Constitutional Recognition of First Peoples in Australia Theories and Comparative Perspectives

This collection of essays explores the history and current status of proposals to recognise Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples in the Constitution of Australia. The book had its genesis in a colloquium co-hosted by the University of Southern Queensland and Southern Cross University, attended by scholars from Australia and overseas and prominent participants in the recognition debates. The contributions have been updated and supplemented to produce a collection that explores what is possible and preferable from a variety of perspectives, organised into three parts: 'Concepts and Context', 'Theories, Critique and Alternatives', and 'Comparative Perspectives'. It includes work by well-regarded constitutional law scholars and legal historians, as well as analysis built from and framed by Indigenous world views and knowledges. It also features the voices of a number of comparative scholars – examining relevant developments in the United States, Canada, the South Pacific, the United Kingdom, New Zealand and South America. The combined authorship represents 11 universities from across Australia, the United Kingdom, the United States and Canada. The book is intended to be both an accurate and detailed record of this critical step in Australian legal and political history and an enduring contribution to ongoing dialogue, reconciliation and the empowerment of Australia's First Peoples.

Professor Simon Young is based at the University of Southern Queensland and is an Adjunct Professor at the University of Western Australia. He specialises in the areas of Indigenous law and policy (including native title) and public law (particularly administrative law), publishing books in those fields in 1997, 2001, 2007, 2008 and 2016, and articles in Australian, Canadian and United Kingdom journals. He has collaborated, in various capacities, with a number of government agencies (in Australia and Canada), various non-government organisations, the Australian Law Reform Commission, judges, law firms, barristers and journalists.

Dr Jennifer Nielsen works as a Senior Lecturer in the School of Law and Justice at Southern Cross University. Her research interrogates the interface between mainstream laws and legal systems, race and whiteness. It applies a theoretical framework informed by Indigenous knowledges and philosophies on colonialism, self-determination, whiteness and racism. She has published a range of articles and book chapters on these themes, presented at national and international conferences, and co-edited the significant 1996 text, Majah: Indigenous Peoples and the Law (The Federation Press).

Dr Jeremy Patrick is a Lecturer at the University of Southern Queensland School of Law and Justice. He has law degrees from the University of Nebraska (JD), University of Toronto (LLM), and York University (PhD). He specialises in law and religion and constitutional law, and has published in American, Canadian and Australian journals. His book Freedom of Religion at the Margins: Fortune-telling, Witchcraft, and Individual Spiritualities is under contract with the University of British Columbia Press.