How a conversation at James Cook University led to the most momentous decision in Australian legal history.

• Read the judgment
• Watch the movie (only accessible via ABC iView in Australia)
• Read an interview with Mabo counsel, Ron Castan

Learn more about the ANU College of Law here. Our thanks to the ANU College of Law Marketing and Communications team. ANU acknowledges and celebrates the First Australians on whose traditional lands we meet, and pays our respect to elders past and present. 

Water under the bridge, and judges kissing babies, in this episode of Secondary Rules. What business do Courts have thinking about socio-economic rights? Can a Constitution transform a society, and can litigation safeguard a democracy? All this and more as we consider the right to water in the Constitutional Court of South Africa.

• Mazibuko  v City of Johannesburg [2009] ZACC 28
• Constitution of the Republic of South Africa(1996)
• Couzens, ‘Avoiding Mazibuko’(2016)
• Dugard and Mohlakoana ‘More work for women : a rights-based analysis of women's access to basic services in South Africa’(2009)

Learn more about the ANU College of Law here. Our thanks to the ANU College of Law Marketing and Communications team. ANU acknowledges and celebrates the First Australians on whose traditional lands we meet, and pays our respect to elders past and present. 

The trial that changed the world. A Jewish rabble-rouser came face-to-face with a provincial Roman governor. He was hanged. But his death was not the end. It was just the beginning. Spikenard not included.

• For a cosmic interpretation, see Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ (2004).
• For a comic interpretation, see Monty Python’s Life of Brian(1979).

Learn more about the ANU College of Law here. Our thanks to the ANU College of Law Marketing and Communications team. ANU acknowledges and celebrates the First Australians on whose traditional lands we meet, and pays our respect to elders past and present. 

‘Directly chosen’ for your enjoyment, this week we look at a case about free speech in a democratic society (and Joshua is a harsh marker of Ryan’s work), all of it ‘unaccompanied by moving images or other vocal sounds’.

• ACTV v Cth(1992)
• “Whither the Implied Freedom of Political Communication?” (2022 paper) Nettle J

Learn more about the ANU College of Law here. Our thanks to the ANU College of Law Marketing and Communications team. ANU acknowledges and celebrates the First Australians on whose traditional lands we meet, and pays our respect to elders past and present. 

Long live the common law! This week we look at the fascinating Malaysian Federal Court decision in Indira Gandhi v Director of the Islamic Department. 

• Indira Gandhi v Director of the Islamic Department(2018, Federal Court of Malaysia)
• J Neoh, Legitimacy of the Common Law in Post-Colonial Malaysia [2010] LAWASIA 59

Learn more about the ANU College of Law here. Our thanks to the ANU College of Law Marketing and Communications team. ANU acknowledges and celebrates the First Australians on whose traditional lands we meet, and pays our respect to elders past and present. 

Bonjour et bienvenue: how do you change the way a constitution changes, without being sure how to change the constitution? In each episode of Season 2, we tell the story of a great landmark court decision from around the world. This week we look at the fascinating Supreme Court of Canada decision in the Patriation Reference (1981). 

• Patriation Reference(Re Resolution to amend the Constitution)(SCC, 1981)
• The Constitution Acts(1867, 1982)
• Ahmed, Albert & Perryarticle (2019)

Learn more about the ANU College of Law here. Our thanks to the ANU College of Law Marketing and Communications team. ANU acknowledges and celebrates the First Australians on whose traditional lands we meet, and pays our respect to elders past and present. 

Ginger beer, the 'nauseating sight' of a snail, the Good Samaritan, and the genius of the common law: it’s all here in the House of Lords’ decision in Donoghue v Stevenson [1932] AC 562. 

• Donoghue v Stevenson (1932)
• Justice Keane on the great Queenslander, Lord Atkin (2017)

Learn more about the ANU College of Law here. Our thanks to the ANU College of Law Marketing and Communications team. ANU acknowledges and celebrates the First Australians on whose traditional lands we meet, and pays our respect to elders past and present. 

In each episode of Season 2, we’ll tell the story of a great landmark court decision from Australia or around the world. This week: terrorism on the streets of Gibraltar and the right to life, in the European Court of Human Rights' decision in McCann and Others v United Kingdom (21 ECHR 97 GC). 

• McCann v UK (1995) 
• European Convention on Human Rights

Learn more about the ANU College of Law here. Our thanks to the ANU College of Law Marketing and Communications team. ANU acknowledges and celebrates the First Australians on whose traditional lands we meet, and pays our respect to elders past and present.