Professor David J McQuoid-Mason, B Comm (Natal) LLB (Natal) LLM (London) PhD (Natal), is a Professor of Law based at the Centre for Socio-Legal Studies at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban; Advocate of the High Court of South Africa; Visiting Professor of Law, Strathclyde University, Glasgow, Scotland; Adjunct Professor of Law, Griffiths University, Brisbane, Australia; the founder of the South African Street Law programme; co-founder of the Democracy for All programme; a former President of AULAI; a former Director of the Practical Training Course for Candidate Attorneys in Durban; former Chairperson of the Durban Chapter of Lawyers for Human Rights; Chairperson of the Durban Medico-Legal Forum; past President of the Society Teachers of Law of Southern African; former member of the Legal Aid Board; former member of the South African Human Rights Commission Trust; President of the Commonwealth Legal Education Association involving over 2 000 law schools in 54 Commonwealth countries; and a former Vice President of the Academic and Professional Development Committee of the International Bar Association. He is also a member of the Health Professions Council of South Africa Human Rights, Ethics and Professional Practice Committee and of the Medical Rights Advocacy Network (MeRAN).
He is a National Research Foundation A-rated Researcher, a Fellow of the University of KwaZulu-Natal and was formerly Dean of the Howard College Law School, University of Natal, for 13 years. He began teaching law in 1971. He taught LLB courses in Delict, Succession, Medical Law and aspects of Human Rights Law, Legal Aid and Street Law, and presently co-teaches in an LLB course in Clinical Law. He also taught LLM courses in Law and Medical Practice, Consumer Law and aspects of Human Rights Litigation. He still teaches a course on Alternate Dispute Resolution at the Practical Training School for Candidate Attorneys. He specializes in Medical Law, Access to Justice and Legal Education. He is Chairperson of the Institute for Professional Legal Training and Street Law South Africa, and Chairperson and Acting Director of the Centre for Socio-Legal Studies at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. He was a member of the University of Natal and later the University of KwaZulu-Natal Medical Ethics Committee for more than a decade.
He established the first law clinic at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in 1973, and the first Street Law legal literacy programme in South Africa in 1986. He has conducted clinical legal education training programmes for law teachers and clinicians in South Africa, West Africa and East Africa. He has taught in continuing legal education courses for the legal profession (attorneys, advocates, judges and academics) throughout South Africa, and in Ethiopia, Ghana, Uganda, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi and Namibia. He has been a member of the International Bar Association’s continuing legal education panel for developing countries and has taught negotiation and mediation skills to law teachers, legal practitioners and paralegals in Southern, Central, East and West Africa.
He has visited more than 125 countries and has facilitated in numerous training, curriculum and materials development workshops on Street Law, Human Rights and Democracy in a variety of countries, including South Africa, Lesotho, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Namibia, Mozambique, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Ghana, Morocco, Egypt, Dubai, Qatar, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, New Zealand, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Albania, Croatia, Ukraine, Latvia,
Armenia, Moldova, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Mongolia, Turkey, Cambodia, Vietnam, China, Malaysia, the Philippines, Vanuatu, Australia, Norway, the United Kingdom, the Falkland Islands, the United States, Spain, Argentina, Peru, Russia and Fiji. In this regard he has worked with Street Law Inc, the Ford Foundation, the Open Society Institute, NORAD, DANIDA, the Commonwealth Secretariat and other organisations. He acted as an International Scholar in the Academic Fellowship Programme to develop law curricula and teaching methods for Moldova for 2009-2013, and Armenia for 2014-2015.
He has helped to draft legal aid legislation for Afghanistan, Sierra Leone, Uganda and Kenya; has advised on the setting up and improving of legal aid schemes in Lithuania, Kyrghyzstan, Afghanistan, Mongolia, Moldova, Indonesia, Sierra Leone, Uganda, Kenya, Somalia, Myanmar (Burma), Nigeria and Fiji; trained paralegals in South Africa, Mongolia and Malawi; helped to develop paralegal advice offices and materials for Sierra Leone, Malawi, Mongolia, Moldova, Cambodia and Indonesia; provided professional legal training in Namibia, Zambia, Malawi and Ghana and clinical legal education training for the United Kingdom, Australia, Nigeria, Uganda, Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos, the Philippines, Indonesia, Iran, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Jordan, Pakistan,Afghanistan and Fiji; and conducted medico-legal workshops for Ghana, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Zimbabwe, and for Iraqi doctors in Kuwait. He has hosted legal aid, clinical legal education and paralegal Study Visits to South Africa from Lithuania, Kyrghyzstan, Afghanistan, Iran, Turkey, Mongolia, Moldova, Indonesia, Cambodia, Myanmar, Uganda, Kenya, Sierra Leone, Nigeria and Somalia (Somaliland).
Professor McQuoid-Mason has published more than 200 articles in law and medical journals. He has contributed more than 70 chapters to books, and co-authored 24 books and manuals, entitled Human Rights for All (1991) and Democracy for All (1994). He has co-authored Consumer Law in South Africa (1997); Human Rights for Correctional Services (1998); The Guide to Forensic Medicine and Medical Law (1999); Basic Trial Advocacy Skills (2000); Handbook of Forensic Medicine and Medical Law in Kenya (2001); Introduction to Medico-Legal Practice (2001); Crimes against Women and Children: A Medico-Legal Guide (2002); Street Law South Africa: Learner’s Manual 2 ed (2004); Street Law South Africa; Instructor’s Manual 2 ed (2005); Dealing with HIV Infection: Antiretroviral Post-Exposure Prophylaxis (2005); Forensic Medicine, Medical Law and Ethics in East Africa (2005); HIV/AIDS the Law and Human Rights (2006); an A-Z of Nursing Law (2009); Student Book on Criminal Law (2009); Bioethics, Human Rights and Health Law: Principles and Practice (2011); an A-Z of Nursing Law 2 ed (2011); A-Z of Medical Law (2011); Crimes against Women and Children: A Medico-Legal Guide (2012); Best Practices Manual on Democracy Education (2013); Street Law South Africa: Learner’s Manual 3 ed (2015); Street Law South Africa; Instructor’s Manual 3 ed (2015).He is sole author of text books on the Law of Privacy in South Africa (1978) and A Guide to Legal Aid in South Africa (1982). He is a co-editor of the Journal for Juridical Science and the South African Journal of Bioethics and Law, and serves on the Editorial Boards of the International Journal of Legal Practice, the International Journal of Clinical Legal Education, the Journal of Commonwealth Law and Legal Education, Legal Ethics and the Tydskrif vir Hedendaagse Romeins-Hollandse Reg.
Professor McQuoid-Mason has delivered over 150 papers at national and over 200 at international conferences, and runs frequent workshops on human rights and democracy for school teachers, community leaders, youth leaders, women’s groups, trade unions, university
students and school children. He serves on the boards of several human rights and cultural bodies. On 10 December 2004 he was awarded a Special Mention by UNESCO for his work in human rights education; in October 2008 a DCL (honoris causa) by the University of Windsor, Ontario, Canada for his access to justice work around the world; and in April 2009 the Advocate of the Year award by Street Law Incorporated for his work in establishing Street Law legal literacy programmes around the world. On 10 July 2013 he was awarded a DCL (honoris causa) by the University of Northumbria for his promotion of clinical legal education, human rights and Street law nationally and internationally.