Lord Jonathan Sumption
Jonathan Sumption, Lord Sumption, OBE, member of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, Fellow at the Society of Antiquaries of London, Royal Historical Society Fellow, is one of the most distinguished legal and intellectual figures in Britain.
A former Justice of the UK Supreme Court, he joined the bench in 2012 after an exceptional career at the Bar, becoming one of only a handful of barristers since the 19th century to be appointed directly to the highest court. Before entering the law, he studied history at Magdalen College, University of Oxford, later serving as a Fellow in History and publishing his first major work on medieval pilgrimage.
Over the following decades, he built a great practice in commercial, public, EU, and constitutional law, taking Silk in 1986 and serving in various judicial and advisory roles, including as a Judicial Appointments Commissioner.
Alongside his legal career, Sumption has always remained a prolific historian. He is best known for his monumental five-volume history of the Hundred Years War (Vols. 1–5) constitutes his most monumental historical project, completed in 2023. He is currently working on a study of the French Wars of Religion. His 2019 BBC Reith Lectures, Law and the Decline of Politics, cemented his reputation as one of Britain’s most incisive public thinkers. He has held roles supporting the arts, including long-standing governance positions at the Royal Academy of Music, serving as a governor from 2002 to 2024, and at the English National Opera.
His legal-political books (Trials of the State, Law in a Time of Crisis, The Challenges of Democracy) draw on his experience as a former Supreme Court Justice and examine the evolving relationship between law, politics, and democracy. The book Equality (1979), featuring Keith Joseph, and his early works, show that, from the outset, Sumption combined historical scholarship with reflections on political and legal questions.
Click the ‘Listen’ button below to hear Dominic Bowen with Jonathan Sumption unpack how erosion of trust in institutions led to stronger Populist movements and hear Jonathan give a thoughtful analysis on the consequences of the UK’s first-past-the-post electoral system on party systems. Click ‘Read’ for a more in-depth analysis of the subject, weighing the competing narratives around why Populism thrives, the growing and perhaps dangerous overstep of Justice over questions of State, the growing anti-globalisation trends, and Sumption’s thoughts on what is to be done.
