Role
At NTU, Dr Michele Grigolo has taught modules in political sociology, urban sociology, service learning and public sociology, at both undergraduate and postgraduate sociology courses. He is also Study Exchange Coordinator for the Department of Social and Political Sciences and contributes to the Research Ethics Committee of the School of Social Sciences.
He co-leads the Research Group Cities and Community based at the Centre for Policy, Citizenship and Society. His research interests focus on human rights, sexuality, cities and urban space, the right to the city, children’s rights and clothing.
Career overview
Dr Michele Grigolo has a Degree in Political Sciences (International Studies) and an MA Degree in Human Rights and Democratisation from the University of Padua (Italy). In 2009, he earned his PhD on Social and Political Sciences from the European University Institute (Florence). Before joining NTU in 2014, he was Postdoctoral Fellow of the Portuguese Federation for Science and Technology at Coimbra’s Centre for Social Studies.
Research areas
Dr Michele Grigolo’s early research focused on the international and legal dimension of human rights and looked critically at the development of LGBT rights within the European Union and the European Convention on Human Rights. Beginning with his PhD, he has shifted his attention on the connection between human rights and cities, through theoretical and empirical explorations of the concept of human rights city. In that respect, he looks critically at how agents of human rights cities and in particular local governments approach and use human rights in practice, from their definition to their implementation through urban policy, at the macro- but also micro-level of construction of human rights. In his current research,
Dr Michele Grigolo is exploring the theoretical and empirical nexus between human rights and the right and looks at how new human rights emerge from relations and practices centred in the urban space. He leads a team project at NTU on children’s right to clothing in Nottingham, in partnership with Sharewear Clothing Scheme. Much of this research has been disseminated through a variety of publications, including his monograph The Human Rights City: New York, San Francisco, Barcelona, published in 2019 by Routledge. Michele Grigolo is interested in supervising doctoral projects in the area of political and urban sociology, around issues of human rights, cities, the right to the city, urban governance, and social movements.
External activity
Dr Michele Grigolo has done consultancy, either alone or as part of a team, for projects commissioned by international organisations and agencies, including the European Parliament, the Fundamental Rights Agency of the European Union and United Cities and Local Governments. He has worked with practitioners such as Amnesty International, the Raoul Wallenberg Institute of Human Rights, and local human rights coalitions in Washington DC, Vienna, Pittsburgh, Cologne, and Nottingham, to develop city action around human rights.
He co-convened the Study Group on the Sociology of Human Rights of the British Sociological Association between 2014 and 2024. He is currently co-lead of the Research Network on Political Sociology of the European Sociological Association, for which he is organising the midterm conference, Social Justice: Reimagined, Repoliticised, Realised at NTU (June 2025).
Publications
Books
- 2019, The Human Rights City: New York, San Francisco, Barcelona, London, New York: Routledge.
- 2016, Global Urban Justice: The Rise of Human Rights Cities, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Co-edited with B. Oomen and M. Davis.
- 2013, Fighting discrimination in Europe: The case for a race-conscious approach, New York, London: Routledge. Co-edited with C. Hermanin and M. Möschel.
Journal Articles
- 2017, “Local governments and human rights: some critical reflections”, in Columbia Human Rights Law Review, 49(1): 67-98.
- 2011, "Incorporating cities into the EU anti-discrimination policy: between racial discrimination and migrant rights", Ethnic and Racial Studies, 34(10): 1751-1769. Special issue “Should and does Race and Ethnic Origin Count in Fighting Discrimination?”.
- 2011, "Introduction: How does race 'count' in fighting discrimination in Europe?”, Ethnic and Racial Studies,34(10): 1635-1647. With C. Hermanin and M. Möschel. Special issue "Should and does Race and Ethnic Origin Count in Fighting Discrimination?".
- 2010, "Human rights and cities: the Barcelona Office for Non-Discrimination and its work for migrants", The International Journal of Human Rights, 14(6): 894-912. Special issue on "Sociology and human rights: confrontations, evasions and new engagements".
- 2010, "Shifting from academic 'brain drain’ to ‘brain gain'", European Political Science, 9(1): 118-130. With M. Lietaert and R. Marimon.
- 2009, "Towards the 'Fifth Freedom': Increasing the Mobility of Researchers in the European Union" Higher Education in Europe, 34(1): 25 – 37. With R. Marimon and M. Lietaert.
- 2003, "Sexualities and the ECHR: Introducing the Universal Sexual Legal Subject", European Journal of International Law, 14(5): 1023-44.
Book Chapters
- 2019, "Understanding the right to the city as the right to difference", in E. Garcia-Chueca and L. Vidal (eds.) Advancing Urban Rights: Equality and Diversity in the City, CIDOB: Barcelona, pp.23-31.
- 2017, “Towards a sociology of the human rights city: Focusing on practice”, in M. Davis, T. Gammeltoft Hansen and E. Hanna (eds.) Human Rights Cities and Regions: Swedish and International Perspectives, Lund: Raoul Wallenberg Institute, 11-21.
- 2016, "Towards a sociology of the human rights city", in B. Oomen, M. Davis and M. Grigolo (eds.), Global Urban Justice: The Rise of Human Rights Cities, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
- 2013, “"Incorporating cities into the EU anti-discrimination policy: between racial discrimination and migrant rights", in M. Möschel, C. Hermanin and M. Grigolo (eds.) Fighting discrimination in Europe: The case for a race-conscious approach, New York, London: Routledge, 115-133.
- 2013, "Introduction: How does race ‘count’ in fighting racial and ethnic discrimination in Europe?", in M. Möschel, C. Hermanin and M. Grigolo (eds.) Fighting discrimination in Europe: The case for a race-conscious approach, New York, London: Routledge. With C. Hermanin and M. Möschel, 1-12.
- 2013, “Conclusion. Rethinking the fight against discrimination: the case for a race-conscious approach”, with C. Hermanin and M. Möschel, in M. Möschel, C. Hermanin and M. Grigolo (eds.) Fighting discrimination in Europe: The case for a race-conscious approach, New York, London: Routledge, 134-145.
- 2011 "Human rights and cities: the Barcelona Office for Non-Discrimination and its work for migrants", in P. Hynes, M. Lamb, D. Short and M. Waites (eds.) Sociology and human rights: new engagements, New York, London: Routledge.
Encyclopaedia articles
- 2012, "Italia", Dicionário das crises e das alternativas, Coimbra: Medina.
- 2009, "Italy”, with F. Jörgens, in C. Stewart (ed.) The Greenwood Encyclopaedia of LGBT Issues Worldwide, Westport: Greenwood Press, pp- 251-268.
Press expertise
- Human rights issues
- European Convention of Human Rights
- European anti-discrimination legislation
- Discrimination issues – including sexual, racial, religious and employment discrimination
- Inequality issues
- LGBT issues
Course(s) I teach on
-
Undergraduate | Full-time / SandwichCOURSE
Sociology - BA (Hons)
https://www.ntu.ac.uk/course/social-sciences/ug/ba-hons-sociology
-
Undergraduate | Full-timehttps://www.ntu.ac.uk/course/social-sciences/ug/sociology-and-criminology
-
Postgraduate taught | Full-timeCOURSE
Sociology - MA
https://www.ntu.ac.uk/course/social-sciences/pg/ma-sociology