Who writes? Explaining authorship on the Supreme Court

In this paper, I examine patterns of authorship on the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom. I relate the identity of the lead opinion author to legal, organisational and political factors. I find that the primary factor explaining lead opinion authorship is specialism in the relevant area of law. Workload and levels of agreement with other panel members have more minor effects. These findings suggest that the UKSC is to a large extent a court of specialists.