Dr Haward Soper

I am a retired commercial and contracts professional. In a 35 year career I worked in local regional and global positions with an emphasis on the analysis negotiation and execution (including the occasional dispute management role) of contracts. My work was broad and included facilities management airport baggage handling nuclear fuel handling coal and ash handling steam and gas turbines compressors and other high speed rotating machinery. In my favourite role I headed up a global department of 60+ contract experts for Siemens 6Bn Euro Oil and Gas division. I am a Scot who has become a Leicester citizen over the last 34 years since I moved here to work at GEC's Whetstone site. I studied Law at the University of Dundee and then undertook an MPhil here in Leicester to improve my understanding of the common law of contract

My research is multi-pronged but focusses on contract law. I prefer real-world research examining the lived experience of real participants in the contracting process to underpin my critique of current contract law and theory. I have also done a little so far unpublished work on decision making building on previous work on sunk cost theory in an effort to show that focussing experimental work on students is not a good idea and results are likely to be unrealistic. 

Book

• Soper, C Haward Commercial Expectations and Cooperation in Symbiotic Contracts - A Legal and Empirical Analysis 2020 Routledge

Articles

• Soper CH, 'Adjudication for All' (2021) 171 NLJ 19
• Soper CH, 'Occam’s Razor or Leggatt’s Multiblade - Good Faith or a Clean Shave?' (2021) 2021 JBL 580
• Soper, C Haward ‘Commercial expectations and cooperation in symbiotic contracts: An empirical and legal analysis ' (2021) Journal of Strategic Contracting and Negotiation
• Soper, C Haward ‘Contractant behaviour in the pandemic: A real-world survey’ (2022) Journal of Strategic Contracting and Negotiation
• Soper CH, 'Unilateral decision-making powers in contract to be used by good boys or cognitive misers?' (2024) Journal of Strategic Contracting and Negotiation 20555636241269297
• Soper CH, 'Consequential Loss? In a Sense No Loss Is Consequential' (2023) 1 Contract and Commercial Law Review
• Soper CH, 'Negotiation and the law of contract – multivalency or incoherence?' (2023) 52 Common Law World Review 3
• Soper CH, 'What is a Relational Contract? Does Coherence Lurk Amongst Shapeshifting Incidents and Grandiloquent Language?' (2023) [Mar 2022 Online] Sing JLS 1
• Soper CH, 'Daejan Investments Ltd v Benson—Lord Wilson Was Right' (2024) 40 Construction Law Journal 219
• Soper CH, 'Loss for Words' (2024) 12th April 2024 NLJ 19
• Forthcoming in the JBL – ‘Long Leasehold ‘Management Packs’ – Use and Abuse’

Under Review:

• Insurance Information Available to Long-Leaseholders
• Service Charge Budget - to Consult or Not to Consult?
• Is a Long Domestic Leasehold Contracta ‘Relational’ Contract?
• The Administration Charge Scamscape

Presentations to Private Law Cluster University of Leicester

• Contract, conflict, contract management and cooperation December 2015
• Constructing a Duty to Cooperate in Contract. From Blackburn to Cranston (and back?) January 2018
• Negotiating Damages or negotiating damages?  Wrotham Park, Milngavie and Kirkcudbright February 2019
• X-Phi – is real-world application possible? Prisoner’s dilemmas and philosophy with an empirical edge examined June 2019
• No Oral Modification Clauses - Safeguards against abuse - More than waiver/less than estoppel? October 2019
• Contract, conflict and  co-operation – Contractual Discretion - the views of professionals July 2020
• Occam’s Razor or Leggatt’s Multiblade - Good Faith or a Clean Shave? November 2020
• Contractant Behaviour in the Pandemic – an Empirical Survey – June 2021
• What is a Relational Contract? Does Coherence Lurk Amongst Shapeshifting Incidents and Grandiloquent Language? November 2023

Surveys

• Cooperation in Contract – 2015 – 550 respondents – results published in PhD and book
• Contract Behaviour in the Pandemic – 2021 – 100+ respondents - results published in JSCAN
• Sunk Cost – 2016-2022 – 1400+ respondents – unpublished
• Long Leaseholder Experience – England and Wales – 655 respondents – part published and still being analysed

External Presentations

• Contract, conflict and  co-operation - Contractual discretion and the views of commercial experts Society of Legal Scholars 2016
• Working with contracts in English – Polish Bar – Warsaw – April 2017
• Are Lawyers Decisive? School of Adult Education Discussion November 2019
• Contract, conflict and  co-operation - The views of professionals – Terrible Grub Inc
  v The Titchborne Trust IACCM Conference - Leeds University April 2019
• Is a Long Domestic Leasehold Contract    a ‘Relational’ Contract? - Could Relational Concepts Transform Long Leasehold? KCON Bristol  June 2024
• How Judicial Normativism Distorts Contract Doctrine – Society of Legal Scholars – Leeds 2025

Any work on contract theory especially where empirical work is involved

Nudge theory Empirical work on contract commercial expectations on contract cooperation in contract

Presented paper to International Association of Commercial and Contract Management conference at the University of Leeds in early 2020. This was a case study of expert reaction to a contract dispute

LLB MPhil PhD. Pre retirement FCIPS and MCIArb