Justice, globalisation and human rights

Criminal Justice: Local and Global covers the way the 'local' can be widened out to look at international, transnational and supranational aspects of justice. This means that issues such as corporate crime and human rights can be discussed in a comparative and critical way, examining the possibility, for example of an International Criminal Court, cross-national jurisdictions of regulation and control (such as Interpol) and so on. Each chapter covers a different area of regulation, punishment and process.

The allocation of taxing rights of ship and aircraft leasing profits under Australia's tax treaties

The Australian Federal Commissioner of Taxation recently released Draft Taxation Ruling TR 2008/D3 with the stated purpose of clarifying ‘what profits derived from the leasing of ships or aircraft fall within the ship and aircraft articles of each of Australia’s tax treaties’. In particular, TR 2008/D3 explains the taxing rights over different types of leasing profits, such as a full basis lease in respect of any transport by a ship operated in international traffic and bareboat leases which are ancillary to the lessor transport operations of ships in international traffic. This article outlines the Commissioner’s views on the application of the standard ships and aircraft articles in the tax treaties to which it is a party as well as considering the major variations on the standard adoption. In doing so, guidance is provided as to the allocation of taxing rights of ship and aircraft leasing profits under Australia’s tax treaties.

Rights versus reality : the difficulty of providing 'access to English' in Queensland courts

This project reviewed the success of the Aboriginal English in the Courts booklet which was published by the Department of Justice and Attorney-General in 2000, with a view to improving access to the courts for speakers of Aboriginal English in Queensland. Surveys and interview were conducted with judges, magistrates, prosecutors, legal aid lawyers and courts registry staff. The feedback from the research has shown that the handbook has had little impact on ‘access to English’ in Queensland courts. The problems relate to the tension between protecting the rights of the accused under an adversarial system and legitimately introducing the issues of language uncertainty to the court in a non-prejudicial manner. In addition, the interviews have brought to light emerging language issues in remote communities that cannot be remedied under existing language policy mechanisms, such as the provision of interpreters or friends of court.

Responsibilisation and Rights: Explorations in Comparative Youth Criminology

Studies of international youth justice, punishment and control are in their infancy but the issues of globalisation, transnationalisation, policy transfer and localisation are gradually being addressed. There also appears a growing demand in policy and pressure group circles in the UK to learn more about other jurisdictions in order to emulate ‘best practice’ and avoid the worst excesses of punitive populism. However, existing comparative work in this area rarely ventures much beyond country specific descriptions of historical development, powers and procedures. Statistical comparisons – predominantly of custody rates – are becoming more sophisticated but remain beset with problems of partial and inaccurate data collection. The extent to which different countries do things differently, and how and why such difference is maintained, remains a relatively unexcavated territory. This article suggests a conceptually comparative framework in which degrees of international, national and local convergence and divergence can begin to be revealed and assessed.

The Punitive Turn in Juvenile Justice: Cultures of Control and Rights of Compliance in Western Europe and the USA

Separate systems of justice for children and young people have always been beset by issues of contradiction and compromise. There is compelling evidence that such ambiguity is currently being `resolved' by a greater governmental resort to neo-conservative punitive and correctional interventions and a neo-liberal responsibilizing mentality in which the protection historically afforded to children is rapidly dissolving. This resurgent authoritarianism appears all the more anachronistic when it is set against the widely held commitment to act within the guidelines established by various children's rights conventions. Of note is the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, frequently described as the most ratified human rights convention in the world, but lamentably also the most violated. Based on international research on juvenile custody rates and children's rights compliance in the USA and Western Europe, this article examines why and to what extent `American exceptionalism' might be permeating European nation states.

Formal complaints of workplace sexual harassment lodged with Australian Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commissions - 1 July 2009 - 31 December 2009

This report presents an analysis of quantitative data collected from the Australian Human Rights Commission, the Anti-Discrimination Commission of Queensland, the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission, the Anti-Discrimination Board of New South Wales, the Equal Opportunity Commission of South Australia, the Australian Capital Territory Human Rights Commission, the Equal Opportunity Commission Western Australia, the Northern Territory Anti-Discrimination Commission, and the Office of the Anti-Discrimination Commissioner (Tasmania) (hereafter referred to as the Commissions). The data comprise formal complaints lodged under the various federal, state and territory anti-discrimination laws in the period 1 July 2009 to 31 December 2009 where a complainant had alleged sexual harassment in the area of employment.

Integrity, attribution, and exploitation : contractual and normative moral rights protection in open licensing

Over the last twenty years, the use of open content licenses has become increasingly and surprisingly popular. The use of such licences challenges the traditional incentive-based model of exclusive rights under copyright. Instead of providing a means to charge for the use of particular works, what seems important is mitigating against potential personal harm to the author and, in some cases, preventing non-consensual commercial exploitation. It is interesting in this context to observe the primacy of what are essentially moral rights over the exclusionary economic rights. The core elements of common open content licences map somewhat closely to continental conceptions of the moral rights of authorship. Most obviously, almost all free software and free culture licences require attribution of authorship. More interestingly, there is a tension between social norms developed in free software communities and those that have emerged in the creative arts over integrity and commercial exploitation. For programmers interested in free software, licence terms that prohibit commercial use or modification are almost completely inconsistent with the ideological and utilitarian values that underpin the movement. For those in the creative industries, on the other hand, non-commercial terms and, to a lesser extent, terms that prohibit all but verbatim distribution continue to play an extremely important role in the sharing of copyright material. While prohibitions on commercial use often serve an economic imperative, there is also a certain personal interest for many creators in avoiding harmful exploitation of their expression – an interest that has sometimes been recognised as forming a component of the moral right of integrity. One particular continental moral right – the right of withdrawal – is present neither in Australian law or in any of the common open content licences. Despite some marked differences, both free software and free culture participants are using contractual methods to articulate the norms of permissible sharing. Legal enforcement is rare and often prohibitively expensive, and the various communities accordingly rely upon shared understandings of acceptable behaviour. The licences that are commonly used represent a formalised expression of these community norms and provide the theoretically enforceable legal baseline that lends them legitimacy. The core terms of these licences are designed primarily to alleviate risk in sharing and minimise transaction costs in sharing and using copyright expression. Importantly, however, the range of available licences reflect different optional balances in the norms of creating and sharing material. Generally, it is possible to see that, stemming particularly from the US, open content licences are fundamentally important in providing a set of normatively accepted copyright balances that reflect the interests sought to be protected through moral rights regimes. As the cost of creation, distribution, storage, and processing of expression continues to fall towards zero, there are increasing incentives to adopt open content licences to facilitate wide distribution and reuse of creative expression. Thinking of these protocols not only as reducing transaction costs but of setting normative principles of participation assists in conceptualising the role of open content licences and the continuing tensions that permeate modern copyright law.

Children’s rights in India : parents’ and teachers’ attitudes, knowledge and perceptions

Individuals’ attitudes influence their behaviour towards children, including whether children’s rights and welfare are promoted. The attitudes generally present in a society shape a culture of how children are perceived and treated. This study explored the attitudes and knowledge of 300 Indian parents and teachers regarding children’s rights, and their perceptions about whether selected rights were secured in reality. Findings revealed that most parents and teachers had positive attitudes about children’s rights, including rights to health and education, and freedom from child marriage and inappropriate work. Yet, about one quarter of participants did not think children should have the rights to freedom of expression and association. Knowledge of laws promoting children’s rights was poor. Most parents and teachers perceived a denial of seven key rights in Indian children’s lived experience. Overall, fijindings suggest a need to heighten awareness of children’s rights and needs, which can improve attitudes towards the treatment of children. Effforts to heighten awareness and attitudes towards children’s rights are needed across society and in key sectors to enhance children’s lived experience.

Patriarchy reasserted : fathers' rights and anti-VAWA activism

The backlash against gender-sensitive responses to women's victimization, offending, and imprisonment is inseparable from contemporary reaction against feminism and other progressive movements. The backlash against the American Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) provides a prime example of this resistance. Despite widespread support for VAWA and other policies designed to address violence against women, some constituencies object to their existence. The author investigates fathers' rights rhetoric on VAWA as an example of antifeminist backlash.

Fathers' rights groups : demographic correlates and impact on custody policy

This article combines information from fathers' rights Web sites with demographic, historical, and other information to provide an empirically based analysis of fathers' rights advocacy in the United States. Content analysis discerns three factors that are central to the groups' rhetoric: representing domestic violence allegations as false, promoting presumptive joint custody and decreasing child support, and portraying women as perpetrators of domestic abuse. Fathers' rights organizations and themes are examined in relation to state-level demographics and custody policy. The implications of fathers' rights activism for battered women and their children are explored.

A left realist approach to antifeminist fathers’ rights groups

Despite earlier critiques of left realists’ failure to adequately address feminist concerns, recent left realist theorizing and empirical research have made valuable contributions to the understanding of woman abuse and other forms of gendered violence. Left realism has further potential to contribute to the criminological understanding of woman abuse and its contributing socioeconomic and cultural contexts. This article describes left realists’ early efforts to include gender in analyses of crime. It then summarizes feminist critiques of left realism and reviews the work that has responded to them. Drawing upon two prominent strands of feminist left realist theorizing about violence and gender, the paper proposes a preliminary left realist theory of antifeminist fathers’ rights group activism. It then outlines a provisional research agenda on antifeminist fathers’ rights groups, and proposes short and long term policies and practices to enhance the safety of abused mothers and their children following divorce or separation.