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Law, Justice and Other Challenges

Law, Justice and Other Challenges

Selected Speeches and Papers of Michael Kirby

Editor

ISBN

9781760025373
Publication date

11/12/2025
Format

Hardback
Page extent

832

AUD $180.00 gst included

Coming soon...
SKU: 9781760025373 Categories: , ,

This book contains a selection of papers and speeches by Michael Kirby covering half a century – from 1975 to 2025. He reflects on his journey from childhood in 1950s Australia and through law school and legal practice to his work as inaugural President of the Australian Law Reform Commission, President of the Court of Appeal of NSW and Justice of the High Court of Australia along with other posts. He has advanced the equality principle for women and all minority groups, including gays and other sexual minorities. In a number of the papers, Michael Kirby examines his struggle with his sexuality and society’s evolving view on the subject. He offers an essay on his partner of fifty-five years, Johan van Vloten. The topics of the papers and speeches included here reveal Michael Kirby’s wide range of interests and the changes that Australia and the world has undergone, to which he has contributed. How would computers, just emerging in the 1970s, affect privacy and society generally? Should Australia recognise First Nations Peoples’ customary law? How would the globalisation of media affect judicial independence? Does the Australian Constitution condone indefinite detention? Michael Kirby’s insights and views are always insightful, occasionally prophetic and, although in a minority at the time, sometimes vindicated by what followed. There will be something in this collection for most readers: not only lawyers, fans of autobiography, or members of the LGBTIQ community. This collection is as much a journey through the late modern history of Australia and the world as it has progressed, often urged on by an impatient Michael Kirby.

Foreword by Governor-General of Australia, Her Excellency, the Honourable Ms Sam Mostyn AC
Preface
Acknowledgments
Table of Cases
Table of Statutes

Part I: Boy, Son and Student
1. Growing Up Gay in Australia (2009)
2. Remembering Teachers (2011)
3. The Role of Universities in Modern Democracies: Riddles and Paradoxes (2020)
4. Constitutional Adjudication and Learning From Each Other – A Comparative Study (2012)

Part II: Practitioner
5. Memories of Hickson, Lakeman and Holcombe (2000)
6. For the Idealists in the “Greediest Profession” (1990)
7. Human Rights: An Agenda for Action (1991)
8. Billable Hours in a Noble Calling (1996)
9. Letter from an Aged Judge to a Disillusioned Lawyer (2020)

Part III: Law Reformer
10. Science, Technology and Law Reform (1977)
11. An Australian Bill of Rights? (1978)
12. Should We Recognise Aboriginal Tribal Laws? (1980)
13. Science, Sex and Society (1988)
14. A Century Reflection on the Australian Constitution: The Republic Referendum, 1999 (2000)
15. ALRC, Law Reform and Equal Justice Under Law (2000)
16. Impact of Technology and Generative AI on the Law (2025)

Part IV: Judge
17. The Future of the Judiciary (1987)
18. Human Rights: The Role of the Judge (1991)
19. Dealing With Drugs (1992)
20. The Abolition of Courts and Non-reappointment of Judicial Officers in Australia (1991)
21. Farewell Speech (1996)
22. Speech on the Occasion of his Swearing in and Welcome as a Justice of the High Court of Australia (1996)
23. Globalisation of the Media and Judicial Independence (1998)
24. Judicial Accountability in Australia (2001)
25. Black and White Lessons for the Australian Judiciary (2002)
26. Ten Years in the High Court – Continuity and Change (2005)
27. Judicial Dissent – Common Law and Civil Law Traditions (2006)
28. 50 Years in the Law: A Critical Self-Assessment (2009)
29. Judicial Farewell (Retirement from the High Court of Australia) (2009)
30. The Internationalization of Domestic Law and Its Consequences – A Public Conversation Between the Hon. Justice Antonin Scalia and the Hon. Michael Kirby (2010)
31. Where Does Truth Lie? (2015)

Part V: Human Rights and Social Inclusion Advocate
32. Aboriginal Bicentenary? (1988)
33. AIDS: A New Realm of Bereavement (1991)
34. Disability and the Human Genome: To Ignore is to Decide (2000)
35. Courage – Gay Games VI, Opening Ceremony Sydney (2002)
36. The Dreyfus Case a Century On – Ten Lessons for Australia (2006)
37. Fundamental Human Rights and Religious Apostasy (2007)
38. Deconstructing Homophobia – High Level Dialogue on punitive laws, human rights, and HIV prevention (2010)
39. The Sodomy Offence: England’s Least Lovely Criminal Law Export? (2011)
40. Transgender Persons – Legal Disharmony and Attitudinal Change (2014)
41. Marriage Equality Law and the Tale of Three Cities – How the Unimaginable Became Inevitable and Even Desirable (2016)
42. Municipal Courts and the International Interpretive Principle: Al-Kateb v Godwin
(2020)
43. Miscarriages of Justice in Australia: Unfinished Business (2021)
44. Justice, Ethics and Culture in Dealing with Human Remains: Australian and Other Indigenous Lessons (2022)
45. The Centenary of the First Abolition of Capital Punishment in Queensland – A Study in Law and Human Dignity (2022)

Part VI: Internationalist
46. Images of the Inauguration (of Nelson Mandela) (1994)
47. Cambodia – A Departing Assessment (1996)
48. The Commonwealth of Nations Today: Historical Anachronism or Focus for Universal Values? (2010)
49. U.N. Commission of Inquiry on Human Rights Violations in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea – Ten Lessons (2014)
50. From Magna Carta 1215 to North Korea 2015: Advancing the Idea of Legal Restraints on Governmental Power (2015)
51. Self-determination of Peoples – Origins, Applications & Problems in the Russo-Ukraine War of 2022 (2022)

Part VII: Biographer
52. H. V. Evatt, The Anti-Communist Referendum and Liberty in Australia (1990)
53. Lionel Murphy – Ten Years On (1996)
54. R. P. Meagher and I: Best of Times/Worst of Times (2011)
55. Johan van Vloten – An Ode on the Law’s Capacity to Reform (2025)

Index

Read the Introduction by Dr Paul Vout KC.

Read Chapter 55, Johan van Vloten: An Ode on the Law’s Capacity to Reform

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