2015 & 2014

2015

  • After the Scottish Referendum: The "The Enduring Settlement" and its Implications for the Energy Industries

    Professor Terence Daintith, Institute of Advanced Legal Studies, University of London, UK. 17 March 2015.

    Despite the rejection of independence, the Scottish referendum has led to proposals for substantial enlargement of the powers devolved to the Scottish government, including control of onshore oil and gas. The paper looks at the implications and possible further development of the devolution proposals, in the context of the unstable political situation that is expected to follow from the 2015 UK General Election.

    This Seminar was hosted jointly by CREEL and the Centre for Comparative Constitutional Studes (CCCS), 17 March 2015.

  • The Urgenda climate case win against the Dutch Government: How citizens win and what it means for Australians

    Ms Minnesma, Urgenda, Netherlands. 23 July 2015.

    Ms Minnesma will speak about her work with Dutch organisation Urgenda, who recently made history with their landmark climate change case in the Netherlands.

    This Seminar was hosted by CREEL, 23 July 2015.

  • Selected Legal Issues in Mining Licensing in Mongolia

    Judge Tsogt Tsend, Administrative Court of Appeals, Mongolia Clinical Law Instructor, School of Law, National University of Mongolia. 28 October 2015.

    This Seminar was hosted jointly by CREEL and the Asial Law Centre, 28 October 2015

  • Commons Governance Masterclass

    Michel Bauwens, Founder of P2P Foundation. 6 December 2015.

    Michel Bauwens, an international peer-to-peer innovator presented a mind-expanding masterclass in commons governance, and how to solve practical problems in designing institutions to meet the challenges of the coming decades.Michel Bauwens, the founder of the P2P Foundation and a co-founder of the Commons Transition Platform, shared his knowledge and analysis of the core issues in commons-based pathways for generating economic and social innovation.

    Michel discussed the basic problems and principles in commons governance design, emerging tools such as innovative intellectual property licences and blockchain technology, and case studies from Spain, New Zealand and virtual transnational spaces. The presentation was followed by working with participants to collectively analyse, critique and generate suggestions for the emerging issues of a local Australian start-up: the Open Food Network, a non-profit, open-source enterprise supporting local food initiatives globally.

    Finally, the event also workshopped governance models and issues arising from the projects and experience of participants in the room.

    This Masterclass was hosted jointly by CREEL and the Open Food Foundation, 6 December 2015

    • 2014

  • Building Community Resilience in the Sharing Economy

    Janelle Orsi, Sustainable Economies Law Centre in Oakland, California, 12 February 2014.

    Janelle, a lawyer and an educator, is at the forefront of the exploration of the role of law and lawyers in the emergent ‘sharing economy’, where communities reorder their access to the goods and services they need to position themselves for a sustainable and secure future.

    This event was staged as part of the Sustainable Living Festival, 12 February 2014.

  • The Core Failure of US Environmental Law: The Grandfathering of Existing Sources Under the Clean Air Act

    Professor Richarc Revesz, New York University, 31 March 2014.

    Professor Revesz will explain how this grandfathering approach kept obsolete plants in operation far longer than would otherwise have been the case, created incentives for interest group pressures to expand the scope of the grandfathering, made it difficult to regulate interstate pollution, and is largely responsible for the failure of legislation to control greenhouse gases.

    Professor Richard Revesz is Lawrence King Professor and Dean Emeritus at New York University (NYU) School of Law and is one of the nation’s leading voices in the fields of environmental and regulatory law and policy. He has published Retaking Rationality: How Cost-Benefit Analysis Can Better Protect the Environment and Our Health (with Michael Livermore, 2008). He is the faculty director of NYU’s Institute for Policy Integrity; serves on the National Academy of Sciences’ Committee on Science, Technology, and Law and is a public member of the Administrative Conference of the United States.

    This Seminar was hosted by CREEL, 31 March 2014.

  • Sir Zelman Cowen Conference

    Woodward Conference Centre, Melbourne Law School, 26 & 27 March 2014.

    The Zelman Cowen Conference, held in honour of The Right Honourable Sir Zelman Cowen AK GCMG GCVO QC PC, is the third in a series of international research conferences conducted by the Melbourne Law School and the Faculty of Law at Oxford University.

    Sir Zelman was Dean of the Faculty of Law in the University of Melbourne from 1951 to 1966, Vice-Chancellor of the University of New England from 1967 to 1970, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Queensland from 1970 to 1977, Governor-General of the Commonwealth of Australia from 1977 to 1982, and Provost of Oriel College, Oxford from 1982 to 1990. He died in Melbourne on 8 December 2011.

    The conference comprises sessions on seven connected themes to which Sir Zelman made a major contribution during his long and distinguished career of public service:

    • International Relations and the British Commonwealth
    • Constitutional Law: Federal Jurisdiction and Reshaping Institutions
    • Liberty: Privacy, the Media and the Press Council
    • Private International Law
    • Governor-General and the Republic
    • Legal Biography
    • Legal Education

    Speakers at the conference will examine the enduring significance of these themes and explore major developments in them during the period since they were the subject of Sir Zelman’s scrutiny.

    In conjunction with the conference, Professor Glyn Davis AC, Vice-Chancellor and Principal of the University of Melbourne, will give the Sir Zelman Cowen Public Lecture on ‘Universities in the service of the nation’, in recognition of Sir Zelman’s remarkable contribution to universities in Australia, the United Kingdom and several other countries.

    This Conference was hosted by CREEL, 26 & 27 March 2014.

  • Sir Zelman Cowen Public Lecture – Universities in the service of the Nation

    Professor Glyn Davis, Vice Chancellor and Principal of the University of Melbourne

    Among many career distinctions, Sir  Zelman Cowen was an outstanding  university leader who believed strongly in the power of education, debate and ideas. The lecture will explore Sir Zelman’s personal reflections on higher education and how these connect with wider Australian and international  conceptions of the role and purposes of higher education.

    Glyn Davis is Professor of Political Science, Vice-Chancellor and Principal of the  University of Melbourne, and immediate past Chair of Universities Australia. Professor Davis was educated in political science at the University of New South Wales and the Australian National  University, before undertaking post-doctoral appointments as a Harkness Fellow at the University of California Berkeley, the  Brookings Institution in Washington DC and the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

    Internationally, Professor Davis is an  immediate past Chair of Universitas 21, a grouping of 24 leading universities from around the globe, a member of the  Association of Pacific Rim Universities, and a Director of the Menzies Centre for  Australian Studies at King’s College  London.

    In 2010 Professor Davis presented the  Boyer Lectures published as The Republic of Learning.

    This Public Lecture was hosted by CREEL, 26 March 2014.

  • The Supreme Court of Canada’s Aboriginal Title Declaration in Tsihlquo’in and its Implications

    Professor Dwight Newman, University of Saskatchewan, 25 July 2014.

    On June 26 2014, the Supreme Court of Canada made the first declaration of Aboriginal title rendered in a Canadian courtroom. Its decision in the case, Tsihlqot’in, has a number of key implications for the law and for policy in the natural resource context, and it will be of interest both domestically and internationally. This seminar will analyse the key aspects of the case and comment on claims (some correct and some incorrect) as to its implications for other litigation and negotiation on various Indigenous rights issues in Canada, thus seeking to offer comparative perspectives to an Australian audience.

    Dwight Newman is Professor of Law & Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Rights in Constitutional and International Law, University of Saskatchewan. He completed his J.D. at Saskatchewan and B.C.L. and D.Phil. at Oxford University where he studied as a Rhodes Scholar. He has published over fifty journal articles, mostly on constitutional law and Indigenous rights, and his books include Community and Collective Rights (Hart 2009); Natural Resource Jurisdiction in Canada (LexisNexis Canada 2013); and Revisiting the Duty to Consult Aboriginal Peoples (Purich 2014).

    This Seminar was hosted by CREEL, 25 July 2014.

  • The 2014 Nathan and Pamela Jacoboson Lecture – Protecting Australia’s Threatened Species and the Environment: Policy, reform and Action

    The Hon. Greg Hunt MP, Minister for the Environment, 15 October 2014.

    Past attempts to protect Australia’s threatened species and improve the health of our land and water have yielded mixed results. There have been successes: the revegetation of our land over the past two decades through the National Salinity Plan, the Natural Heritage Trust and Landcare and the success, also, of the Murray Darling Basin Plan. Both of these have been achieved with bi-partisan support.

    Where Australia has failed is in the protection of both our threatened species and the Great Barrier Reef, both of which were meant to have been protected through the law. These failures have shown us that the law alone is not enough. In fact, our over-reliance on law has allowed deep problems to persist. The focus now needs to be on outcomes: how we can increase the numbers of our threatened species - whether it be loggerhead turtles, quolls, southern brown bandicoots or our great and iconic whale populations - tackle habitat degradation and improve water quality around the Reef.  This requires real action rather than legislation.

    The Hon. Greg Hunt MP graduated from Melbourne University in 1990 with First Class Honours in Law. He subsequently won a Fulbright Scholarship to complete a Masters in International Relations at Yale University in the United States.

    Minister Hunt was elected as the Federal Member for Flinders in 2001. In 2004 he became Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Environment and Heritage and in January 2007 was appointed Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Foreign Affairs.

    After the November 2007 Federal election, Minister Hunt was appointed Shadow Minister for Climate Change, Environment and Urban Water, a role that brought together the great interests of his time in parliament.  After the 2013 Federal election he became Minister for the Environment, with responsibility for climate, environment, heritage and water.

    The Nathan and Pamela Jacobson Lecture

    Mr Nathan Jacobson OBE (LLB 1946) was a corporate lawyer and founding partner of Jacobson, Chamberlin & Casen. He is a highly prominent member of Australia’s Jewish community and a committed philanthropist. He received an OBE in 1972 for services to the community. The 2014 Nathan and Pamela Jacobson Lecture was made possible by the generous support of Mr Nathan Jacobson OBE and Mrs Pamela Jacobson.

    This event was hosted by CREEL, 15 October 2014.