The Cambridge Journal of Law, Politics and Art

The Cambridge Journal of Law, Politics, and Art

Co-Editors: Alexander Kardos-Nyheim (2018) and Joseph Court (2017)

In 2020, Trinity Law student Alexander Kardos-Nyheim founded the Cambridge Journal of Law, Politics, and Art. Within a few weeks, the enterprise had swollen to a bustling publication, boasting dozens of editors, administrators, and writers from across Cambridge. Within a few months, the journal had attracted the likes of Lord Sumption, Lady Arden, Yanis Varoufakis, Anthony Julius, Sir Christopher Le Brun, Edward LucieSmith, Maggi Hambling CBE, and Trinity’s own Professor Lord Rees. Sir Quentin Blake came out of retirement to illustrate its front cover (pictured). Alexander comments, ‘I was frustrated with the tunnel vision of much of Cambridge’s student writing opportunities, and perhaps in academic writing more generally. I wanted to offer a forum where bold and brilliant writing is supported and protected, no matter which way the political wind happens to blow at any particular time. The journal’s extraordinary reception, both in the UK and in institutions across the world, shows that there is appetite for a publication that shows some strength of character’.

Trinity Archaeology student Joseph Court joined CJLPA midway through the first issue and saw it through to completion. ‘I couldn’t resist the prospect of working with expert and student writers of the journal’s calibre – and indeed editing them! There was a huge amount to be done, and I pulled several 130hour weeks towards the end. I also designed the website, cjlpa.org, which is replete with Trinity pictures! However, I always had huge amounts of energy for the journal. Not only is it an important opportunity for Cambridge students, but it is also an opportunity that Cambridge can offer the best minds the world over.’

Other Trinity students played a key role in the journal’s progress too, including Tiffany Chow, David Edwardes-Ker, Louisa Stuart-Smith, Owain Cooke, Lucia

Cafoor-Camps, Owain Cooke, Michael Nguyen-Kim, Gabrielle Desalbres, Helena Heaton, Ashna Ahmad, Samuel Rubinstein, Amber Li, and Uma-Jonanna Shah.

What’s next for the journal? ‘The aim is simple’, says Alexander. ‘I want the journal to become another great Trinity export, both in Cambridge and around the world. I want it to continue to grow and attract the very best of writing and editing talent. I also want it to do its bit, no matter how small, to encourage freedom of reasoned expression. That applies as much to increasingly controlled university spaces as much as it does to places where basic freedoms are under threat’. Focusing on Cambridge itself, Joseph says, ‘I want the journal to become a fixture of Cambridge life, and we want to further this aim through superb events. It would be nice to break the Union’s monopoly on the brightest speakers, as well as the brightest students’.

CJLPA is the largest and most professional student-run journal in the UK, and possibly the world. It is already in four beloved bookshops: Heffers, Waterstones, and G. David, and ‘the world’s legal bookshop’ Wildy & Sons in London, as well as countless legal, political, and cultural institutions across the world. The journal’s Co-Editors believe it is here to stay.

Visit the CJLPA website: www.cjlpa.org

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TRINITY ANNUAL RECORD 2021 103 ©istock.com/Evgenil Kovalev