Tenants of the soil: adapting agricultural land ownership in Australia. Resolving the problem of environmental degradation on agricultural land, which is 60% of Australia’s land surface, is a major challenge. By engaging with farmers whose innovative practices have generated environmental and productivity benefits, this project aims to investigate the co-constructive relationship between land ownership, land use decision making and geography. The project tackles conventional accounts treating pr ....Tenants of the soil: adapting agricultural land ownership in Australia. Resolving the problem of environmental degradation on agricultural land, which is 60% of Australia’s land surface, is a major challenge. By engaging with farmers whose innovative practices have generated environmental and productivity benefits, this project aims to investigate the co-constructive relationship between land ownership, land use decision making and geography. The project tackles conventional accounts treating private property rights in agricultural land as unavoidably opposed to environmental goals. A key projected outcome is a set of rich case studies showing how geography shapes land use decision-making. This new approach provides much-needed evidence to inform law reform that transcends the public law/private rights impasse.Read moreRead less
Garuwanga: Forming a Competent Authority to protect Indigenous knowledge. Garuwanga: Forming a Competent Authority to protect Indigenous knowledge. This project will work with the Aboriginal Community to identify, evaluate and recommend an appropriate Competent Authority legal structure so Australia can meet the requirements of the Nagoya Protocol. This Protocol calls for a Competent Authority to govern and administer a legal framework that ensures Indigenous communities’ informed consent is obt ....Garuwanga: Forming a Competent Authority to protect Indigenous knowledge. Garuwanga: Forming a Competent Authority to protect Indigenous knowledge. This project will work with the Aboriginal Community to identify, evaluate and recommend an appropriate Competent Authority legal structure so Australia can meet the requirements of the Nagoya Protocol. This Protocol calls for a Competent Authority to govern and administer a legal framework that ensures Indigenous communities’ informed consent is obtained for access to their traditional knowledge, and that establishes fair and equitable benefit-sharing mechanisms for use of that knowledge. This project will work with the Indigenous community to address concerns over the form, independence and funding of the Authority so Indigenous knowledge and culture can be protected and shared.Read moreRead less
Property as habitat: reintegrating place, people, and law. This project aims to produce an original account of property law that will connect it to place and human relationships. Property is at the centre of contemporary social life and law, yet it is often separated in legal scholarship from the human and natural worlds it structures. Using innovative analytical techniques and a grounded consideration of the functions and effects of property, the objective of the project is to produce an unders ....Property as habitat: reintegrating place, people, and law. This project aims to produce an original account of property law that will connect it to place and human relationships. Property is at the centre of contemporary social life and law, yet it is often separated in legal scholarship from the human and natural worlds it structures. Using innovative analytical techniques and a grounded consideration of the functions and effects of property, the objective of the project is to produce an understanding of property as habitat that is both sensitive to place and adapted to social conditions. Expected benefits include a responsive understanding of property that is better able to address the challenges of Australian society into the future.Read moreRead less