Nicholas Aroney is Professor of Constitutional Law at The University of Queensland, Director (Public Law) of the Centre for Public, International and Comparative Law and a Senior Fellow of the Centre for Law and Religion at Emory University. In 2010 he received a four-year Future Fellowship from the Australian Research Council to study comparative federalism and in 2021 he secured an Australian Research Council Discovery Grant to investigate the nature and function of constituent power in federal systems. He has held visiting positions at Oxford, Cambridge, Paris II, Edinburgh, Durham, Padua, Sydney, Emory and Tilburg universities.
Professor Aroney has published over 160 journal articles, book chapters and books in the fields of constitutional law, comparative constitutional law and legal theory. He has led several international research projects in comparative federalism, bicameralism, legal pluralism, and law & religion, and he speaks frequently at international conferences on these topics. His most notable publications in these fields include: The Constitution of a Federal Commonwealth: The Making and Meaning of the Australian Constitution (Cambridge University Press, 2009), Shari'a in the West (Oxford University Press, 2010) (edited with Rex Ahdar), The Future of Australian Federalism (Cambridge University Press, 2012) (edited with Gabrielle Appleby and Thomas John), The Constitution of the Commonwealth of Australia: History, Principle and Interpretation (Cambridge University Press, 2015) (with Peter Gerangelos, James Stellios and Sarah Murray), Courts in Federal Countries (Toronto University Press, 2017) (edited with John Kincaid), The Routledge Handbook of Subnational Constitutions and Constitutionalism (Routledge 2021) (edited with Patricia Popelier and Giacomo Delledone) and Christianity and Constitutionalism (Oxford University Press, 2022) (edited with Ian Leigh).
Professor Aroney is a former editor of The University of Queensland Law Journal (2003-2005) and International Trade and Business Law Annual (1996-1998), and a past secretary of the Australian Society of Legal Philosophy. He is a past member of the Governing Council and the current Co-Convenor of the Queensland Chapter of the Australian Association of Constitutional Law. He is also a member of the editorial advisory board of the American Journal of Jurisprudence, Public Law Review, Australian Journal of Law and Religion and International Trade and Business Law Review. He has made numerous influential submissions to government and parliamentary inquiries and in 2013 undertook a review of the Crime and Misconduct Act for the Queensland Government with the Hon Ian Callinan AC QC, a former Justice of the High Court of Australia. In 2017 he was appointed by the Australian Prime Minister to an Expert Panel to advise on whether Australian law adequately protects the human right to freedom of religion.
Professor Aroney joined the Law School in 1995 after working with a major national law firm and acting as a legal consultant in the field of building and construction law.
Professor Emerita Jennifer Corrin researches on law reform and development in plural legal regimes and legal issues affecting small states. She is a former Australian Research Council Future Fellow and in 2019 was a short-term Visiting Fellow at Jesus College, Oxford. Professor Emerita Corrin has participated in a number of research grant projects including an ARC Discovery Grant, which investigated means of better managing the flow of public finances and people across Australia's international borders; and work on environmental issues in Solomon Islands, funded by the MacArthur Foundation. Most recently she has been co-investigator in a project concerning inclusion of women’s voices in marine resource management in the Pacific, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (UK). Jennifer has been consulted as an expert in a number of legal cases.
Professor Emerita Jennifer Corrin has published in the areas of legal pluralism, comparative law, South Pacific law, customary law, human rights, court systems, evidence, civil procedure, family law, land law, constitutional law and contract. She is the author of Contract Law in the South Pacific and co-author of Introduction to South Pacific Law (heading for its 5th edition), Courts and Civil Procedure in the South Pacific and Proving Customary Law in the Common Law Courts of the South Pacific. In 2019, she co-edited and wrote several chapters in a book on adoption in plural legal regimes. Her latest publication is the co-edited book, Legal Systems of the Pacific: Introducing Sixteen Gems.
Before joining The University of Queensland, Professor Emerita Corrin spent six years at the University of the South Pacific, having joined the Faculty after nine years in her own legal firm in Solomon Islands. She retains strong links with the profession and is a life member of Solomon Islands Bar Association. Professor Emerita Corrin’s memberships include the Australian Academy of Law, the Board of the Commission on Legal Pluralism, the Executive Committee of the Australian Law Academics Association, and titular membership of the International Academy of Comparative Law. She is a member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Legal Pluralism, a member of the International Editorial Board of the Journal of South Pacific Law, and a member of the Editorial Board of the Comparative Law Journal and of the Asia Pacific Journal of Environmental Law.
Dr Caitlin Goss is a Lecturer at the TC Beirne School of Law, teaching in the Law of Evidence, Constitutional Law, and Public International Law. Dr Goss obtained her DPhil in comparative constitutional law at the University of Oxford, where she previously read for a Bachelor of Civil Law and an MPhil in Law. Her postgraduate study has been funded by a Rhodes Scholarship, and a Commemorative Fellowship from the Australian Federation of University Women- Queensland.
Dr Goss has worked as a Judge's Associate to the Hon. Chief Justice Catherine Holmes (then a Justice of the Queensland Court of Appeal), as a solicitor, and as a legal intern in the Extraordinary Chambers of the Courts of Cambodia. At the University of Oxford, she served as a Graduate Teaching Assistant in Public International Law, teaching on the undergraduate BA in Jurisprudence, and she jointly coached the Oxford Jessup Moot team. Her research interests are in comparative constitutional law, constitutional theory, international law, and in the law of evidence.
Professor Paul Harpur OAM (introductory video) aims to create a world which is more inclusive for all. He advances his vision through advancing human rights and helping universities become disability champions of change. Professor Harpur is an nationally and internationally acclaimed legal scholar, advocate and director. He is currently Affiliated with the Harvard Law School Project on Disability, and an International Distinguished Fellow with the Burton Blatt Institute, College of Law, Syracuse University, New York.
He is a former Fulbrighter, having been awarded a prestigious Fulbright Future Scholarship entitled "Universally Designed for Whom? Disability, the Law and Practice of Expanding the "Normal User".
In2021 Professor Harpur was awarded a 4 year Future Fellowship, commencing in 2022, with the Australian Research Council entitled “Normalizing Ability Diversity through Career Transitions: Disability at Work”. Professor Harpur is using his Future Fellowship to support the higher education sector to become champions of disability inclusion.
Professor Harpur is involved in higher education reforms, including serving during 2023 on the Federal Education Minister's Universities Accord Ministerial Reference Group. He also serves on the Higher Education Standards Panel (HESP), which is a statutory body under Part 9 of the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency Act 2011 (Cth). The HESP is charged to advise and make recommendations to the Minister and to the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (TEQSA) on the Higher Education Standards Framework and to TEQSA on matters including TEQSA’ strategic objectives, corporate plan, performance against that plan, regulatory and reform agenda. From 2024 Professor Harpur serves on the Advisory Board for the Australian Centre for Student Equity and Success, formerly the National Center for Student Equity in Higher Education.
Professor Harpur is also an ambassador for the Australian Human Rights IncludeAbility Network. This network has major Australian employers who are actively seeking to champion disability inclusion. With the support of Vice-Chancellor Debbie Terry and Deputy Provost Pauline Ford the university continues as the first founding member from the higher education sector. IncludeAbility is an initiative of the Australian Human Rights Commission (the Commission) developed to increase meaningful employment opportunities for people with disability, and to close the gap in workforce participation between people with disability and people without disability.
In 2019 he was named a fellow of the Higher Education Academy.
Professor Harpur chairs the UQ Disability Inclusion Group, which supports the university in its implementation of the UQ Disability Action Plan. He also sits on the Academic Board, the University Senate's sub-committee focusing on inclusion, and on the Senate Committee for Equity Diversity and Inclusion.
Professor Harpur has published monographs with Cambridge University Press. 'His monograph, Discrimination, Copyright and Equality: Opening the E-Book for the Print Disabled (2017), analyses the interaction between anti-discrimination and copyright laws, and his Ableism at Work, Disablement and Hierarchies of Impairment 2019, analyses disability inequalities
at work in several jurisdictions. Professor Harpur has also led a range of projects, including an International Labour Organization project assessing labour rights in the South Pacific, including a particular focus on the rights of persons with disabilities.
Professor Harpur is a TEDx Speaker, ‘Universities as Disability Champions of Change’, and has given numerous keynotes and speeches, including addressing the International Labour Organization in
Geneva.
Outside the law, Professor Harpur has been a professional athlete with a disability, competing in the 2000 Sydney and 2004 Athens Paralympics, the 2002 Manchester and 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games and a range of other World Titles and international competitions.
In the 2024 Australia Day Honours, Professor Harpur was awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia by the Governor General of Australia (OAM). The citation for his OAM is “for service to people with disability”.
Professor Harpur is the 2022 Blind Australian of the Year.The Blind Australian of the Year Award recognises and celebrates “Blind Australians, who by example- inspire others to excellence, by action, improve Australian life.”
He received the 2021 BEL Employee Excellence Award in Research for excellence in Cross-Faculty Research.
The UQ Disability Inclusion Group, which he chairs, was recognised as Champions for Change in recognition of the tireless work they do to improve inclusion and access to higher education” by the Nationa
l Centre for Student Equity in Higher Education& Equity Practitioners in Higher Education Australasia.
In the Australian HR Awards, Excellence Awardees 2021, the University of Queensland was awarded the “BEST Workplace Diversity & Inclusion Program”.Dr Harpur is part of this large team including, Al Jury, Provost Professor Aidan Byrne, Angie Sturrock, Professor DVCR Bronwyn Harch (FTSE, FAQ), Caitlin Bennett, Celina Campas, Dr Deanne (Dee) Gibbon CSC OAM, Vice Chancellor Professor Debbie Terry, Dr Dino Willox, Elodie Tischer, Jordan Akhurst, Kriti Garg, Monika Andersen, Neena Mitter, Nicole Barton, Rob Moffatt, Tanya Lutvey, and Taylor Bamin.
The University of Queensland 2019 Excellence Award, received the Community, diversity and inclusion Award, for the team, the University of Queensland Disability Inclusion Group, chaired by Professor Harpur:
“Formed in 2017, UQ's Disability Inclusion Group (DIG) provides outstanding leadership and advocacy for students/staff with disability. The Group has delivered numerous programs and actions to dismantle physical, technological and cultural barriers impacting students and staff with disability, to enable full access to UQ life. The DIG is a unique operating model within Higher Education, in that it brings stakeholders, staff and students with disability together in a cohesive way, to champion and progress disability inclusion outcomes. The Disability Action Plan developed by DIG members in 2018 is considered 'industry leading', and is receiving considerable external interest. The DIG works across a range of area in support of inclusion, including law, academia, information technology, student and staff support, governance, property and facilities and library services.”
The University of Queensland 2019 Excellence Award, received commendation in the Community, diversity and inclusion category as an individual:
“Dr Harpur has been championing the rights of persons with disabilities from the age of 14, when a train accident caused him to become blind. The problems he had in accessing print textbooks inspired a research and advocacy agenda that has resulted in a substantial body of scholarship in Australia and internationally, and a drive to transform how UQ provides access to its students and community. His work has led to the formation of a UQ-wide body monitoring and coordinating disability inclusion, which he now chairs, and progress in how various other groups across the University manage disability digital inclusion.”
Professor Harpur was recognised to receive a 2019 Citation for Outstanding Contributions to Student Learning, as part of the Australian Award for University Teaching (AAUT) program.Professor Harpur’s citation is“for outstanding leadership in translating disability strategy into a vision of ability equality and core university business.”.
of Queensland for the 2019 Australian Awards for University Teaching. These Universities Australia awards celebrate and reward excellence in university teaching.
Professor Harpur is often in the media and engaged with public discourse. See for example the Federal Education Minister, the Hon Jason Clare speaking on the life of Professor Harpur during the Minister’s speech at the Australian Parliament House at the Australian-American Fulbright Commission Gala Presentation Dinner 2022.
Professor Harpur's publications and speeches can be found on his Google Scholar page. Further information can be found on his Linkedin page.
Dr Radha Ivory is a Senior Lecturer in Law at the University of Queensland, Australia (UQ), where she teaches company law and researches the transnational regulation of corruption and corporate crime.
Her work explores the interlocking domestic and international laws that aim to govern powerful economic and political actors, from politically exposed persons to multinational enterprises. Radha asks what these laws require of whom; how they develop and change across borders; and how we can better appraise and design them to manage their unintended consequences. Her approach is interdisciplinary, using doctrinal legal and socio-legal methodologies, as well as insights from economics, sociology, and international relations. Current projects focus on the human rights impacts of asset recovery laws, the reform of transnational anticorruption and corporate criminal laws, and the securitisation of integrity regulations (corporate ‘lawfare’).
Radha’s research has appeared in leading law journals (International & Comparative Law Quarterly, London Review of International Law, UNSW Law Journal) and important edited collections (e.g., Krieger/Peters/Kreuzer, Due Diligence in the International Legal Order, Oxford University Press; Aaronson/Shaffer, Transnational Legal Ordering of Criminal Justice, Cambridge University Press). Her sole-authored book, Corruption, Asset Recovery, and the Protection of Property in Public International Law: The Human Rights of Bad Guys was published by Cambridge University Press and launched by former Australian federal treasurer, The Hon. Peter Costello AC. Her work with Pieth on corporate criminal liability is also widely cited. A regular speaker at international conferences and meetings, Radha has been a visitor at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), and has delivered presentations at the University of Melbourne, the Wharton School (University of Pennsylvania), and the University of Bergen.
Radha’s scholarship is informed by her past and ongoing roles in the international and private sectors. She commenced her career at Freehills (now Herbert Smith Freehills) in Brisbane, Australia, before joining an NGO self-governance and compliance initiative, Building Safer Organisations in Geneva, Switzerland. Prior to commencing at UQ, Radha was a Senior Expert, Collective Action and Compliance, at the Basel Institute on Governance, Switzerland. In that role, she supported Ukraine and Colombia in anticorruption project design and implementation. During her PhD studies, Radha held research roles in the Basel Institute’s International Centre for Asset Recovery (ICAR) and the University of Basel. Radha currently consults to the World Bank and has previously been engaged by the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. She is on the Advisory Board of the Bribery Prevention Network, Australia.
Radha was awarded a PhD (summa cum laude) from the University of Basel, and Bachelors of Arts (International Relations and German) and Laws (Hons I) from UQ.
John Swinson's principal interests are intellectual property law, Internet law, privacy law, AI law, cybersecurity law and the application of law to new technologies.
John graduated from the T.C. Beirne School of Law in 1988 with a University Medal. He also has a Bachelor of Arts majoring in computer science from The University of Queensland and a Master of Laws from Harvard Law School where he studied as a Fulbright Fellow and a Frank Knox Scholar. In 1989, John worked as a judge's associate to Justice C W Pincus of the Federal Court of Australia. John is admitted to the NY Bar, and worked as an associate at Kenyon & Kenyon in NYC from September 1991 to January 1997. From 1999 until 2017, John was an adjunct professor at QUT.
John was a partner at the law firm King & Wood Mallesons from 1999 to 2021. He was also Chairman of the auDA Policy Review Panel, which made recommendations to the auDA Board to revise Australia's domain name policies in 2019.
Since 2000, John has been an arbitrator for the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) in Geneva, and has decided over 720 disputes regarding the ownership of domain names.
John commenced as a professor at the T.C. Beirne School of Law in November 2017.
