Grants
ARC Grants
| Project title: | Taxation, family policy and pension reform in an uncertain economy |
| Researchers: | Apps, P, Booth, A, Breunig, R, Rees, R & van Soest, A |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2010-December 2012 |
| Funding: | $580,000 |
| Project Summary: | The policies with which this research is concerned are central in determining the well being of millions of Australians in both current and future generations. It is important that these policies be debated and formulated on the basis of the best possible conceptual framework and with the most reliable possible quantitative assessments of their effects. It is also important that the policies concerned be considered jointly rather than in isolation from each other. The work will therefore directly assist policy makers in this area. Since it will be at the leading edge of current research, it will also benefit Australia's standing in the international research community. |
| Project title: | The design and application of taxation laws to domestic and cross-border transactions triggered by carbon emission trading schemes |
| Researchers: | Black, C, Burns, L & Milne, J |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2010-December 2012 |
| Funding: | $217,000 |
| Project summary: | The introduction of a national emissions trading scheme is the cornerstone of the Australian Government's response to climate change, the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme. The goal of this and other similar emissions trading schemes is the reduction of carbon emissions in the most cost effective manner. By promoting the harmonisation of the taxation treatment of permits on an international level, this project will promote the establishment of a uniform price for carbon and thereby support global initiatives to reduce emissions. Only a coordinated international response has the potential to reduce global emissions and therefore mitigate the impact of climate change on Australians and the Australian economy. |
| Project title: | A Comparative Constitutional History of Citizenship Law and Gender |
| Researchers: | Irving, H |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2010-December 2013 |
| Funding: | $204,000 |
| Project summary: | Australia has been a historical leader both in progressive citizenship laws for women, and in democratic constitution making. This history is relatively well known, but little attention has been paid to the constitutional dimension of citizenship law, and even less with respect to its impact on gender equality. As constitution making and modernisation increase around the world, along with growing strains on domestic regulation of citizenship in all modern countries, the place of gender equality in these processes is a central issue. This project will engage Australian scholarship in, and enhance Australia's contribution to, an important and growing field, from a comparative and trans national perspective. |
| Project title: | Financing Human Rights: Global Problems and Possibilities |
| Researchers: | Kinley, D |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2010-December 2012 |
| Funding: | $278,000 |
| Project summary: | In global terms, Australia is a rich country with a large aid budget and a strong record of supporting the international advancement of human rights standards, especially in the Asia Pacific. Australia's private sector also invests heavily in many of our neighbouring states, thereby helping to advance human rights through economic development. But human rights problems persist in many countries in our region. This project seeks to optimise the impact of the financing of human rights protection in developing countries, and thereby add significantly to the maintenance and promotion of the security, prosperity and welfare of all peoples in our region. |
| Project title: | Developing a legal framework for Indonesia's participation in an internationally sanctioned scheme for Reducing Emissions from Deforestation (and Degradation) |
| Researchers: | Lyster, R, Peden, E, Stephens, T & Butt, S |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2010 - December 2012 |
| Funding: | $224,000 |
| Project summary: | In global terms, Australia is a rich country with a large aid budget and a strong record of supporting the international advancement of human rights standards, especially in the Asia Pacific. Australia's private sector also invests heavily in many of our neighbouring states, thereby helping to advance human rights through economic development. But human rights problems persist in many countries in our region. This project seeks to optimise the impact of the financing of human rights protection in developing countries, and thereby add significantly to the maintenance and promotion of the security, prosperity and welfare of all peoples in our region. |
| Project title: | Risk, Urban Fire Protection and Security Networks |
| Researchers: | O'Malley, P |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2010 - December 2012 |
| Funding: | $255,000 |
| Project summary: | Urban fire prevention is a critical field for public security and economic development. As such, it has always been shaped by factors beyond those of simple technological growth. These include major unanticipated events and the responses to them by many state and non state agencies with divergent interests and knowledge bases. By analysing the resulting 'technological politics', the project will examine the ways in which this strategic field has taken on a risk based preventative orientation. This will contribute new perspectives and considerations for the assessment and development of fire prevention and urban security in the 21st century. |
| Project title: | Legal and Ethical Preparedness for Pandemic Influenza |
| Researchers: | Bennett, B & Carney, T |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2009-December 2011 |
| Funding: | $430,000 |
| Project Summary: | Over 40 million people in the world died in the 1918 Influenza pandemic. Any repetition could have devastating social and economic costs for Australia and the Region. Community confidence in quarantine or other restrictions in the medical management of pandemics depends on balancing protection of public health against the rights of citizens to go about their work and daily lives. By studying the adequacy of existing human pandemic influenza planning in Australia and the Asian region, this project will contribute to law reform and policy development needed to command community confidence in the ethical and public policy balances embodied in national pandemic plans, and the laws and practices which support them. |
| Project title: | Juror confidence in justice: democratic participation or deference to authority? |
| Researchers: | Tait, D, Parker, S, Carney, T & Goodman-Delahunty, J |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2009-December 2011 |
| Funding: | $245,000 |
| Project summary: | Australia will be better protected from terrorism and crime if its justice system has the confidence of its citizens. Currently it does not. Without such confidence, justice offers neither a credible deterrent nor a protector of rights. Courts are typically designed and run using a hierarchical model of authority, while new therapeutic and restorative approaches make justice processes more democratic. There is little evidence of how either of these impacts on justice for participants. Understanding the process by which people develop trust during one critical adjudicative process, the jury trial, will allow juries, and other forms of lay decision making in judicial processes, to be used more effectively in the justice system. |
| Project title: | Enhancing Reproductive Opportunity in Australia: Reconsidering Consent, Altruism and the Legal Status of Embryos in ART Processes |
| Researchers: | Millbank, J, Stuhmcke, A & Karpin, I |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2009-December 2011 |
| Funding: | $304,000 |
| Project summary: | This project meets the national research priority of a healthy start to life by enhancing reproductive opportunity while safeguarding the rights and interests of all involved in reproduction with donor gametes. This research will create significant national benefits in the form of an up to date, practical and coherent platform for the reform of all aspects of embryo and gamete donation and embryo disputes. We propose a pro-active consultative model that centres the needs and experiences of gamete and embryo donors and recipients. Our research will inform current and future modes of regulation of gamete and embryo donation and dispute resolution, including legislation, ethics guidelines and codes of practice. |
| Project title: | Relocation after parental separation: a longitudinal study |
| Researchers: | Parkinson, P, Cashmore, J & Chisholm, R |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2009-December 2011 |
| Funding: | $360,000 |
| Project summary: | This project is to examine the long-term outcomes of relocation disputes, when one parent after separation wants to move far away with the children against the opposition of the other parent. The study is of great international importance, as these disputes have become so numerous and difficult to resolve. The results of the study will enhance Australia's international reputation as a leader in family law innovation and research. The national benefits will include better information for courts in making relocation decisions and an evidence-base for the Government to make legislative changes if needed. |
| Project title: | The Legal Function of Serious Disability in Prenatal and Neonatal Health Care Settings |
| Researchers: | Savell, K & Karpin, I |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2009 - December 2011 |
| Funding: | $229,000 |
| Project summary: | Increasing numbers of Australians are using prenatal testing technologies to avoid having a disabled child. Australians also have access to a range of sophisticated life-sustaining technologies for premature newborns and seriously imperiled infants. Legal guidance on the appropriate uses of these technologies is piecemeal and inconsistent across Australia's States and Territories, and the meaning of serious disability varies amongst members of the community. This project will benefit Australians by providing greater consistency in decision-making about disability. This will be achieved by assessing the value of a uniform framework for governing legal responses to serious disability in the context of reproduction. |
| Project title: | The International & Humanitarian Law Library - A global dimension in Australian legal research infrastructure |
| Researchers: | Mowbray, A, Greenleaf, G, Blay, S, Byrnes, A, Rayfuse, R, Adams, M, Rothwell, D, Rubenstein, K & Triggs, G |
| Grant type: | ARC LIEF |
| Duration: | January 2009 - December 2009 |
| Funding: | $150,000 |
| Project summary: | All researchers in international and humanitarian law in Australian Law Schools will use this infrastructure to improve their research. So will similar researchers from Universities worldwide, enhancing Australia's reputation in this field. Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, and other government agencies involved in international law, co-operation and trade, will obtain similar benefits from resources not available within government, assisting the Australian Government's moves toward greater involvement in international institutions. Researchers from non-government organisations with international engagements will benefit from free access, as will all Australians who wish to better inform themselves in these fields. |
| Project title: | A Lifecycle Approach to Labour Supply, Human Capital Accumulation and Public Policy |
| Researchers: | Apps, P, Rees, R & Walker, I |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2008-December 2010 |
| Funding: | $207,938 |
| Project summary: | Australia's rate of economic growth and tax base for funding education, health and welfare will depend crucially on future labour supply and productivity. The central aim of this project is to develop a more advanced approach to modelling the impact of education, childcare and tax polices on household labour supply decisions and human capital accumulation over the lifecycle. The significance of the project is that it will provide a better understanding of the longer-term effects of government policies on family labour supply decisions, and on gender difference that begin in the early childrearing phases and persist throughout the lifecycle. |
| Project title: | Workplace Death and Injury: Re-visiting the Regulatory Impact of Prosecution and Deterrence |
| Researchers: | McCallum, R, Jamieson, S & Schofield, T |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2008-December 2010 |
| Funding: | $345,237 |
| Project summary: | This project aims to: a) determine the deterrent capacity of recent occupational health and safety legislation in NSW (2000) and Victoria (2004); b) identify how the law and prosecution of OH&S infringement can contribute to reducing and preventing the mounting carnage and serious impairment that occurs in Australian workplaces; and c) advance current legal thinking associated with the concept of deterrence in relation to OH&S. The project will provide fresh insights into OH&S prosecution and deterrence, identifying pathways for legal prosecution to advance the achievement of workplaces that ensure the health and well-being of Australian workers and their families, and improved economic productivity. |
| Project title: | Gateways to Justice: Improving video-mediated communications for justice participants |
| Researchers: | Tait, D, Carney, T, Goodman-Delahunty, J, Lennard, C, Brawn, G, Battye, G, Blackman, D, Wallace, A, Robertson, J, Jones, D, Auty, K, Missingham, G & Refshauge, R |
| Grant type: | ARC Linkage |
| Duration: | July 2007-June 2010 |
| Funding: | $295,603 |
| Project summary: | Justice hearings are increasingly likely to employ video communication facilities to provide access for remote participants. This project brings together a critical mass of researchers from seven disciplines together with courts, prosecutors, police and technology companies to develop best practice guidelines for introducing new video technologies. The project tests the impact of technological change on participants' sense of presence and the effectiveness of communication; tests the impact of social and environmental changes; and their combined effects. Real courtroom environments are modified, based on results of the experiments, and impacts of the changes on users are measured and analysed. |
| Project title: | Safeguarding the domestic tax base in a world without investment borders |
| Researchers: | Burns, L & Krever, R |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2007-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $120,000 |
| Project summary: | The project will examine Australia's tax rules applying to investments in foreign corporations controlled by Australian residents (known as "CFCs") in the context of a changing global economy. Australia's CFC rules are based on design principles developed overseas long before globalization that are now viewed by many in the business community as a significant impediment to investment abroad. Drawing upon country experiences and the growing field of theoretical literature, the project will examine CFC design, making reform recommendations for more efficient tax rules that protect the integrity of Australia's tax base while removing unnecessary impediments to legitimate Australian investment abroad. |
| Project title: | A study of law reform and its responses to rapid social and community change |
| Researchers: | Graycar, R & Morgan, J |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2007-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $220,000 |
| Project summary: | Institutional law reform agencies, particularly law reform commissions, have been part of the legal landscape in Australia since the 1960s or 1970s. It is timely to critically examine whether in light of the rapid rate of social change in the 21st century their processes and practices remain effective and responsive. Through the use of three case studies: family law reform, laws governing defences to domestic homicide and tort law reform, we will assess the extent to which they are responsive to the concerns of those traditionally excluded from the legal mainstream. |
| Project title: | Aboriginal Women Law and Colonialism: Safe Places for Women |
| Researchers: | Watson, I & Stubbs, J |
| Grant type: | ARC Indigenous Researchers Development |
| Duration: | January 2007-December 2008 |
| Funding: | $40,000 |
| Project summary: | This project will collect, collate and analyse Australian case law from the 1820s until 1985, complementing the Chief Investigator's current review of Australian cases from 1986 to 2006. In light of the recent debate on violent crimes against Aboriginal women this project will review Australian cases that have considered questions of Aboriginal law, culture and violence against Aboriginal women, throughout Australian legal history. The decisions will be analysed to consider the courts interpretation of Aboriginal law and culture. This analysis will provide information for the framing of future conversations and policy directions concerning the safety of Aboriginal women and children. |
| Project title: | Managing Conflict in Higher Education |
| Researchers: | Astor, H |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2006-December 2007 |
| Funding: | $62,000 |
| Project summary: | Disputes in Australian universities attract extensive publicity that damages the national and international reputation of Australian universities in the local and global marketplace. Litigation and other costs amount to millions of dollars. This money could be better spent on universities' core business of teaching and research. This project will use new developments in alternative dispute resolution to help Australian universities resolve disputes more effectively. It will focus on methods of resolving disputes that save costs but are also appropriate for disputes involving important issues such as academic freedom. |
| Project title: | Gender Inequities in Health Research: Towards a New Regulatory Framework |
| Researchers: | Bennett, B, Rogers, W & Karpin, I |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2006-December 2008 |
| Funding: | $300,000 |
| Project summary: | This project will benefit Australian women by identifying better and fairer ways for the legal system to ensure that health research performed in Australia provides meaningful information about the significance of new health treatments for Australian women. The research undertaken in this project will make recommendations for the development of Australian laws and policies that will promote and maintain good health by encouraging equal participation of men and women in health research and analysis by gender of research results. This is particularly important given the ageing of the Australian population and the greater longevity of women compared to men. |
| Project title: | The Subversion of Contemporary Performance-Based Pay: A Comparative Australian-US Study |
| Researchers: | Hill, J, Thomas, R & Masulis, R |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2006-December 2008 |
| Funding: | $210,000 |
| Project summary: | The key national benefit from the project will be the development of a more informed basis for analysing, and making policy and regulatory decisions about executive remuneration, which is a matter of great community concern in Australia. The project will assess key provisions in Australian and US executive contracts, providing important comparative information about the structure and operation of performance based pay schemes. The project will also examine whether systemic problems exist in executive remuneration. The results will assist policy analysts in identifying directions for legal reform, to address problems of non alignment of interests in executive remuneration, thereby achieving fairer outcomes. |
| Project title: | GST and the Global Economy: Identifying the underlying causes of consumption tax conflicts affecting cross-border trade |
| Researchers: | Millar, R |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2006-December 2008 |
| Funding: | $140,000 |
| Project summary: | This project will provide an independent analysis of the desirability of particular types of destination based jurisdictional rule in a GST/VAT in light of their effects on global trade and revenue collection. Focussing on basic principles, the project will assess the relationship between the ideal subject of the tax (consumption) and the practical effects of existing laws (which tax their own peculiar concept of consumption). The inclusion of comparative research on developing and transition countries will enable Australia to assess the outcomes of the concurrent OECD and EC work in this area from a broader perspective and to evaluate the effects of its own laws on both global trade and the revenue of Australia and its trading partners. |
| Project title: | Lifestyle Wars: Law's role in responding to the challenges of non-communicable diseases |
| Researchers: | Magnusson, R |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2006-December 2008 |
| Funding: | $156,000 |
| Project summary: | In economic, social and personal terms, non communicable diseases impose a massive health burden upon Australian society. Law is a potent tool that could influence the economic, environmental and social structures, as well as the personal choices, that generate poor health outcomes. Very little work has been carried out on law's relationship with non communicable diseases, either in Australia or internationally. By exploring and promoting the contribution that public health law can make to health policy on non communicable diseases, this project will contribute to the promotion and maintenance of good health in Australia. |
| Project title: | Relocation after parental separation and the best interests of children |
| Researchers: | Parkinson, P, Cashmore, J & Chisholm, R |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2006-December 2008 |
| Funding: | $330,000 |
| Project summary: | The project is of importance not only for Australia, but internationally, because relocation disputes are a pressing issue around the world in family law. These disputes have become numerous as laws have changed in recent years to reflect the ideal that parents should share responsibility after separation and that children should have regular contact with both of them. This ideal clashes with the promise of divorce that individuals should be able to live their own lives without being unduly bound by ties to the other parent. This will be the world's first such prospective longitudinal study of the outcomes of relocation decisions. The national benefits will include better information for courts in making relocation decisions. |
| Project title: | Modelling the labour market and the impact of the tax-benefit system on employment and GDP |
| Researchers: | Apps, PF, Booth, A & Rees, R |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2005-December 2007 |
| Funding: | $319,000 |
| Project summary: | The aim of the project is to develop a general equilibrium model of the labour market that can provide a rigorous and empirically relevant framework for tax-benefit reform analysis. The research will test alternative hypotheses concerning the determinants of changes in female and male employment and wage dispersion. Importantly, the analysis will take account of shifts in labour demand with the substitution of market for domestic work associated with the expansion of female employment, and the crucial implications this has for GDP in an ageing population. The project will provide a more informed basis for formulating policies that can raise living standards while reducing inequality. |
| Project title: | Family Lawyers and Child-Focused Dispute Resolution: Managing Inter-Professional Relationships in the Family Law System |
| Researchers: | Rhoades, HM, Sanson, AV, Swain, PA, Astor, H |
| Grant type: | ARC Linkage |
| Duration: | January 2005 - December 2007 |
| Funding: | $64,000 |
| Project summary: | This multi-disciplinary project involving law, psychology and social work, will shed light on the facilitators and inhibitors of effective collaboration between legal and social science professionals in the family law system. It will do this by exploring the knowledge base, attitudes, norms and beliefs that underpin practice for both groups as well as contextual factors affecting collaboration. . The study is a response to government proposals to increase reliance on non-legal dispute management methods and mediation professionals to resolve post -separation parenting disputes. It aims to inform the design of better integrated professional services for separated parents in the family law system. |
| Project title: | Mental Health Tribunals: Balancing fairness, freedom, protection and right to treatment? |
| Researchers: | Carney, T, Tait, D, Chappell, D & Coumarelos, C |
| Grant type: | ARC Linkage |
| Duration: | January 2005-December 2007 |
| Funding: | $285,000 |
| Project summary: | In determining treatment options for mentally ill people, mental health tribunals must balance the person's right to treatment with rights to safety, justice and freedom from coercion. Much studied overseas, Australia lacks information about the 'fairness' of hearings. Applying popular 'therapeutic jurisprudence' literature, this project studies the impacts of hearings in three diverse Australian jurisdictions (NSW, Vic & ACT). It uses field observations, interviews and file reviews to isolate best practice reforms. Broader than overseas work, it assesses the actual and perceived fairness of hearings, and the therapeutic outcomes for patients. As in Britain, the project will inform legislative reform and tribunal practices. |
| Project title: | The World Trade Organisation and Human Rights |
| Researchers: | Kinley, D |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2005-December 2007 |
| Funding: | $240,000 |
| Project summary: | The expansion of a liberalised trade regime has special importance for a trade-dependent small economy such as that of Australia. Yet this process within the WTO, particularly after the Cancun Ministerial meeting, has stalled. This inertia has in part been caused by tensions arising from the WTO/human rights debate. There is therefore an urgent need for cutting edge, thorough, balanced research on that topic. Furthermore, the investigation of the attitudes of Australia's neighbours to the human rights/trade debate will aid friendly relations and contribute to the promotion of global security, which is enhanced by the promotion of a just global economic system. Australia also benefits by being a world leader in this crucial debate. |
| Project title: | Globalisation and Biomedicine: Harmonisation of local and global regulatory demands |
| Researchers: | Rothwell, D R & Bennett, B |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2004-December 2005 |
| Funding: | $120,000 |
| Project summary: | The pursuit of biotechnological research and development requires a clear and effective regulatory structure at both the global and national level. Australia's strengths in biotechnology and biomedicine and the Federal Government's strategy to support and promote Australian expertise demand the formulation of appropriate regulatory structures. This project will assess these issues with a focus on globalisation, Australia's federal legal system, the patient in society and health law, and the scope of effective legal regulation. The project will provide insights into and a theoretical understanding of existing global and national legal regulation of this sector as well as assisting in the formulation of future regulatory measures. |
| Project title: | The Impact of Migrants on Australian Public Law: An historical and cultural study |
| Researchers: | Crock, M & Irving, H |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2004-December 2006 |
| Funding: | $110,000 |
| Project summary: | Many leading cases in constitutional and administrative law since 1901 have involved migrants and non-citizens. This project explores their role in the development of public law in Australia. Selected cases will be interpreted from historical, cultural, political and legal doctrinal perspectives, to understand how migrants have shaped the public discourse on judicial review, power of the Executive and human rights. In mapping the impact of migrants on Australian law and society (and, ultimately, national identity), it will contribute to current debates about public law, and assist understanding of citizenship, immigration, sovereignty, and the proper scope of judicial review. |
| Project title: | Seeking Asylum Alone: The treatment of separated and trafficked children in need of refugee protection in Australia |
| Researchers: | Crock, M |
| Grant type: | ARC Linkage |
| Duration: | January 2004-December 2006 |
| Funding: | $118,196 |
| Project summary: | Forced migration is a critical human rights issue. Although increasing in number, children travelling on their own to seek protection abroad have received scant scholarly attention. No systematic research exists on the efficacy of asylum as a mechanism for protecting separated children smuggled or trafficked into Australia. Claims and experiences of such children will be catalogued and studied to determine the extent and nature of the disadvantage they face within Australia's refugee system. The findings will contribute to an international project aimed at articulating best practice guidelines for the legal treatment of separated children in refugee determination systems around the world. |
| Project title: | Legal Responses to Systemic Injuries: Towards a new paradigm for compensation |
| Researchers: | Graycar, R |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2004-December 2006 |
| Funding: | $130,000 |
| Project summary: | This research aims to identify better and fairer ways for the legal system to respond to systemic injuries, such as the taking of indigenous children from families, or widespread abuse of children in institutional settings. The tort system is under attack from the various quarters: in this context, its failure lies in its focus on harms that happen on a one-to-one, rather than a systemic basis. The research will review redress scheme established in other countries (most notably Canada and Ireland) with a view to developing better and more appropriate legal responses to widespread contemporary harms. |
| Project title: | 'Traction' or 'Turbulence' in Japanese Regulatory Style? 'An Empirical Analysis of Japanese Commercial Law Reform since the 1990s |
| Researchers: | Nottage, L, Wolff, L &Anderson, K |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2004-December 2006 |
| Funding: | $195,000 |
| Project summary: | A massive program of law reform is fundamentally reconfiguring Japan's commercial law regime. But where will this reform lead? Many commentators predict the law's "traction" to either a 'Japanese-style' system of informal governance or an 'American-style' system of transparent ex-post regulation. In contrast, this project hypothesises a more "turbulent" process of law reform - one that is complex, conflicting, unpredictable and ongoing. Empirically testing this hypothesis against Japan's wave of commercial law reforms since the 1990s, this project aims to develop a model of legal and regulatory change in Japan. A model is of strategic importance for Australian policy-makers, business-leaders and legal advisors seeking to understand and respond to Japan's changing business and legal environment. |
| Project title: | Family law and the indissolubility of parenthood |
| Researchers: | Parkinson, P |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2004-December 2006 |
| Funding: | $122,784 |
| Project summary: | This project involves comparative analysis of how different family law systems address the problems of post-separation parenting, in particular, the tension between the promise of post-separation autonomy and the need for continuing co-operation between parents. Changes in expectations about post-separation parenting are placing pressures on legal systems to play an ongoing role in dispute resolution and to find a balance between continuing contact and issues about the safety of women and children from family violence. By examining existing approaches, processed and law reform proposals in North America, Europe and elsewhere, proposals will be developed for systemic reform in Australia. |
| Project title: | Rethinking social intolerance: Lessons from the suspension of homophobia at public gay and lesbian celebrations |
| Researchers: | Mason, G, Tomsen, S & Markwell, K |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2003-December 2005 |
| Funding: | $151,000 |
| Project summary: | This project will contribute to the understanding of intolerance via the lessons drawn from an analysis of homophobia at public gay and lesbian celebrations. It will take advantage of these events as exceptional social windows that appear to be characterised by a suspension of overt intolerance. The study innovatively reverses the usual analysis of intolerance and hostility as a social presence. It will analyse situational elements and ways of understanding sexuality that structure mainstream views of these events as pleasurable activities for all participants. It will advance knowledge of homophobia and intolerance in Australian society as contradictory and shifting phenomena. |
| Project title: | Taxation and the Welfare State: Implications of current policy directions for saving, fertility, economic growth and inequality |
| Researchers: | Apps, PF, Breunig, R & Rees, R |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2002-December 2004 |
| Funding: | $260,000 |
| Project summary: | Current changes to taxation and welfare programs increase inequality by significantly lowering the net incomes of secondary earners, thus in turn reducing the net incomes of many low and middle wage families. The aim of the project is to investigate, both theoretically and empirically, the further effects on labour supply and saving in the short term and on family size and economic growth in the longer term. The study will produce new models and empirical results which will contribute to rigorous, informed debate on these issues. |
| Project title: | The Human Rights Responsibilities of Multinational Corporations |
| Researchers: | Kinley, D |
| Grant type: | ARC Linkage |
| Duration: | January 2002-December 2004 |
| Funding: | $134,996 |
| Project summary: | Human rights abuses are perpetrated by multinational corporations, yet they are subject to few laws protecting human rights. Given the global power of these bodies, it is imperative and inevitable that greater legal accountability mechanisms will be developed. Working with a consortium of major industry partners, this project will identify current legal obligations on corporations to protect human rights, their means of enforcement and investigate their likely future extension in Australia and internationally. Best practice models for corporate compliance with these laws will be constructed and all results will be widely disseminated and accessible in a variety of formats. |
| Project title: | Children's involvement in decision-making about residence and contact in family law proceedings |
| Researchers: | Parkinson, P, Cashmore, J & Wilson, J |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2002-December 2004 |
| Funding: | $276,369 |
| Project summary: | This project aims to discover the extent to which children and young people are involved in decision-making about residence and contact when their parents divorce, and to examine how their views are taken into account. It will involve interviews with children and parents about agreements reached without court involvement, and interviews with children, parents, counsellors, separate representatives and judges in cases with court involvement. The findings will result in greater understanding of the factors that affect children's willingness and capacity to be involved in such decision-making and assist counsellors, judges and other court personnel in ascertaining and assessing children's wishes. |
| Project title: | Involuntary treatment of severely ill anorexia nervosa patients: A role for law in therapy? |
| Researchers: | Carney, T, Beumont, P, Touyz, S & Tait, D |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2001-December 2003 |
| Funding: | $142,381 |
| Project summary: | Balancing individual autonomy against ethical duties to save life vexes society, clinicians and lawyers. Coercion in treatment of severely ill young women suffering intractable chronic anorexia highlights these dilemmas. Various legal machinery regulates coercion in treatment, some, like clinical practices, uniquely Australian. Adults in NSW & SA obtain guardians from Guardianship Boards, but Victoria uses mental health powers. Children are covered by child protection, wardship and Family Court powers. Consent and accountability rules differ, as do experiences of patients, families and clinicians. This study examines how legal institutions shape and interact with clinical and life experience, to found best practice medico-legal guidelines. |
| Project title: | Constitutional History, Federation and Judicial Review |
| Researchers: | Irving, H |
| Grant type: | ARC Discovery |
| Duration: | January 2001-December 2003 |
| Funding: | $82,000 |
| Project summary: | The Australian High Court's use of history has grown in recent years and appears likely to increase. Yet it has been neither systematic nor grounded in historical methodology. Commentators have tended to focus on issues of legal rather than historical interpretation. This project aims to identify the uses of Federation history in High Court judgments (both before and after Cole v Whitfield), explore patterns of historical interpretation in these references, and evaluate the use of Federation history in judicial review. The outcome will be a new, systematic approach to the application of history in assisting an understanding of the Constitution. |
| Project title: | Assessing the quality of business tax reform |
| Researchers: | Vann, R, Cooper, G & Dirkio, M |
| Grant type: | ARC SPIRT |
| Duration: | January 2001-December 2003 |
| Funding: | $150,000 |
| Project summary: | This project will undertake research that is long overdue: a systematic study of the outcomes and processes of taxation policy and law development in Australia. It will be the first comprehensive study of private sector involvement in the process using the substantial amount of private data held by the Partner Investigator, the Taxation Institute of Australia. The research has the potential to inform the future development in Australia of a substantial agenda of tax policy and law development still to occur including the entire rewriting of the tax law into a tax code and the review of taxation of international income and superannuation which will occur in the relatively near future. |
| Project title: | Third Party Guarantees |
| Researchers: | Graycar, R, Millbank, J & Harland, D |
| Grant type: | ARC SPIRT |
| Duration: | January 2000-December 2002 |
| Funding: | $169,013 |
| Project summary: | This project will undertake research that is long overdue: a systematic study of the operation of laws dealing with guarantees and other forms of third party securities. This will be the first comprehensive empirical study of this area of law. It will be undertaken collaboratively with the NSW LRC as part of its reference on third party guarantees. The research has the potential to play a key role in informing legal reforms that will both ease the burdens on those involved in financing small business and provide for greater legal and commercial certainty (and therefore less costly litigation). |
NHMRC Grants
| Project title: | Individual decision-making, welfare measurement and policy evaluation |
| Researchers: | Apps, PF, Hall, JP, Fiebig, DG, Louviere, JJ & Viney, RC |
| Grant type: | NHMRC Program Grant |
| Duration: | January 2002-December 2007 |
| Funding: | $6,825,000 |
| Project summary: | This proposed program of research will contribute to the development of economics and health economics internationally. It provides an exciting opportunity to bring together scholars who are at the forefront of the discipline internationally, and who are researchers with extensive experience in the practical application of research results in shaping policy directions. The immediate outcomes of the research program will be information on specific health policy issues, in terms of the drivers of cost and utilisation, access and equity. |
| Project title: | Ethical and legal issues surrounding the decision-making process for donating and banking Umbilical Cord Blood |
| Researchers: | Kerridge, I, O'Brien, T, Stewart, C, Jordens, C, Nassar, N & Ankeny, R |
| Grant type: | NHMRC Project Grant |
| Duration: | January 2008 - December 2010 |
| Funding: | $402,000 |
| Project summary: |
Allogeneic haematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) is curative therapy for many malignant and non-malignant conditions including leukaemia, lymphoma, bone marrow failure syndromes, haemoglobinopathies, immunodeficiencies and inborn errors of metabolisms. Over the past decade transplantation using Umbilical Cord Blood (UCB) stem cells has been shown to be as effective as transplants using bone marrow or peripheral blood stem cells. The success of UCB transplantation in children and in adults has been made possible by the establishment of UCB banks. UCB banking has, however, raised a number of important scientific and ethical concerns, including issues regarding ownership of the blood, the processes for obtaining consent for collection and storage, donor and recipient confidentiality, the ethics and science of commercial "non-altruistic" banking, and social justice issues relating to equity of access and equity of care. Although these concerns have been widely debated, many have not been resolved. Further, to this point there has been no empirical examination of the UCB donation and banking system in Australia.
This research will be the first comprehensive study to ascertain the knowledge and attitudes of the Australian community for UCB donation and banking, as well as provide both a description of practices for obtaining consent, and a thorough legal analysis of the Australian UCB donation and banking system. The results of this research will provide the basis for recommendations for law reform in this area and for changes to institutional practices surrounding education and consent. It is the expectation of the researchers that this, in turn, may lead to increases in donations to public UCB banks, particularly from under-represented populations, which will ultimately benefit all Australians. |
| Project title: | Difficult decisions: a critical analysis of consent to high-risk medical procedures |
| Researchers: | Kerridge, I, Stewart, C, Jordens, C & Carter, S |
| Grant type: | NHMRC Project Grant |
| Duration: | January 2007-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $309,750 |
| Project summary: | It is now widely accepted that individuals have the right to make decisions about their own health care and that their consent is required for the commencement or withdrawal of any intervention or treatment. Consent processes thus codify patient autonomy in health care by ensuring both that competent patients are able to make autonomous choices and that non-competent patients are protected from harm. Although most would agree that the concept of consent is important, the concept is neither clear nor distinct, understanding of its practical application of clinical practice is imperfect, and there are many and conflicting views of its nature and its procedures. This study will re-conceptualise consent to high risk medical procedures through a critical examination of its principles and practices. The hypothesis being that formulaic constructions of consent within a medical context in terms of basic elements fails to adequately capture the specific, complex and deeply contextual nature of decisions about healthcare. |
| Project title: | Deconstructing DTCA: Towards a differentiated policy response to Direct-to-Consumer Advertising in Australia |
| Researchers: | Kerridge, I, Komesaroff, P, Jordens, C, Stewart, C, Ankeny, R & Carter, S |
| Grant type: | NHMRC Project Grant |
| Duration: | January 2007-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $185,563 |
| Project summary: | In recent years attention has turned to the role of the Direct to Consumer Advertising (DCTA) on increasing consumer demand for prescription drugs and the costs of health care. Although DCTA is prohibited in Australia, there are commercial and political pressures to reconsider the current ban. This study will examine the harms and benefits of DCTA, the processes of commercial influence and the opinions of major stakeholders regarding DTCA. The results will allow more informed examination of the legislation and health policy and enable development of resources for increasing literacy among lay people and health professionals for dealing with commercial influence and DTCA. |
Other Competitive Grants
| Project title: | Provision of Research into Shared Care Parenting Arrangements Since the 2006 Family Law Reforms |
| Researchers: | Parkinson, P & Cashmore, J |
| Grant type: | Attorney-General's Department Tender |
| Duration: | March 2009-February 2010 |
| Funding: | $329,755 |
| Project summary: | Shared parental responsibility is about parents having an equal role in making decisions about major long term issues that affect their children. It does not mean that children should spend equal time with each parent. In all decisions relating to children the court is required to decide on the basis of what is in the best interests of the child. This research commissioned by the Attorney-General's Department is into the characteristics of shared care parenting arrangements that work in the best interest of the child. It concerns: a) circumstances under which shared care arrangements work in the best interest of the child; b) circumstances under which shared care arrangements do not work in the best interest of the child; c) circumstances where shared care has not continued; d) whether and, if so, how these circumstances and outcomes for children differ depending on whether shared care arrangements are reached through a court or through Family Dispute Resolution, or outside both courts and Family Dispute Resolution. The purpose of the research is to outline the full range of factors that are positive for shared care and factors which are negative for shared care, with a view to assisting courts, family dispute resolution practitioners and parents in their decision making about the likelihood that a separating family's circumstances would mean that it would or would not be in the best interests of the child to have shared care. |
| Project title: | Strengthening Extractive Industry Governance in Eastern and Southern Africa |
| Researchers: | Burns, L |
| Grant type: | AusAID - Australia Africa Fellowships |
| Duration: | June 2008-October 2008 |
| Funding: | $176,106 |
| Project summary: | The primary outcome of the Fellowship program is to build public sector capacity for fiscal and accounting transparency in respect of revenue generated from extractive industries in Eastern and Southern Africa. Through a combination of formal coursework, , research under academic supervision and practical experience, the program will provide senior government officials with key skills in the development of fiscal policies and revenue management to enable them to improve critical oil, gas, and mining fiscal and regulatory frameworks in their countries. |
| Project title | Tax Administration Capacity Building in Vanuatu |
| Researches: | Burns, L |
| Grant type: | AusAID - Australian Leadership Awards - Fellowships |
| Duration: | March 2009-May 2009 |
| Project summary: | The Tax Administration Capacity Building Fellowship Program intends to transfer key skills and knowledge in tax enforcement, transparent tax practices and development of tax instruments and policy to a senior tax official from the Department of Customs and Inland Revenue, Vanuatu, for the purpose of assisting the Government to develop better enforcement practices, consider new sources of revenue, and implement transparent tax practices. |
| Project title: | Tax Administration Capacity Building |
| Researchers: | Burns, L |
| Grant type: | AusAID - Australian Leadership Awards - Fellowships |
| Duration: | February 2008-May 2008 |
| Funding: | $31,335 |
| Project summary: | The proposed Fellowship program aims to develop skills within the Revenue Services Department relevant to the passing of the new income tax law in Tonga. A combination of formal university coursework, research work and practical placement within the Australian Tax Office will enhance the Fellow's leadership capacity and provide knowledge transfer in key areas such as international tax, audit policy and practice. |
| Project title: | Safeguarding Human Rights in the Criminal Justice System in Nepal |
| Researchers: | Saul, B |
| Grant type: | AusAID - Public Sector Linkages Program |
| Duration: | July 2008-July 2009 |
| Funding: | $170,000 |
| Project summary: | The objective of this project is to improve understanding and knowledge of, and respect for, Nepal's human rights law obligations amongst key actors in the criminal justice system in Nepal. The objective will be achieved by: (1) reviewing legal education in Nepal on human rights in the criminal justice system and formulating and disseminating a model curriculum; (2) training Nepalese police and prosecutors on human rights in the criminal justice system.Thee activities will be conducted by the Sydney Centre for International Law at the University of Sydney, in collaboration with the Kathmandu School of Law. |
| Project title: | Lawmaking in Regional Parliaments: Translating Policy into Law |
| Researchers: | Butt, S & Sholikin, M Nur |
| Grant type: | Australia-Indonesia Governance Research Partnership |
| Duration: | January-December 2010 |
| Funding: | $50,000 |
| Project summary: | Along with his Indonesian research partner - The Centre for Study of Law and Policy, Indonesia (PSHK) - he will investigate the extent to which Indonesian parliaments accommodate constitutional and international human rights norms when making laws; and the extent of the authority of regional parliaments to pass revenue raising laws. |
| Project title: | The Migrant Child Project |
| Researchers: | Crock, M & Cashmore, J |
| Grant type: | Australian Research Alliance for Children & Youth |
| Duration: | June 2007-February 2008 |
| Funding: | $10,000 |
| Project summary: | A primary goal of this collaboration is to develop a national network of stakeholders involved in research into the needs and experiences of child migrants and their transition to full participation in the Australian community. This application is designed to build such a network through a range of interconnected activities aimed at increasing awareness of the needs of migrant children; improving knowledge of relevant laws (with a long term view to reform); and creating more friendly and responsive welfare systems and communities for migrant children and young people. |
| Project title: | Endeavour Executive Award for Muhammad Daud Pirzado from the Federal Bureau of Revenue, Pakistan |
| Researchers: | Burns, L |
| Grant type: | DEEWR Endeavour Executive Award |
| Duration: | January 2009-Decemeber 2009 |
| Funding: | $20,000 |
| Project summary: | Audits are an essential feature of all self-assessed taxes, such as the Value Added Tax. In addition to ensuring high levels of voluntary compliance,audits are essential for the prevention of fraud, particularly in identifying dummy companies used in input tax credit fraud. There is a need in Pakistan to develop effective models for VAT audits to create confidence in the self-assessment system, minimise corruption and detect fraud. The proposed activity will involve study at Sydney Law School engaged incomparative research into developing an effective audit strategy for Pakistan and attending courses on tax administration. |
| Project title: | Hosting Aisling O'Sullivan from the Irish Centre for Human Rights, National University of Ireland |
| Researchers: | Saul, B |
| Grant type: | DEEWR Endeavour Research Fellowship |
| Duration: | March 2009-August 2009 |
| Project summary: | The core issue of this research project is Australian Government policy towards Genocide Convention (1948), from the time of the Convention's drafting to the present day. It aims to establish why successive Australian Governments failed to incorporate the definition of genocide under article II of the Genocide Convention into Australian law. |
| Project title: | Indigenous Stolen Wages on Northern Territory Cattle Stations: Stories from Wave Hill |
| Researchers: | Anthony, T |
| Grant type: | Don Chipp Foundation Small Grants |
| Duration: | November 2007-December 2008 |
| Funding: | $5,000 |
| Project summary: | This project seeks to provide a record of wage conditions for workers in the Northern Territory cattle industry, with particular reference to the stations in the area of Wave Hill. |
| Project title: | Understanding Prosecutorial Decision-Making in Child Sexual Assault Cases |
| Researchers: | Shackel, R |
| Grant type: | Law & Justice Foundation of NSW |
| Duration: | November 2007-February 2009 |
| Funding: | $25,614 |
| Project summary: | This project will gather data about prosecutorial decisions in child sexual abuse cases to improve the understanding of the basis upon which such decisions are made and thereby address any problems that are identified which may undermine the delivery of justice in such cases and public confidence. It is envisaged that the findings of this research will form the basis for further research in this area in other Australian jurisdictions so that a broader picture of prosecutorial decision-making in child sexual assault cases may be gained across Australia. |
| Project title: | Court-directed expert witness conferences in medical negligence cases |
| Researchers: | McDonald, B & Parkinson, P |
| Grant type: | Law & Justice Foundation of NSW |
| Duration: | 2005 |
| Funding: | $16,757 |
| Project summary: | Section 13 CA of the Supreme Court Rules was introduced in 2000 in order to achieve savings in legal and court costs to all parties to a claim and to improve the efficient determination of claims in cases involving conflicting expert evidence. It allows the court to direct that expert witnesses confer and endeavour to reach agreement on outstanding matters in dispute between them and then to provide the court with a joint report specifying matters agreed upon and matters not agreed upon with the reasons for non-agreement. In this way, the matters upon which each witness need be examined and cross examined are drastically reduced and also the court is given much more guidance about the real issues in dispute. |
| Project title: | Seeking Asylum Alone - The treatment of separated and trafficked children in need of refugee protection |
| Researchers: | Crock, M & Bhabha, J |
| Grant type: | MacArthur Foundation |
| Duration: | January 2004-July 2005 |
| Funding: | US$90,000 |
| Project summary: | The research will examine the application of the refugee definition to children and child specific forms of persecution; it will also include an analysis of relevant human rights law as it pertains to trafficked and separated children within the asylum process. Thus the project will inquire into the protections available for child soldiers, drafter deserters and evaders, and it will investigate how children who are smuggled and trafficked prior to their asylum applications come to be in those situations, and what legal remedies are available to them. It will relate international and domestic laws for the protection of victims of trafficking and smuggling to protections available through the refugee protection system. |
| Project title: | Building institutions and capabilities for work and employment in a global era: the social dynamics of labour regulation |
| Researchers: | McCallum, R and 60 co-researchers from Inter-University Research Centre on Globalization and Work |
| Grant type: | Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, Major Collaborative Research Initiatives (MCRI) |
| Duration: | April 2008-December 2015 |
| Funding: | CAD $2,500,000 |
| Project summary: | CRIMT is an interuniversity and interdisciplinary research centre that brings together researchers from around the world to look at the theoretical and practical challenges of institutional renewal for work and employment in a global context. The CRIMT team will examine the involvement of institutional players in dialogues about change and seek to gain a better understanding of the capabilities required to evolve and thrive in this new environment. Key issues include the cross-border organization of production and care, citizenship in the workplace and the implementation of public policies that redistribute work rights and risks, new forms of collective representation, and the social aspects of comparative institutional advantage. |
| Project title: | Government by fire: Fire prevention and urban security networks |
| Researchers: | O'Malley, P |
| Grant type: | Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada Standard Research Grant |
| Duration: | 2005-2008 |
| Funding: | $84,261 |
| Project title: | Principled Engagement: Promoting Human Rights by Engaging Abusive Regimes |
| Researchers: | Pedersen, M & Kinley, D |
| Grant type: | United Nations University Peace & Governance Programme Grant |
| Duration: | April 2008 – September 2009 |
| Funding: | $30,000 |
| Project summary: | The purpose of this project is to explore "principled engagement" as a distinct approach to promoting human rights. Intended to address an important gap in the literature on international statecraft, as well as to provide concrete lessons and recommendations for policy makers, the project will develop a theoretical model of principled engagement and undertake a series of case studies to elucidate how it works in practice. The results will be published in a joint volume by UN University Press, complemented by targeted policy briefings as appropriate. |
| Project title: | Children's Experience of Child-Inclusive Mediation |
| Researchers: | Parkinson, P & Cashmore, J |
| Grant type: | Uniting Care Unifam Counselling & Mediation Research Support Grant |
| Duration: | June 2009-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $60,000 |
| Project summary: | This project is to examine how children experience an intervention which is aimed at helping the parents to listen to their children in making parenting arrangements through mediation. This is known as child inclusive mediation. |
University Grants
| Project title: | Aligning Assessment Regimes in the Sydney Law School |
| Researchers: | Giles, A |
| Grant type: | Teaching Improvement and Equipment Scheme |
| Duration: | January-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $4,962 |
| Project title: | Revise and Update the Sydney Law School Teaching Handbook |
| Researchers: | Giles, A |
| Grant type: | Teaching Improvement and Equipment Scheme |
| Duration: | January-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $4,965 |
| Project title: | Enhancing the undergraduate Law student experience through a peer mentoring programme (pilot) |
| Researchers: | Johns, F, Burns, F & Shearing, S |
| Grant type: | Teaching Improvement and Equipment Scheme |
| Duration: | January-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $49,750 |
| Project Summary: | This project will develop and implement a pilot student peer mentoring programme for first-year undergraduate students in the Faculty of Law. The programme aims to develop a learning community and assist the formation of peer-group support networks. It will provide an intercultural experience and encourage the integration and interaction of local students, international students and exchange students. |
| Project title: | Preventing negligent plagiarism in Postgraduate Law through a formative assessment task |
| Researchers: | Lead, P, Bath, V, Mowbray, J & Anthony, T |
| Grant type: | Teaching Improvement and Equipment Scheme |
| Duration: | January-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $5,000 |
| Project summary: | This project aims to prevent negligent plagiarism in the postgraduate units "Legal Reasoning and the Common Law System" and "International Business Law" by calling students' attention to expectations of referencing, reinforcing ethical and professional standards, and identifying any problems early in the semester. |
| Project title: | Developing Classroom Participation in Explaining Punishment LAWS 6194-64 |
| Researchers: | Mason, G |
| Grant type: | Teaching Improvement and Equipment Scheme |
| Duration: | January-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $4,815.05 |
| Project summary: | The postgraduate criminology unit Explaining Punishment has not been taught in the faculty since 2006. In 2009 I will teach this unit and for the first time it will be offered in an intensive mode. This project will integrate and reformulate the structure and content of these existing units into a new unit structure appropriate for delivery in the intensive mode in 2009. |
| Project title: | Teaching materials for Introduction to Property and Commercial Law |
| Researchers: | Parkinson, P |
| Grant type: | Teaching Improvement and Equipment Scheme |
| Duration: | January-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $5,000 |
| Project summary: | Introduction to Property and Commercial Law is an entirely new subject introduced as a result of changes to the curriculum. It will be taught first in 2009. The purpose of this project is to develop teaching materials to support the introduction of the subject and to develop a web-based supplementary learning environment. |
| Project title: | Review and Redesign of the two Master of International Law compulsory units: "International Law & Australian Institutions" and "Public International Law" |
| Researchers: | Saul, B, Kinley, D & Stephens, T |
| Grant type: | Teaching Improvement and Equipment Scheme |
| Duration: | January-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $5,000 |
| Project summary: | The project will review and redesign the two compulsory units in the Master of International Law (MIL) program. The MIL is one of the alrgest specialist postgraduate coursework programs at Sydney Law School, with a large number of foreign students enrolled. The need to comprehensively revise the two compulsory units has been raised and suggestions for reform have been made. |
| Project title: | Establishing learning and teaching guidelines in the Social Justice Programme in Law |
| Researchers: | Triggs, G, Cashman, P, Saul, B, Coss, G, Stubbs, J & Baghoomians, I |
| Grant type: | Teaching Improvement and Equipment Scheme |
| Duration: | January-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $50,000 |
| Project summary: | This project will develop a model curriculum and curriculum design guidelines for the Social Justice Programme in the Faculty of Law. These will be used to ensure good learning and teaching practice and consistency across all units in the Social Justice Programme. |
| Project title: | Constructing an online assessment tool to aid the development of case analysis skills in law students |
| Researchers: | Glister, J, Smith, B & Shackel, R |
| Grant type: | Teaching Improvement and Equipment Scheme |
| Duration: | January-December 2008 |
| Funding: | $5,131 |
| Project title: | Enhancing HASS Students' Experiences Through Blended Learning Opportunities |
| Researchers: | Atkinson, S, Barbaux, M-T, Loughnan, A, O'Hara, A, Tindall-Ford, S & Waugh, F |
| Grant type: | Teaching Improvement and Equipment Scheme |
| Duration: | January 2008-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $ 79,574 |
| Project summary: | Consistent with goals two and five of the University's Learning and Teaching Plan (2007-2010) to "promote quality and innovative teaching" and to "enhance learning in an information rich environment", this four-Faculty project aims to create an environment that is conducive to the development of blended learning frameworks that will engage students. |
| Project title: | Enhancing Teaching of Economics of Competition for UG LAWS3016 Competition Law |
| Researchers: | Williams, B |
| Grant type: | Teaching Improvement and Equipment Scheme |
| Duration: | January-December 2008 |
| Funding: | $5,000 |
| Project title: | Power, Rule and Consensus in the Mekong River Basin: The Dynamics of 'Hard'and 'Soft' Law in Transboundary Water Governance |
| Researchers: | Johns, F, Hirsch, P, Lyster, R, Saul, B & Stephens, T |
| Grant type: | USyd Bridging Support Grant |
| Duration: | January-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $20,000 |
| Project summary: | The Mekong River Basin sustains approximately 70 million people across Cambodia, China, Laos, Myanmar (Burma), Thailand and Vietnam. Its ecosystem is as complex as the network of transnational rules, institutions and arrangements through which it is governed. This project aims to improve understanding of how those transnational rules, institutions and arrangements operate, and how they might be made to deliver better outcomes for the people of the Mekong River Basin. The project will also deepen understanding of the contemporary dynamics of the international legal order, in its formal and informal dimensions, through close attention to their effects in the governance of the Mekong River Basin. |
| Project title: | Developing a legal framework for Indonesia's participation in an internationally sanctioned scheme for Reducing Emissions from Deforestation (and Degradation) |
| Researchers: | Lyster, R, Stephens, T, Peden, E & Butt, S |
| Grant type: | USyd Bridging Support Grant |
| Duration: | January-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $50,000 |
| Project summary: | Indonesia is the world's third highest emitter of greenhouse gases, emanating from deforestation. There are two emerging global policy responses for reducing deforestation and degradation (RED(D)): public funding schemes to compensate developing countries for reduced deforestation; and the generation of internationally tradeable carbon credits from RED(D). Indonesia's role in RED(D) schemes is crucial yet its forestry legislation ignores the carbon sequestration services provided by its forests. This research project, the first of its kind in the world, will recommend reforms to Indonesia's forestry legislation, government/landholder contracts for reduced deforestation, land tenure and property rights, so as to support RED(D) schemes. |
| Project title: | Modernising and Codifying Australian Sale of Goods Law |
| Researchers: | Tolhurst, G, Gerangelos, P, Peden, E, Winterton, G & Carter, J |
| Grant type: | USyd Bridging Support Grant |
| Duration: | January-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $20,000 |
| Project summary: | Australian sales law is based on an 1893 English statute. It is out of Duration and there are differences between the States. This undermines confidence in transactions. The project aims to review Australian sale of goods law to modernise it, bring uniformity to the law and recommend ways to implement the law. Significantly this will be the first major academic review of sales law in Australia and the first detailed study offederal powers to implement commercial law. The outcome will be a codified law and the means to implement it Australia wide. |
| Project title: | The Regulation of PGD in Australia and New Zealand : Assessing the Attitudes of Key Stakeholders |
| Researchers: | Karpin, I & Bennett, B |
| Grant type: | USyd Bridging Support Grant |
| Duration: | January 2008-December 2008 |
| Funding: | $40,000 |
| Project summary: | This project aims to provide a critical analysis of the current Australian regulatory landscape at the interface between genetic technologies and reproductive decision-making and develop a series of policy and legislative recommendations. It involves a comparative analysis with other countries and international law and a contextual examination of the way law regulates concepts such as disease, disability and health. Specific genetic technologies will be considered including prenatal genetic testing, preimplantation genetic diagnosis and genetic modification. |
| Project title: | Regulating Reproductive Decision-Making in Australia and the Impact of Genetic Technologies |
| Researchers: | Karpin, I & Bennett, B |
| Grant type: | USyd Bridging Support Grant |
| Duration: | January 2007-December 2007 |
| Funding: | $20,000 |
| Project summary: | This project aims to provide a critical analysis of the current Australian regulatory landscape at the interface between genetics and reproductive decision-making and develop a series of policy and legislative recommendations. The project involves a comparative analysis with other countries and international law and a contextual examination of the way law regulates concepts such as disease and health, abnormality and normality. Specific genetic testing technologies will be considered including prenatal genetic testing, preimplantation genetic diagnosis and inheritable genetic modification. |
| Project title: | Workplace Death and Injury: Re-imagining Deterrence and Prosecution |
| Researchers: | McCallum, R, Jamieson, S & Schofield, T |
| Grant type: | USyd Bridging Support Grant |
| Duration: | January 2007-December 2007 |
| Funding: | $40,000 |
| Project summary: | This project aims to determine the deterrent capacity of recent legislation (2000) and administrative processes involved in OH&S prosecution in NSW. It seeks to advance current thinking about how the law and prosecution of OH&S infringement can contribute to preventing the mounting carnage and serious impairment that occurs in Australian workplaces. The project will provide fresh insights into legal deterrence of OH&S offences and identify pathways for legal prosecution in advancing the achievement of workplaces that ensure the health and well-being of Australian workers and their families, and improved economic productivity. |
| Project title: | Australian Immigration Law and Policy: Towards Global Best Practice |
| Researchers: | Crock, M & Hiscox, M |
| Grant type: | USyd Institute of Social Sciences International Linkage Projects Grant |
| Duration: | January 2010-December 2010 |
| Funding: | $40,000 |
| Project summary: | This project is designed ultimately to begin a process of wholesale review of immigration laws and policies in Australia with a view to identifying those areas in which this country has departed from the practices in other Western countries. It is designed to help 'place' Australian law and policies that might assist in the reform process in this country. |
| Project title: | Regulatory Responses to Global Crime: Critically Examining the Themes, Objectives and Institutions of International Criminal Justice (the 'International Criminal Justice Project') |
| Researchers: | Findlay, M, Lynch, J, Fallah, K & Bikundo, E |
| Grant type: | USyd Institute of Social Sciences New Capacity Projects Grant |
| Duration: | January 2010-December 2010 |
| Funding: | $25,000 |
| Project summary: | This application is directed towards capacity enhancement for a pre-existing research network, and a growing cross-disciplinary engagement within the University of Sydney and beyond. |
| Project title: | Intersections in Foreign Investment Law & Policy: Examining Engagement with Cross-Cutting Fields |
| Researchers: | Miles, K, Nottage, L & Park, S |
| Grant type: | USyd Institute of Social Sciences New Capacity Projects Grant |
| Duration: | July 2009-July 2010 |
| Funding: | $58,000 |
| Project summary: | This project undertakes research into interdisciplinary perspectives on foreign investment law, practices and policy. It has a particular focus on the investment sector's interaction with non-investment issues. It is designed to bring together a range of scholars with different but often overlapping perspectives - especially in law, governance, economics and environmental science - converging on the focal point of foreign investment. |
| Project title: | Legal regulation and the evolution of organisational practice: The impact of good faith bargaining rules on employment relations strategies |
| Researchers: | Riley, J, Sarina, T & Knox, A |
| Grant type: | USyd Institute of Social Sciences New Capacity Projects Grant |
| Duration: | January 2010 - December 2010 |
| Funding: | $25,000 |
| Project summary: | The purpose of this project is to examine the impact of the enactment of 'good faith bargaining' obligations in the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth). We propose to monitor the responses of major employers in four key industries - airlines, mining and resources, telecommunications and financial services - to these newly legislated obligations, to assess the extent to which compliance with those obligations has driven any kind of cultural change within organisations, particularly in respect to the accommodation of employees' voices in the processes for negotiating workplace change. |
| Project title: | Crisis and its consequences: The human rights impact of global finance |
| Researchers: | Kinley, D |
| Grant type: | USyd International Visiting Fellowship |
| Duration: | January-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $14,500 |
| Project summary: | USyd International Visiting Fellowship for Dr Andrew Lang from the Law Department, London School of Economics. |
| Project title: | The Cultural Significance of the Fear of Crime |
| Researchers: | Lee, M |
| Grant type: | USyd International Visiting Fellowships |
| Duration: | June 2008-June 2009 |
| Funding: | $10,000 |
| Project summary: | USyd International Visiting Fellowship for Professor Jonathon Jackson from the Methodology Institute and Mannheim Centre for Criminology, London School of Economics. |
| Project title: | Chronic Diseases in National and Global Perspective: Healthy People, Healthy Places, Prosperous Societies |
| Researchers: | Magnusson, R |
| Grant type: | USyd International Visiting Fellowships |
| Duration: | March 2009-March 2010 |
| Funding: | $20,000 |
| Project summary: | USyd International Visiting Fellowship for Professor Lawrence Gostin from Georgetown University Law Center. |
| Project title: | Comparative Law: Human Rights and Common Law Approaches to Criminal Evidence and Procedure |
| Researchers: | Findlay, M |
| Grant type: | USyd International Visiting Fellowships |
| Duration: | November 2007-November 2008 |
| Funding: | $10,000 |
| Project summary: | USyd International Visiting Fellowship for Professor Ian Dennis from the Faculty of Laws, University College London. |
| Project title: | Beyond Sentencing: Transforming Justice in International Criminal Trials |
| Researchers: | Findlay, M |
| Grant type: | USyd International Visiting Fellowships |
| Duration: | November 2007-March 2008 |
| Funding: | $14,500 |
| Project summary: | USyd International Visiting Fellowship for Professor Ralph Henham from Nottingham Trent University, UK. |
| Project title: | Networking International and Comparative Criminal Justice Studies |
| Researchers: | Findlay, M |
| Grant type: | USyd International Program Development Fund - International Network Research Collaborations (IPDF-INRC) |
| Duration: | January 2008-December 2008 |
| Funding: | $5,000 |
| Project summary: | To further develop a formative network of scholars and justice professionals in the fields of international and comparative criminal justice, placing USyd at the centre of international research initiatives covering global justice, conflict resolution and peacemaking. The networks will foster dialogue between international justice professionals and socio-legal scholars to produce enduring, self-sustaining research and knowledge transfer collaborations. |
| Project title: | Co-host and co-sponsor 2nd Annual Meeting of the Society for Environmental Law and Economics with Emory University School of Law |
| Researchers: | Black, C & Franklin, N |
| Grant type: | USyd International Program Development Fund |
| Duration: | January - December 2010 |
| Funding: | $58,000 |
| Project summary | Sydney Law School has been invited by Emory University School of Law to co-host and co-sponsor the 2nd Annual Meeting of the Society for Environmental Law and Economics, to be held in Atlanta, Georgia, USA, in 2010. This involves identifying the themes of the conference, selecting speakers and having oversight of the reviewing of papers for inclusion, and advertising the conference as well as providing support with the logistics of the meeting itself. Our involvement will build the Law School's international reputation and extend our research contacts in the very topical Environmental Law field, especially in the US. |
| Project title: | Energy & Resources Law |
| Researchers: | Triggs, G, Kinley, D & Boer, B |
| Grant type: | USyd International Program Development Fund |
| Duration: | January - December 2010 |
| Funding: | $11,150 |
| Project summary: | The Sydney Law School wishes to establish links with the Gulf region and, in particular, with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for a new academic programme, Energy & Resources Law. The aim is to advance the knowledge of law relating to mineral and petroleum resources and to develop partners with Gulf countries who are directly involved in energy production. The World Future Energy summit to be held in Jan 2010 is a major summit in the region focusing on future energy issues and energy policy; the Faculty aims to participate in the Summit and to be included in the conference speaker program. Participation in the Summit will provide opportunities to network with the region's leaders in energy policy and to showcase the research strengths of Sydney Law School. |
| Project title: | WUN - University of Sydney Fellowship in International and Comparative Criminal Justice |
| Researchers: | Findlay, M |
| Grant type: | USyd International Program Development Fund |
| Duration: | January 2009-December 2011 |
| Funding: | $10,000 |
| Project summary: | This fellowship will support the research scholarship of the International and Comparative Criminal Justice Network and would also recognise the research missions of the principal donor institution and the WUN. The fellowship would be made available to Network participants or their nominees and would provide for travel and subsistence expenses, and where possible limited research support. Priority would be given to research projects which required the collaboration of a Network research team. |
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| Project title: | The Sydney Law School and Harvard Law School Staff Exchange Program |
| Researchers: | McCallum, R |
| Grant type: | USyd International Program Development Fund |
| Duration: | January 2008-December 2009 |
| Funding: | $10,000 |
| Project summary: | The Harvard Law School at Harvard University has agreed to enter into a staff exchange program with the Faculty of Law of the University of Sydney to foster collaboration and research. Already researchers at both law schools have co-operated in the areas of comparative constitutional law and taxation. It is hoped that this exchange will lead to further co-operation in the areas of human rights law, health law, and corporate and commercial law. |
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| Project title: | Law-full woman: an exploration of the self-determination of Aboriginal women's law, its colonisation and the possibility of the journey towards decolonisation, to the place of the law-full woman |
| Researchers: | Watson, I |
| Grant type: | USyd Postdoctoral Research Fellowship |
| Duration: | July 2005-July 2008 |
| Funding: | $241,600 |
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| Project title: | Promoting an Efficient Market for Water Rights: Clarifying the Impact of the Income Tax System |
| Researchers: | Black, C |
| Grant type: | USyd Research & Development Grant Scheme |
| Duration: | January 2007-December 2008 |
| Funding: | $10,000 |
| Project summary: | As part of the National Water Initiative, the Council of Australian Governments has agreed, as a priority, to establish a market for the trading of water rights. This project will determine the income tax consequences of such trading, as issue which has been given surprisingly little attention, and offer suggestions for reform. The results of this project would have significance to other jurisdictions in search of a best practice model. It also has potential to expand into a project to consider the impact of other forms of taxation as well as other environmental market-based mechanisms such as carbon emissions trading. |
Law Faculty Grants
| Project title: | Principled Engagement: Promoting Human Rights by Engaging Authoritarian Regimes | |
| Researchers: | Kinley, D & Saul, B | |
| Grant type: | Conference Seeding Grant | |
| Duration: | June 2009-May 2010 | |
| Funding: | $10,000 | |
| Project summary: | This workshop will form a key part of a collaboration with the United Nations University (Tokyo's) Peace and Governance Program. Theproject has two parts: (i) the engagement of leading scholars andpractitioners to write specific contributions to an edited volume to be published by the UN Press, and (ii) a 2-day workshop involving all contributors to be held in Sydney in November 2009. | |
| Project title: | Investment Treaty Arbitration: Evolution and Revolution in Substance and Procedure | |
| Researchers: | Miles, K, Nottage, L & Brown, C | |
| Grant type: | Conference Seeding Grant | |
| Duration: | June 2009-July 2010 | |
| Funding: | $10,000 | |
| Proejct summary: | This conference brings together leading international academics and practitioners in international investment law to explore some of the most controversial issues in contemporary investment arbitration discourse and practice. It will serve to cement Sydney Law School as the leading Australian academic institution in international investment law, and several overlapping fields of international economic law. | |
| Project title: | International Conference on Human Rights in Asia-Pacific: Towards Institution-Building | |
| Researchers: | Nottage, L, Saul, B & Bath, V | |
| Grant type: | Conference Seeding Grant | |
| Duration: | January 2009-March 2010 | |
| Funding: | $10,000 | |
| Project summary: | This conference will be one of the first opportunities for leading legal scholars to talk through the issues arising from political aspirations towards institution-building for human rights monitoring the Asia-Pacific region. The conference theme is aligned with the Sydney Law School's vision for internationalisation and engagement with Asia, and intersects with several themes for the opening of the Law Building in 2009. | |
| Project title: | Law and Society Australia and New Zealand (LSAANZ) Annual Conference | |
| Researchers: | Loughnan, A | |
| Grant type: | Conference Seeding Grant | |
| Duration: | May 2008-December 2009 | |
| Funding: | $7,000 | |
| Project summary: | Seizing on the important event of the anniversary of the UN Declaration of Human Rights (1948), the 2008 LSAANZ Conference will bring together a range of international and domestic academics, legal practitioners, human rights activists, students and independent scholars to critically address the conference there, 'w(h)ither human rights?'. With such an important theme, this timely conference will have a high profile and it is vital that the principle organ for legal education and research at the University, the Faculty of Law, is properly represented in the University of Sydney's sponsorship of this event. | |
| Project title: | 21st century challenges in evidence law: international and comparative perspectives | |
| Researchers: | Kumar, M | |
| Grant type: | Conference Seeding Grant | |
| Duration: | May 2008-December 2010 | |
| Funding: | $10,000 | |
| Project summary: | This conference will bring together leading international and Australian evidence scholars to present and discuss current issues and new perspectives in evidence scholarship and teaching. | |
| Project title: | The Future of Indigenous Legal Studies in Australian Law Schools | |
| Researchers: | Anthony, T | |
| Grant type: | Conference Seeding Grant | |
| Duration: | January 2008-December 2008 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project summary: | In recent years Australian law schools have increasingly embraced Indigenous legal issues in their core and elective curricula. In part this has been catalysed by the recognition of native title in 1992. In part it is due to the ongoing overrepresentation of Indigenous people in the legal system. Arguably, it is also attributable to the rising consciousness in the academy of the importance of Indigenous justice. However, Indigenous issues continue to be under-represented in law curricula in proportion to their significance in and to the Australian legal system. Their significance arises of Indigenous peoples' engagement with the legal system, as well as the historical rights of Indigenous people within the legal system and to their own legal systems. This conference-encapsulated in the theme of 'The Future of Indigenous Legal Studies in Australian Law Schools'-seeks to promote cross-institutional dialogue (and potentially agreement) on the development and presentation of Indigenous Legal Studies in Australian law schools. It endeavours to create a working framework for the inclusion of Indigenous Legal Studies across core subjects. |
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| Project title: | Teaching Torts in an Age of Statutes | |
| Researchers: | McDonald, B & Rolph, D | |
| Grant type: | Conference Seeding Grant | |
| Duration: | January 2008-December 2008 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project summary: | As part of the National Water Initiative, the Council of Australian Governments has agreed, as a priority, to establish a market for the trading of water rights. This project will determine the income tax consequences of such trading, as issue which has been given surprisingly little attention, and offer suggestions for reform. The results of this project would have significance to other jurisdictions in search of a best practice model. It also has potential to expand into a project to consider the impact of other forms of taxation as well as other environmental market-based mechanisms such as carbon emissions trading. | |
| Project title: | Legal drafting in decentralised Indonesia | |
| Researchers: | Butt, S | |
| Grant type: | Faculty ECR/ R&D Scheme | |
| Duration: | January-December 2009 | |
| Funding: | $23,978 | |
| Project summary: | Indonesia began a process of decentralisation in 1999. Significant lawmaking powers were devolved to over 440 local and regional parliaments and executive bodies.These new lawmakers have already produced thousands of laws. Yet, according to recent reports, decentralisation has not been the 'boon' for governance that had been expected. This seems partly attributable to poorly-conceived and badly-drafted laws enacted at the local level. There has been no scholarly attempt to account for commonly-encountered defects in lawmaking processes-that is, from point of inception through to enactment-and in the laws themselves, regardless of subject matter. This research aims to identify some of these defects and to suggest ways to remedy them. | |
| Project title: | Understanding the legal basis of successful appeals in child sexual assault cases | |
| Researchers: | Shackel, R | |
| Grant type: | Faculty ECR/ R&D Scheme | |
| Duration: | January-December 2009 | |
| Funding: | $24,468 | |
| Project summary: | This project will investigate the grounds for, and outcomes of child sexual assault appeal cases decided by the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal in the period 2005-2008. Currently, there is only fragmented data on appeal rates in such cases and their rate of success. More disturbing, however, is the absence of any understanding of the legal basis for successful appeals against conviction in child sexual assault cases. This project aims to fill this lacuna in understanding with a view to identifying systemic issues that may need to be addressed in the prosecution of child sexual assault cases. | |
| Project title: | Governing Social Exclusion: Criminalisation, Isolation and Disadvantage in Sydney's West | |
| Researchers: | Lee, M | |
| Grant type: | Faculty R & D Scheme | |
| Duration: | January 2008-December 2008 | |
| Funding: | $12,000 | |
| Project summary: | Much has been expressed in the popular media and in political circles about social problems in specific areas of Sydney's West and South West. The so called 'Macquarie Fields Riot' in March 2005 focused attention on the plight of residents in some areas, however the public and governmental response to this disturbance was largely law and order focused; constructing the 'rioters' as 'bad' individuals lacking self control and thus in need of discipline. On the other hand some commentators spoke as if crime were a self evident outcome of disadvantage. My recent body of work has attempted to focus on the problem of social isolation or exclusion in some areas of Sydney's west and how a sense of social isolation creates an environment where crime and criminalisation occurs under some circumstances. It has attempted to be attentive of the lack of services in many areas and the larger economic, political and social forces that have seen such areas excluded from Australia's recent economic 'miracle'. This project seeks to begin a process of more specifically identifying and mapping areas of social isolation and exclusion and beginning the painstaking work of developing a body of empirical data to help us more fully understand the connection between social isolation/exclusion, criminalisation, policy and governance. |
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| Project title: | Principles of Contract Construction and the Role of Good Faith in Contractual Pre-emptive Rights | |
| Researchers: | Peden, E | |
| Grant type: | Faculty R & D Scheme | |
| Duration: | January 2008-December 2008 | |
| Funding: | $12,500 | |
| Project summary: | Pre-emptive rights are widely used, with little research ever having been carried out to explain and rationalise their operation. Significantly, pre-emptive rights bring together the three largest issues being debated in contract law scholarship, namely, formation of contracts, construction of contracts and the relationship between contract and property. Their use spans from the first right of refusal to purchase land or goods, to pre-emptive rights in shareholdings to pre-emptive right in joint venture enterprise especially in the mining and petroleum industry. There are hundreds of unreported cases that are very long because of the complex transactions involved; this more than anything else inhibited research into the legal principles governing these clauses. | |
| Project title: | The construction of the victim in determinations of criminal liability in medical settings | |
| Researchers: | Savell, K | |
| Grant type: | Faculty R & D Scheme | |
| Duration: | January 2008-December 2008 | |
| Funding: | $13,815 | |
| Project summary: | This project asks whether, in the context of a broader cultural turn toward utilitarian ethics, the medical management of seriously disabled individuals poses serious challenges for the criminal law of homicide. The project will draw upon current legal and policy debates around (1) the withdrawal of treatment in adults and children; (2) proposals to relax the prohibition on active killing; and (3) the sacrificial separation of conjoined twins. The primary focus will be to analyse the jurisprudence relating to 'end of life' medical treatment as an intermingling of distinct paradigms (family and criminal) which has been made possible, perhaps necessary, by the failure of criminal law theory to fully engage with the construction of the victim. | |
| Project title: | The Operation and Efficacy of Contractual Pre-emptive Rights | |
| Researchers: | Tolhurst, G | |
| Grant type: | Faculty R & D Scheme | |
| Duration: | January 2008-December 2008 | |
| Funding: | $12,500 | |
| Project summary: | Pre-emptive rights are widely used, with little research ever having been carried out to explain and rationalise their operation. Significantly, pre-emptive rights bring together the three largest issues being debated in contract law scholarship, namely, formation of contracts, construction of contracts and the relationship between contract and property. Their use spans from the first right of refusal to purchase land or goods, to pre-emptive rights in shareholdings to pre-emptive right in joint venture enterprise especially in the mining and petroleum industry. There are hundreds of unreported cases that are very long because of the complex transactions involved; this more than anything else inhibited research into the legal principles governing these clauses. | |
| Project title: | Law School Special Visiting Fellow application for Professor Lawrence Gostin from Law Centre, Georgetown University, USA | |
| Researchers: | Magnusson, R & Bennett, B | |
| Grant type: | Faculty Special Visiting Fellow Scheme | |
| Duration: | June-December 2009 | |
| Funding: | $10,000 | |
| Project title: | Law School Special Visiting Fellow application for Professor Anita Bernstein from Brooklyn Law School, USA | |
| Researchers: | McDonald, B & Rolph, D | |
| Grant type: | Faculty Special Visiting Fellow Scheme | |
| Duration: | 15 March-6 April 2009 | |
| Funding: | $4,000 | |
| Project title: | Law School Special Visiting Fellow application for Professor Yasuhei Taniguchi from Senshu University, Japan | |
| Researchers: | Nottage, L, Bath, V, Saul, B & Williams, B | |
| Grant type: | Faculty Special Visiting Fellow Scheme | |
| Duration: | 11 July-14 August 2009 | |
| Funding: | $6,000 | |
| Project title: | Law School Visiting Scholar application for Dr David Bilchitz from the South African Institute for Advanced Constitutional, Public, Human Rights and International Law | |
| Researchers: | Kinley, D | |
| Grant type: | Faculty Visiting Scholar Scheme | |
| Duration: | July 2008-December 2009 | |
| Funding: | $4,900 | |
| Project title: | Law School Visiting Scholar application for Dr Paul Johnson from the Department of Sociology, University of Surrey, UK | |
| Researchers: | Mason, G, Findlay, M & Stubbs, J | |
| Grant type: | Faculty Visiting Scholar Scheme | |
| Duration: | July 2008-December 2009 | |
| Funding: | $4,100 | |
| Project title: | Law School Visiting Fellow application for Professor Jonathan Simon of the Jurisprudence and Social Policy Department, School of Law, University of California, Berkeley | |
| Researchers: | Findlay, M, Lee, M & O'Malley, P | |
| Grant type: | Faculty Visitors Scheme | |
| Duration: | May 2008-October 2008 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project title: | Law School Visiting Fellow application for Professor Phil Scraton of the Institute of Criminology and Criminal Justice, School of Law, Queen's University, Belfast | |
| Researchers: | Stubbs, J, Lee, M & Mason, G | |
| Grant type: | Faculty Visitors Scheme | |
| Duration: | January 2008-June 2009 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Duration: | November 2007-April 2009 | |
| Funding: | $4,951 | |
| Project summary: | This project would seek to lay the foundations for a book on crime, criminalisation, social isolation and disadvantage in South Western Sydney as well as providing the basis for a grant application. Specifically the project would involve a research assistant (RA) producing, in consultation with the principle researcher (PR), an annotated bibliography for use in a book proposal / literature review / research proposal. The resulting book would build on the previous work of the PR (Lee 2004, Lee 2005, Lee 2006, Lee 2007) on crime, crime fear and social isolation and would seek to challenge simplistic political, media and popular explanations and images of 'crime prone' communities. | |
| Project title: | Accommodating Islamic Banking and Finance in Australia and Across Asian Markets: Exploring Legal Problems and Agendas for Reform | |
| Researchers: | Farrar, S | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | July 2009-January 2011 | |
| Funding: | $4,300 | |
| Project summary: | Islamic banking and finance has become a growth area in recent years (in Southeast Asia especially) and is percieved by its advocates as a safer option in the wake of the global banking debacle. Noting that Islamic banking is in its very early stages in Australia, this pilot project seeks to explore how current banking and regulatory regimes in New South Wales can accommodate an ostensibly very different system. In particular, it will consider whether the problems in adjustment and cost implications would have a major impact on take-up locally and on foreign investment.2009. | |
| Project title: | A Right to Independent Hearing: Rights Conventions of the Separation of Powers? | |
| Researchers: | Gerangelos, P | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | July 2009-January 2011 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Proejct summary: | The project will examine the efficacy of rights conventions/charters of rights (UK, EU) vis a vis the doctrine of the separation of powers, as a source of protection to a fair and independent judicial hearing. | |
| Project title: | A Feminist Adjudication Process: is there such a thing? | |
| Researchers: | Graycar, R | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | July 2009-January 2011 | |
| Funding: | $3,000 | |
| Project summary: | This project follows from a recent ARC funded research project into legal responses to systemic injuries and/or historical harms. It draws on empirical research conducted for that project into redress schemes in Canada and Ireland, and it also seeks to draw upon and develop recent scholarship on gender and reparations. Specifically the research is designed to interrogate whether there are feminist modes of adjudication or dispute resolution that can be effectively used in dealing with systemic harms (such as harms to the Stolen Generations of indigenous peoples). | |
| Project title: | Discovering Australian Guardianship Law: Publishing the decisions of the Australian Guardianship authorities | |
| Researchers: | Stewart, C | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | July 2009-January 2011 | |
| Funding: | $3,000 | |
| Project summary: | Guardianship law is a significant body of law affecting Australian health and welfare. The number of people affected by guardianship law is growing exponentially. This project will provide both published and unpublished decisions of guardianship authorities on an easy-to-use web database. The database will include decisions of NSW, QLD, TAS, Vic and WA authorities. Making these decisions available in this way will improve understanding of guardianship law and its consequential effects on the health and welfare of Australians. The database is a first step in a critical reformation of guardianship law, leading to submissions to stakeholders and law reform bodies. | |
| Project title: | The Meanings of Violence: Feminist Methodological Developments and Unresolved Tensions | |
| Researchers: | Stubbs, J & Mason, G | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | July 2009-January 2011 | |
| Funding: | $3,000 | |
| Project summary: | The project will examine the benefits of feminist research methodologies in the analysis of meanings and interpretations of violence. The researchers will examine feminist methodologies within criminology and other disciplines to: a) identify recent developments and ongoing tensions; b) bring insights from other disciplines to criminology; and c) reveal the potential for future research in this domain. They will draw upon a multi-disciplinary approach to feminist methodologies and apply this to violence as experienced by marginalised groups such as women, and racial and sexual minorities. Outcomes will include publications on feminist research methodology and on the meanings of violence. | |
| Project title: | Judging the Media: An Analysis of Judicial Perceptions of the Media in Australia | |
| Researchers: | Rolph, D | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | January 2009-June 2010 | |
| Funding: | $4,000 | |
| Project summary: | Judges determine the rights and responsibilities of the media in relation to a range of legal issues - from defamation to contempt of court to the emerging issue of invasion of privacy. In doing so, judges inevitably provide an assessment of the media's conduct and their motives. In addition, judges disclose, sometimes incidentally, sometimes overtly, views about the role of the media in contemporary Australian society. This project seeks to analyse the complex and occasionally contradictory perceptions of the media which are revealed by decided cases. | |
| Project title: | What do victim impact statements reveal about the harm suffered by child sexual assault victims? | |
| Researchers: | Shackel, R | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | January 2009-June 2010 | |
| Funding: | $4,983 | |
| Project summary: | This project seeks to analyse victim impact statements in child sexual assault cases in order to better understand how victims of such abuse are impacted by these offences. Our understanding of the impact of such crime on victims rests largely on psychological research and clinical reports. This research project is important because it provides insights into: (i) the harm caused by child sexual abuse from the victim's perspective; (ii) the nature of such harm as articulated by victims within a legal context; and (iii) information about how such statements are used by sentencing courts to sentence convicted offenders in such cases. | |
| Project title: | Responding to the Threat of Ocean Acidification: An Acid Test for International Law | |
| Researchers: | Stephens, T | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | January 2009-June 2010 | |
| Funding: | $4,982 | |
| Project summary: | This project will examine how existing international institutions may be used to address ocean acidification which is occurring in tandem with human induced climate change. The world's oceans are a major carbon sink, absorbing increasing amounts of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere which dissolves forming carbonic acid that disrupts processes of calcification utilised by many marine organisms, including corals. Despite the seriousness of this problem it is poorly addressed by existing international regimes. Although falling implicitly within the climate change regime and regimes for marine environmental protection it is not clearly and effectively embraced by either. Through publication as a journal article this project will contribute to knowledge on the gaps and linkages in addressing ocean acidification in an era of regime complexity and competition in international environmental law. | |
| Project title: | Research and editorial assistance in the final stages of the publication of three books in the general area of human rights and the global economy | |
| Researchers: | David Kinley | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | December 2008-May 2010 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project Summary: | This project constitutes the fruition of two ARC grants (one Linkage and one Discovery) that ran consecutively from 2003 to 2007 - "Multinational Corporations and Human Rights" (2002-04) and "The WTO and Human Rights" (2005-07), respectively. The funds from these have been expended just short of what is needed to complete the final stages of three book publications. | |
| Project title: | "The Battle of Sandon Point" - an examination of the operation of indigenous cultural heritage and planning laws in NSW | |
| Researchers: | Patricia Lane | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | December 2008-May 2010 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project Summary: | This project will investigate the relationship in NSW between the Aboriginal cultural heritage protection regime, and environmental protection and planning legislation in the context of the litigation over the Sandon Point development near Wollongong in NSW. The NSW provisions will be compared with those in other jurisdictions, particularly in Queensland under the Integrated Planning Legislation, to identify problems in the NSW system and consider opportunities for reform. | |
| Project title: | Blue Oil: Freshwater Resources and International Investment Law | |
| Researchers: | Kate Miles | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | December 2008-May 2010 | |
| Funding: | $4,982 | |
| Project summary: | This project aims to undertake research on the impact of international investment law on the use of freshwater resources and the provision of water services in the host state. In particular, it aims to identify the legal mechanisms that will progress the equitable resolution of water-related investor-state disputes and that will facilitate the socially and environmentally responsible operation of foreign-owned water-related companies. Through publications as a book chapter, the project is designed to contribute to the scholarly discourse on the way in which international investment law interacts with social and environmental issues. | |
| Project title: | International Law and Language Rights: The Case of Diasporic Language Communities | |
| Researchers: | Jacqui Mowbray | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | December 2008-May 2010 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project summary: | In an age of globalisation, language communities are increasingly scattered around the world, rather than concentrated in particular territorial areas. This project investigates how well the existing international legal framework meets the needs of such diasporic language communities to protect and use their own languages. In doing so, it seeks to achieve two objectives: to understand how the existing law in this area could be developed to meet the linguistic needs of these groups more effectively; and, through this process, to identify some of the limitations inherent in current legal approaches to language rights more generally. | |
| Project title: | An analysis and critique of the legal regulation of embryonic research for therapeutic purposes and the prohibition of inheritable genetic modification in Australia, the UK & the USA | |
| Researchers: | Kristin Savell | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | December 2008-May 2010 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project summary: | This project examines legal responses to embryonic research for therapeutic purposes and inheritable genetic modification. Although the Prohibition of Human Cloning Act 2002 (Cth) permits embryonic cloning for research only and pre-emptively prohibits inheritable genetic modification (IGM), there has been scant discussion of the impact of such technologies on reproductive rights generally, and the rights of the disabled in particular. Accordingly, this project will adopt a disability rights perspective to examine and critique the current regulatory and policy landscape with respect to embryonic research for therapeutic purposes and IGM in Australia and key comparator jurisdictions, such as the USA and the UK. | |
| Project title: | Freedom of religion and polygamy in Indonesia: perspectives on Indonesia's Bill of Rights, Islamic Law, and national family law | |
| Researchers: | Butt, S | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | July 2008-December 2009 | |
| Funding: | $4,967 | |
| Project summary: | Polygamy is a controversial issue in Indonesia and elsewhere. On the one hand, some Muslim scholars hold very strongly that Islamic law permits polygamy. On the other, modernists argue that polygamy is essentially unjust and discriminatory, and that it breaches the human rights of women. This project aims to examine the law and practice on polygamy in Indonesia, including a recent Constitutional Court case in which the constitutionality of the state's restrictions on polygamy was challenged. This project aims to fill a lacuna in the very limited publicly-available literature on polygamy law in Indonesia. More broadly, its discussion of the Constitutional Court decision aims to contribute to the more widely-available general literature on the 'contest' between Islam and the state in Indonesia. | |
| Project title: | Expert Evidence - Reform and Reality: A Review of the Impact of Recent NSW Reforms | |
| Researchers: | Cashman, P | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | July 2008-December 2009 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project summary: | The objects of the proposed project are to examine the impact of the reforms in relation to expert evidence recently introduces in NSW to compare this with the more traditional approach to expert evidence in Victoria and in the Federal Court. | |
| Project title: | Participation and responsiveness in merits review of development assessment decisions in NSW and Victoria | |
| Researchers: | Edgar, A | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | July 2008-December 2009 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project summary: | This project involves a comparison of the Land and Environment Court (LEC) and the planning and environment list of the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT). Both tribunals undertake merits review of development assessment decisions made by councils but they seem to do it quite in different ways. The project seeks to determine whether the two tribunals are as dissimilar as the respective legislation and reported cases suggest. | |
| Project title: | Activating Victim Constituency in International Criminal Justice | |
| Researchers: | Findlay, M | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | July 2008-December 2009 | |
| Funding: | $3,000 | |
| Project summary: | This project will provide the empirical foundation for a new normative framework on which the transformation of the international criminal trial rests. The framework invites consideration of an essential victim constituency for international criminal justice (ICJ) being arguably as legitimate and persuasive as any more removed commitment to a global constitutional legality. | |
| Project title: | Constitution-Making and Legitimacy: Survey of literature and archival sources on post-war constitution-making | |
| Researchers: | Irving, H | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | July 2008-December 2009 | |
| Funding: | $4,355 | |
| Project summary: | This project is a preparatory stage for a larger project: "Constitutionalism and legitimacy: securing obedience to new or altered Constitutions." The latter aims to develop an account of processes for acquiring legitimacy in the transitional period between a constitution's adoption and its entrenchment. | |
| Project title: | The impact of human rights on evidence and procedure | |
| Researchers: | Kumar, M | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | July 2008-December 2009 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project summary: | Human rights have increasing relevance to the development of evidence law and procedure. This project has two aims: (i) to analyse and critique English and Australian approaches to human rights legislation and its impact on evidence. This is a comparative study and will be the first project of this type published in the international literature on criminal evidence. (ii) to analyse and critique the impact of human rights on civil procedure. To my knowledge, there has been no such study done in Australia. | |
| Project title: | An Analysis of the Emergence of Hate Crime Law Within the Context of 'New Punitiveism' | |
| Researchers: | Mason, G | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | July 2008-December 2009 | |
| Funding | $4,705 | |
| Project summary: | This project aims to undertake preliminary research on the nexus between the 'new punitiveness' in criminal punishment and the emergence of hate crime laws in selected Australian and international jurisdictions since the 1980s. It will examine and synthesise two bodies of material: literature on the new punitiveness in punishment; literature on the emergence of hate crime legislation. The project is designed to provide the theoretical and conceptual framework for an ARC application in 2009 and a refereed journal article. | |
| Project title: | A cross-jurisdictional study of customary law and Indigenous culture as mitigating factors in criminal sentencing | |
| Researchers: | Anthony, T | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | January 2008-July 2009 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project summary: | This project seeks to examine sentencing factors in NSW in comparison with other Australian jurisdictions, with a view to providing an overall assessment of sentencing principles for Indigenous offenders. It aims to position this study in the critical context of Law Reform Commission reports and international law. | |
| Project title: | Power and Rule in the Mekong Basin : The Dynamics of 'Hard' and 'Soft' Law in International Watercourse Governance | |
| Researchers: | Johns, F | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | January 2008-July 2009 | |
| Funding: | $3,219 | |
| Project summary: | Effective, responsive, coordinated governance is vital to maintenance of the fragile eco-system of the Mekong River Basin and the social, economic and political networks that depend upon its flourishing. Development of such a governance regime tailored to the field in question has, however, been impeded by the absence of any rigorous, critical mapping of the normative infrastructure of the Mekong River Basin, particularly its transnational 'soft law' dimensions. This project seeks to connect intra-regional developments in the law and policy of transboundary water governance with the broader tendencies and tensions within the international legal order by which they are, in part, informed. | |
| Project title: | Law and Celebrity - a comparative study | |
| Researchers: | McDonald, B, Loughlan, P & Rolph, D | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | January 2008-July 2009 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project summary: | This project will result in a book to be published by Federation Press. The book will explore the legal implications - particularly the protection of lack of protection - of a celebrity's reputation and personality in the modern technological age. | |
| Project title: | Re-regulating Common Risks in Japan : Product Safety, Consumer Credit, and Corporate Governance | |
| Researchers: | Nottage, L | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | January 2008-July 2009 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project summary: | Japan's 'lost decade' of economic stagnation over the 1990s has generated extensive legal and socio-economic, involving significant deregulation. Yet, as in other major post-industrial capitalist economies, it has been a 'gradual transformation'. The government has recently re-regulated areas characterised by risks commonly encountered by citizens in Japan and indeed world-wide. Manufacturers must now notify regulators about serious consumer product related risks. Consumer lenders face stricter interest rate caps. Securities regulation has been expanded and strengthened. This project considers whether this means a return to welfare-statism, or instead a "third way" balancing public and private interests in increasingly complex contemporary society. | |
| Project title: | New models of justice in response to violence against women: An analysis of two US cases studies | |
| Researchers: | Stubbs, J | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | January 2008-July 2009 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project summary: | This project forms part of a larger research program but is significant in itself. Debates about responses to violence against women (VAW) have been limited by a dichotomous characterisation of justice as retributive or restorative, and by the absence of empirical data concerning restorative justice (RJ). This project will draw on feminist theory to challenge that dichotomy and will document newly emerging models of justice for VAW. It will contribute much needed empirical data through two cases studies of innovative US programs and will inform debates about improving justice system responses to VAW. | |
| Project title: | The resolution of trans-national commercial disputes through international arbitration and enforcement of awards in the Asian region | |
| Researchers: | Triggs, G | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | January 2008-July 2009 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project summary: | While international commercial arbitration has flourished in legal and financial cities such as London, Paris and New York, efforts to promote the use of expert legal skills available in Sydney have been only moderately successful. The value of the proposed research lies in its emphasis on the use of international arbitration to resolve commercial disputes by states and companies within the Asian region, filling a gap in legal analysis that has tended to emphasise practice in the Northern hemisphere. | |
| Project title: | What do the 1995-2008 World Trade Organization ('WTO') disputes on the rules applying to agricultural trade indicate about the adequacy of the 1995 reforms and the trajectory of further reform? | |
| Researchers: | Williams, B | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | January 2008-July 2009 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project summary: | After many years of difficulty in applying the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) to agricultural trade, in the Uruguay Round of negotiations (1986-1995) the partied agreed on a programme of reform to be implemented under the new Agreement on Agriculture (AoA). It is proposed to analyse the outcomes of dispute settlement cases under the AoA between 1995 and the present so as to make some observations on the adequacy and suitability of the reforms adopted in 1995 and upon the impact of the decisions on the likely path of negotiations to further reform agricultural trade. | |
| Project title: | Managing Conflict in Higher Education | |
| Researchers: | Astor, H | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | November 2007-April 2009 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project summary: | This project examines conflict handling in universities. There are two parts to the project. The first is analysis of the involvement of Australian universities in litigation. The second involves case studies of Australian universities to discover how they handle conflict. The project will provide data that will assist universities to improve the ways in which they handle conflict and disputes and to reduce the considerable amount of money spent by universities on conflict handling, including litigation. | |
| Project title: | Implied and Prescriptive Easements, and Title by Registration Systems | |
| Researchers: | Burns, F | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | November 2007-April 2009 | |
| Funding: |
$3,000 |
|
| Project summary: | The aim of this project is to consider the impact of title by registration systems on implied and prescriptive easements (or servitudes) in common law and civilian jurisdictions, using Australia, England and Scotland as the primary focus. The extent to which prescriptive and implied easements are accommodated within a title by registration system is a good litmus test for the extent to which title by registration systems have become hard edged and minimalist. Moreover, in the event that these kinds of easements vanish from the land law, due to the effect of the title by registration system and the demands for inviolable title, the question is whether it is necessary to implement other means of easement creation. | |
| Project title: | Contracting Out Public Service: The Search for Suitable Mechanisms | |
| Researchers: | Fridman, S | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | November 2007-April 2009 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project summary: | Increasingly the strained public sector is making use of private agencies to provide necessary services. Often specific projects take the form of public-private partnerships, the scope of which is defined by contract. For non-specific services, the public sector is often reliant on non-profit agencies or commercial enterprises. In this project we intend to explore the various means of organising such efforts with a view to defining applicable principles of governance and accountability and assessing whether current vehicles can be adapted appropriately. | |
| Project title: | Crime and Social Isolation in South Western Sydney: A Socio-Spatial Account of Global Forces and Local Consequences | |
| Researchers: | Lee, M | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | November 2007-April 2009 | |
| Funding: | $4,951 | |
| Project summary: | This project would seek to lay the foundations for a book on crime, criminalisation, social isolation and disadvantage in South Western Sydney as well as providing the basis for a grant application. Specifically the project would involve a research assistant (RA) producing, in consultation with the principle researcher (PR), an annotated bibliography for use in a book proposal / literature review / research proposal. The resulting book would build on the previous work of the PR (Lee 2004, Lee 2005, Lee 2006, Lee 2007) on crime, crime fear and social isolation and would seek to challenge simplistic political, media and popular explanations and images of 'crime prone' communities. | |
| Project title: | Strike Law in Australia: Australian Compliance with International Standards on the Right to Strike | |
| Researchers: | McCrystal, S | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | November 2007-April 2009 | |
| Funding: | $3,787 | |
| Project summary: | Conversion of PhD thesis into a book examining Australian compliance with international standards on the right to strike. New work, a new chapter is in draft form but the remainder of the thesis must be updated to accommodate Work Choices and international developments and reworked in book format. | |
| Project title: | A Conceptual History of the Criminal Law | |
| Researchers: | Loughnan, A | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | June 2007-November 2008 | |
| Funding: | $4,954 | |
| Project summary: | The aim of this research is to develop the framework for a project on the conceptual development of the criminal law. This research focuses on the conceptual development of the criminal law in the late modern era. It is in this era that the conceptual apparatus of criminal law in common law systems - including doctrines of mens rea, actus reus, causation, excuse and justification - developed. The processes by which these doctrines formalised - in significant part in the absence of appellate court structures - is of interest to criminal law scholars, legal theorists, historians and sociologists. The proposed research will build on existing research in this area by uniting an analysis of the conceptual structure of the criminal law with a study of the processes of criminalisation (according to which doctrines are enmeshed in principles and practices of ascribing criminal responsibility). | |
| Project title: | Re-regulating Consumer Credit: Australia, Japan and Beyond | |
| Researchers: | Nottage, L | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | June 2007-November 2008 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project summary: | Consumer over-indebtedness has become a major socio-economic problem in Australia, Japan and other industrialised democracies. A common response has been to improve the insolvency regime for consumers. But attention is increasingly turning to ex ante measures to spread and minimise risks. Industry self-regulation is being bolstered by private law obligations. Going beyond general disclosure, new legislation enacted (eg in parts of Australia) or under discussion (eg NZ) requires lenders to assess the circumstances of individual borrowers, and limit consumer loans accordingly. In some countries (eg Japan recently), restrictions on loan amounts as well as on maximum interest rates have been strengthened through public regulation. The OECD, EU and other supranational organisations are now comparing different countries and theories to determine which combinations of industry schemes and areas of law may deal best with problems of consumer over-indebtedness. This project draws on such developments and debates to assess the best path to be taken particularly by Australia and Japan. | |
| Project title: | Aboriginal Women, their laws and culture: Relationships with the early colonial legal system | |
| Researchers: | Watson, I | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | June 2007-November 2008 | |
| Funding: | $4,970 | |
| Project summary: | This project will survey and collect early colonial court decisions of NSW from 1788-1911, in matters where the courts considered Aboriginal law and culture as a defence to a crime, and in particular violent crimes against women and children. This project complements and extends previous and current research of the CI and proposes an Aboriginal (the CI is an Aboriginal scholar) reading of the interpretation early NSW courts gave to Aboriginal law and culture. Research of early colonial law will provide a context for the historical developments between Aboriginal peoples and the Australian legal system on the important question of recognition or otherwise of Aboriginal law and culture. | |
| Project title: | Developments in Australasian criminological thought - Research to prepare an edited reader on Australasian Critical Criminology | |
| Researcher: | Anthony, T | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | January 2007-June 2008 | |
| Funding: | $2,000 | |
| Project summary: | This will be the first time a Critical Australasian Criminology collection, that covers the leading debates and issues in Australasian Critical Criminology, has been compiled. It will involve original research into the historical developments in Australasian Critical Criminology, its similarities and differences with overseas Critical Criminology (particularly in terms of cultural criminology) and future directions. In addition, it will consider how Australasian Criminology has departed from and been influenced by orthodox and institutionalised studies of Criminology and its institutional, empirical and policy outcome orientation. It will also consider the role of Australasian Critical Criminology in a globalising world and its contribution to responding to new threats and renovations of the international justice system. | |
| Project title: | Legislative Interference with Judicial Process and Functions: Constitutional principles and limitations | |
| Researchers: | Gerangelos, P | |
| Grant type: | Legal Scholarship Support Fund | |
| Duration: | January 2007-June 2009 | |
| Funding: | $5,000 | |
| Project summary: | This will provide the only comprehensive study of the relevant constitutional principles which limit legislative interference in actual pending or completed court proceedings. No other work to the writer's knowledge has considered this issue. As testament to the importance of the work, I note that it was only my work that was referred to by the Commonwealth Parliament when it was considering the James Hardie legislation: (See Bills Digest No. 74, 2004 of the Commonwealth Parliament). | |
| Project title: | Australian and New Zealand Society of International Law Annual Conference - The Future of Multilateralism in a Plural World | |
| Researchers | Brown, C | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | 2-4 July 2009 | |
| Funding: | $1,900 | |
| Project summary: | Presenting paper: The Relevance of the Doctrine of Abuse of Process in International Adjudication | |
| Project title: | Gender and Judging Workshop | |
| Researchers: | Granycar, R | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | 10-13 June 2009 | |
| Funding: | $1,200 | |
| Project summary: |
Presenting paper: Feminist Adjudication: is there such a thing? |
|
| Project title: | International Association of Law Schools - Constitutional Law Conference | |
| Researchers | Irving, H | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | 11-12 September 2009 | |
| Funding: | $1,900 | |
| Project summary: | Presenting paper: Gender and Constitutional Citizenship | |
| Project title: | Fifth Criminal Procedure Discussion Forum | |
| Researchers | Kumar, M | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | 10-11 June 2010 | |
| Funding: | $1,200 | |
| Project summary: | Presenting paper: Terrorism and Procedure - the Impact on Open Justice and a Fair Trial | |
| Project title: | 137th Annual Meeting of the American Public Health Association (APHA) | |
| Researchers: | Magnusson, R | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | 7-11 November 2009 | |
| Funding: | $1,700 | |
| Project summary: | Presenting paper: Policies for Populations, Not Just Individuals: “Personal Responsibility” and Policy Leadership on Obesity Prevention and Public Health Nutrition | |
| Project title: | Blurring Legal Boundaries: The Commercialization and Informalization of Work | |
| Researchers: | McCrystal, S | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | 1-2 July 2010 | |
| Funding: | $1,900 | |
| Project summary: | Presenting paper: Organising Independent Contractors: The Impact of Competition Law | |
| Project title: | 1) The Inaugural Conference of the Society of International Economic Law: New Horizons of International Economic Law 2) Climate Law in Developing Countries post-2012: North & South Perspectives 3)2008 Annual Conference, British Institute of International and Comparative Law: Climate Change and its Challenges for the International Legal System |
|
| Researchers: | Miles, K | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | 1) 28-29 May 2009 2) 1-2 August 2009 3) 6 November 2009 |
|
| Funding: | $1,700 | |
| Project summary: | Presenting paper: 1) Integrating Sustainability into Bilateral Investment Treaties: New Models and New Practices 2) Imperialism, Eurocentrism and International Investment Law: Where to from Here for Asia? 3) Arbitrating Climate Change: Regulatory Regimes and Investor-State Disputes |
|
| Project title: | Trade Agreements: Where Do We Go from Here? | |
| Researchers: | Nottage, L | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | 22-23 October 2009 | |
| Funding: | $1,200 | |
| Project summary: | Presenting paper: Asia-Pacific Product Safety Regulation in an FTA Era | |
| Project title: | Blurring Legal Boundaries: The Commercialization and Informalization of Work | |
| Researchers: | Riley, J | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | 1-2 July 2010 | |
| Funding: | $1,700 | |
| Project summary: | Presenting paper: Business Format Franchising: True Enterpreneurs or Indentured Labour | |
| Project title: | NETSPAR Pensions Workshop | |
| Researchers: | Apps, P | |
| Grant Type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | January 2009 | |
| Funding: | $2,000 | |
| Project summary: | Presenting paper 'Life Cycle Time Allocation and Saving in an Imperfect Capital Market' | |
| Project title: | 31st Congress of the International Academy of Law and Mental Health | |
| Researchers: | Carney, T | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | June/July 2009 | |
| Funding: | $2,000 | |
| Project summary: | Presenting paper 'Mental Health Tribunals: A "relational case-conference" to pursue fairness, freedom & treatment?' | |
| Project title: | International Conference on Islamic Banking & Finance | |
| Researchers: | Farrar, S | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | August 2009 | |
| Funding: | $2,000 | |
| Project summary: | Presenting paper 'Accommodating Islamic Banking and Finance in New South Wales' | |
| Project title: | British Society of Criminology Conference | |
| Researchers: | Findlay, M | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | June/July 2009 | |
| Funding: | $2,000 | |
| Project summary: | Presenting paper 'Conversations with a Crime Boss: New directions in researching criminal enterprise' | |
| Project title: | Asian International Economic Law Network Inaugural Conference - Multilateralism and Regionalism in Global Economic Governance: Trade, Investment and Finance | |
| Researchers: | Lee, S | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | August 2009 | |
| Funding: | $2,000 | |
| Project summary: | Presenting paper 'The US-Korea Free Trade Agreement - False Promise or Path to Economic Prosperity?' | |
| Project title: | 31st Congress of the International Academy of Law and Mental Health | |
| Researchers: | Loughnan, A | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | June/July 2009 | |
| Funding | $2,000 | |
| Project summary: | Presenting paper '"Bodies of Mind"?: An Historical Perspective on Evidence and Proof in Claims of Mental Incapacity' | |
| Project title: | Brown International Advanced Research Institute in Law, Social Thought and Global Governance | |
| Researchers: | Mowbray, J | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference & Travel | |
| Date: | June 2009 | |
| Funding: | $2,000 | |
| Project summary: | Presenting paper 'Language in the International System: How Linguistic Diversity Presents a Challenge for Multilateralism' | |
| Project title: | 31st Congress of the International Academy of Law and Mental Health | |
| Researchers: | Shackel, R | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference & Travel | |
| Date: | June/July 2009 | |
| Funding: | $2,000 | |
| Project summary: | Presenting paper 'The Use of Victim Impact Statements in Child Sexual Assault Cases' | |
| Project title: | Global Justice and Sustainable Development Conference | |
| Researchers: | Stephens, T | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | August 2009 | |
| Funding: | $2,000 | |
| Project summary: | Presenting paper 'Sustainable Development Discourses in International Counts and Tribunals: What Place for Global Justice?' | |
| Project title: | International Association of Consumer Law (IACL)'s conference "Consumer Law - Globalisation, Poverty and Development" | |
| Researchers: | Nottage, L | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | 25-27 February 2009 | |
| Funding: | $1,600 | |
| Project summary: | Since completing my PhD in the late 1990s focusing on comparative contract law, my interest in unfair contract terms has led me increasingly into the fields of comparative product liability (2004 book) and now product safety regulation (over a dozen articles). This has attracted the attention of local and overseas specialists in consumer law, who have encouraged my research into the related field of consumer credit regulation (two forthcoming book chapters, and a third co-authored paper underway that I wish to present a final version of at this conference in India). I have also been invited to join the editorial board of the Yearbook of Consumer Law, with many other IACL members. Attending this conference will be the first time I have been able to get to one of these major IACL events, and an opportunity finally to meet many of the field's leading and up-and-coming researchers, many of whom I have corresponded with for years without ever meeting. | |
| Project title: | 8th World Congress "Where to now: Charting the future course of international protection" | |
| Researchers: | Crock, M | |
| Grant type: | Overseas Conference and Travel | |
| Date: | 28-30 January 2009 | |
| Funding: | $1,100 | |
| Project summary: | Working on guidelines for asylum adjudicators presented with claims made by vulnerable persons. The guidelines cover children, victims of torture and trauma and disabled persons. Looking in particular at disabled applicants. Our brief is part of a broad project of the IARLJ: "to encourage standardization of practice procedure and interpretation of refugee law and practice throughout the world." The IARLJ Constitution, Part 1, Section 2(1), requires that its members commit to promoting "within the judiciary and quasi-judicial decision makers world-wide a common understanding of refugee law principles and to encourage the use of fair practices and procedures to determine refugee law issues." "to encourage standardization of practice procedure and interpretation of refugee law and practice throughout the world." The IARLJ Constitution, Part 1, Section 2(1), requires that its members commit to promoting "within the judiciary and quasi-judicial decision makers world-wide a common understanding of refugee law principles and to encourage the use of fair practices and procedures to determine refugee law issues." Presenting the guidelines devised by our group in conjunction with Professor Rebecca Wallace (from Glasgow). | |