Dr Sorcha MacLeod is an academic lawyer with more than twenty years experience in teaching and researching general international human rights law and business and human rights with a focus on private military and security companies. She is a Marie Skłodowska Curie Individual Fellow and Associate Professor at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. She is also a Guest Lecturer affiliated with the Centre for Fundamental Rights at the Hertie School of Governance, Berlin Germany. Before that she was based for many years at the School of Law at the University of Sheffield, UK. In August 2018 she was appointed by the UN Human Rights Council as an independent human rights expert at the UN Working Group on Mercenaries.

Specifically she researches and publishes widely in the area of business and human rights with a particular focus on the regulation of private military and security industry (PMSCs and PSCs) and the privatisation of armed conflicts. She was involved in the drafting of international standards for the security industry including a proposed UN treaty, the Montreux Document and the International Code of Conduct for Private Security Providers (ICoC). She holds Observer Status at the International Code of Conduct Association (ICoCA). Furthermore, she was the UK Technical Expert on Human Rights for the drafting of international audit standard for private military and security companies, ISO18788

She is particularly interested in researching the use and effectiveness of non-traditional regulatory approaches such as certification and auditing and multistakeholder mechanisms to regulate the private security industry and other business actors in conflict zones. As an early adopter of business and human rights standards, the PMSC industry and its regulatory developments offer novel and rich opportunities for ongoing research on effective implementation of human rights standards, multi-stakeholder initiatives (MSI) and regulatory approaches. In addition, these regulatory developments present a potential source of 'lessons learned' and stand as a likely model for other industries seeking to advance and improve human rights and other business standards.

Her expertise in this field has resulted in her being invited to work with government, international organisations, civil society and industry e.g. the UN, the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces (DCAF) and the International Code of Conduct Association for private security providers.