The potential of critical race theory in decolonizing university curricula

This paper critiques our experiences as non-Indigenous Australian educators of working with numerous embedding Indigenous perspectives curricular projects at an Australian university. Reporting on these project outcomes alone, while useful in identifying limitations, does not illustrate ways in which future embedding and decolonising projects can persist and evolve. Deeper analysis is required of the ways in which Indigenous knowledge and perspectives are perceived, and what ‘embedding’ IK in university curricula truly means to various educational stakeholders. To achieve a deeper analysis and propose ways to invigorate the continuing decolonisation of Australian university curricula, this paper critically interrogates the methodology and conceptualisation of Indigenous knowledge in embedding Indigenous perspectives (EIP) in the university curriculum using tenets of critical race theory. Accordingly, we conduct this analysis from the standpoint that EIP should not subscribe to the luxury of independence of scholarship from politics and activism. The learning objective is to create a space to legitimise politics in the intellectual / academic realm (Dei, 2008, p. 10). We conclude by arguing that critical race theory’s emancipatory, future and action-oriented goals for curricula (Dei, 2008) would enhance effective and sustainable embedding initiatives, and ultimately, preventing such initiatives from returning to the status quo (McLaughlin & Whatman, 2008).

Bringing protection home : healing the schism between international obligations and national safeguards created by extraterritorial processing

Extraterritorial processing schemes are designed to prevent and deter access to statutory and judicial safeguards in the country responsible for the interception and transfer of asylum seekers to a third country. In line with this objective, they incorporate interdiction, transfer and processing practices and standards that are deliberately isolated from the national legal and institutional protections within either the intercepting state or the third country where processing occurs. Australia's recent disbandment of its extraterritorial processing centres in third countries highlights the fact that extraterritorial processing schemes have proven unworkable as a matter of international law, as they negate the national safeguards fundamental to the satisfaction of a state's protection obligations.

Removing barriers to protection at the exported border : visas, carrier sanctions, and international obligation

Asylum is being gradually denuded of the national institutional mechanisms (judicial, legislative and administrative) that provide the framework for a fair and effective asylum hearing. In this sense, there is an ongoing ‘denationalization’ or ‘deformalization’ of the asylum process. This chapter critically examines one of the linchpins of this trend: the erection of pre-entry measures at ports of embarkation in order to prevent asylum seekers from physically accessing the territory of the state. Pre-entry measures comprise the core requirement that foreigners possess an entry visa granting permission to enter the state of destination. Visa requirements are increasingly implemented by immigration officials posted abroad or by officials of transit countries pursuant to bilateral agreements (so-called ‘juxtaposed’ immigration controls). Private carriers, which are subject to sanctions if they bring persons to a country who do not have permission to enter, also engage in a form of de facto immigration control on behalf of states. These measures constitute a type of ‘externalized’ or ‘exported’ border that pushes the immigration boundaries of the state as far from its physical boundaries as possible. Pre-entry measures have a crippling impact on the ability of asylum seekers to access the territory of states to claim asylum. In effect, states have ‘externalized’ asylum by replacing the legal obligation on states to protect refugees arriving at ports of entry with what are perceived to be no more than moral obligations towards asylum seekers arriving at the external border of the state.

The role of legislative, executive and judicial mechanisms in ensuring a fair and effective asylum process

A good faith reading of core international protection obligations requires that states employ appropriate legislative, administrative and judicial mechanisms to ensure the enjoyment of a fair and effective asylum process. Restrictive asylum policies instead seek to ‘denationalize’ the asylum process by eroding access to national statutory, judicial and executive safeguards that ensure a full and fair hearing of an asylum claim. From a broader perspective, the argument in this thesis recognizes hat international human rights depend on domestic institutions for their effective implementation, and that a rights-based international legal order requires that power is limited, whether that power is expressed as an instance of the sovereign right of states in international law or as the authority of governments under domestic constitutions.

The application of Raman spectroscopy to the study of the uranyl mineral coconinoite Fe2Al2(UO2)2(PO4)4(SO4)(OH)2•20H2O

Raman spectra of the uranyl containing mineral coconinoite, Fe2Al2(UO2)2(PO4)4(SO4)(OH)2•20H2O, are presented and compared with the mineral’s infrared spectra. Bands connected with (UO2)2+, (PO4)3- , (SO4)2-, (OH)- and H2O stretching and bending vibrations, are assigned. Approximate U-O bond lengths in uranyl, (UO2)2+, and O-H...O hydrogen bond lengths are calculated from the wavenumbers of the U-O stretching vibrations and (OH)- and H2O stretching vibrations, respectively, and compared with published data for similar natural and synthetic compounds.

Legal ethics in a post-Westphalian world : building the international rule of law and otehr tasks

The emergence of strong sovereign states after the Treaty of Westphalia turned two of the most cosmopolitan professions (law and arms) into two of the least cosmopolitan. Sovereign states determined the content of the law within their borders – including which, if any, ecclesiastical law was to be applied; what form of economic regulation was adopted; and what, if any, international law applied. Similarly, states sought to ensure that all military force was at their disposal in national armies. The erosion of sovereignty in a post-Westphalian world may significantly reverse these processes. The erosion of sovereignty is likely to have profound consequences for the legal profession and the ethics of how, and for what ends, it is practised. Lawyers have played a major role in the civilization of sovereign states through the articulation and institutionalisation of key governance values – starting with the rule of law. An increasingly global profession must take on similar tasks. The same could be said of the military. This essay will review the concept of an international rule of law and its relationship to domestic conceptions and outline the task of building the international rule of law and the role that lawyers can and should play in it.

Water rights and water governance : a cautionary tale and the case for interdisciplinary governance

Although Australia is the world’s driest continent without the complication of international borders and a generally good governance reputation, its record of water governance is very poor. This chapter considers some of the potentially general lessons that might be derived for water governance. These include: the difficulties of delineatingwater rights; the apparent preference for creating property rights in unsustainable uses of water while failing to deliver basic water rights; the inter twining of carbon and water crises; the dangers of privatising networks that form natural monopolies; the dangers of disciplinary hubris where interdisciplinary understanding is critical. It concludes by starting to address some of the water governance issues raised by globalisation.

Developing an intimate ''relationship'' with nature through extreme sports participation

This article explores the interplay between extreme sports and the natural world in which they take place. Prior theoretical work on extreme sports has often made anthropocentric assumptions about this relationship, taking for granted that extreme participants treat nature only as a resource for athletic consumption, valuable only for its human uses. From this perspective, the natural world is regarded as a playground or battlefield, as a means to test physical prowess and human capacity. In contrast, extreme sports participants involved in this study report developing an intimate and reciprocal relationship with the natural world. A phenomenological analysis of participant accounts reveals, among veteran extreme athletes, the development of a heightened respect for something greater than themselves and a realization that humanity is simply a part of the natural environment.