristotle and as predicated on a notion of good conscience;3. thirdly, as equity is understood in finance theory in relation tosecurities law; and4. finally the understanding of equity in the other social sciences where itis used as a rough synonym for “equality”.First, though, we must consider this idea of “England’s dreaming”.3www.alastairhudson.com | © professor alastair hudson