Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gxg78 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T09:03:45.109Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Exceptionalism, politics and liberty: a response to Professor Tushnet from the Antipodes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 March 2008

Andrew Lynch*
Affiliation:
Director of the Terrorism and Law Project, Gilbert + Tobin Centre of Public Law, Faculty of Law, University of New South Wales

Abstract

In this comment, the author takes issue with Professor Tushnet’s favourable stance on the protection which political controls can afford human rights relative to legal ones. Writing in a jurisdiction with no formal legal instrument of human rights enables the author to speak with experience of the operation of political controls in a ‘pristine parliamentary environment’. The author outlines the ineffectiveness in the Australian experience of counter-terrorism since September 11 of many of the mechanisms which Tushnet has suggested impose constraints upon the diminishment of liberties. The comment concludes that the essential condition for the enhancement of political controls is the presence of legal ones.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2008

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Ackerman, Bruce (2004) ‘The Emergency Constitution’, Yale Law Journal 113: 10291091.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Australian Law Reform Commission (2006) Fighting Words Report – A Review of Sedition Laws in Australia (July 2006).Google Scholar
Bonner, David (2006) ‘Responding to Crisis: Legislating Against Terrorism’, Law Quarterly Review 122: 602.Google Scholar
Carne, Greg (2007) ‘Prevent, Detain, Control and Order? Legislative Process and Executive Outcomes in Enacting the Anti-Terrorism Act (No 2) 2005 (Cth)’, Flinders Journal of Law Reform 10: 1732.Google Scholar
Commonwealth of Australia, Report of the Security Legislation Review Committee, June 2006; Review of Security and Counter Terrorism Legislation, December 2006.Google Scholar
Cotler, Irwin (2001) ‘Thinking Outside the Box: Foundation Principles for a Counter-Terrorism Law and Policy’ in Daniels, Ronald J, Macklem, Patrick and Roach, Kent (eds), The Security of Freedom: Essays on Canada’s Anti-Terrorism Bill 111.Google Scholar
Ferejohn, John and Pasquino, Pasquale (2004) ‘The law of the exception: A typology of emergency powers’, ICON 2: 210.Google Scholar
Golder, Ben and Williams, George (2006) ‘Balancing National Security and Human Rights: Assessing the Legal Response to Common Law Nations to the Threat of Terrorism’, Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis 43.Google Scholar
Gross, Oren (2003) ‘Chaos and Rules: Should Responses to Violent Crises always be Constitutional?’, Yale Law Journal 112: 1011–1034.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Halligan, John, Miller, Robin and Power, John (2007) Parliament in the Twenty-first Century – Institutional Reform and Emerging Roles, 255–59.Google Scholar
Hocking, Jenny (2004) Terror Laws – ASIO, Counter-Terrorism and the Threat to Democracy.Google Scholar
Hogg, Peter W. and Bushell, Allison A. (1997) ‘The Charter Dialogue Between Courts and Legislatures (or Maybe the Charter of Rights and Freedoms Isn’t Such a Bad Thing After All)’, Osgoode Hall Law Journal 35: 75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Howard, John ‘Counter-Terrorism Laws Strengthened’ (Press Release, 8 September 2005).Google Scholar
Lomas, Owen G. (1980) ‘The Executive and the Anti-Terrorist Legislation of 1939’, Public Law 16.Google Scholar
Lynch, Andrew (2006) ‘Legislating with Urgency – The Enactment of the Anti-Terrorism Act [No 1] 2005’, Melbourne University Law Review 30: 747.Google Scholar
Lynch, Andrew and Williams, George (2006) What Price Security? Taking Stock of Australia’s Anti-Terrorism Laws. Sydney: University of New South Wales Press.Google Scholar
Manfredi, Christopher P. and Kelly, James B. (1999) ‘Six Degrees of Dialogue: A Response to Hogg and Bushell’, Osgoode Hall Law Journal 37: 513.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mcclelland, Robert (2004) ‘The Legal Response to Terrorism: A Labor Perspective’, University of New South Wales Law Journal 27: 262.Google Scholar
Michaelsen, Christopher (2006) ‘Balancing Civil Liberties Against National security? A Critique of Counter-Terrorism Rhetoric’, University of New South Wales Law Journal 29: 1.Google Scholar
Oberleitner, Gerd (2006) ‘Porcupines in Love: The Intricate Convergence of Human Rights and Human Security’, European Human Rights Law Review 6: 588.Google Scholar
Parliamentary Joint Committee on ASIO, ASIS and DSD, (2002) Parliament of Australia, An Advisory Report on the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation Legislation Amendment (Terrorism) Bill 2002.Google Scholar
Phillipson, Gavin (2005) ‘Legislative Over-Breadth, Democratic Failure and the Judicial Response: Fundamental Rights and the UK’s Anti-Terrorist Legal Policy’ in Ramraj, Victor V, Hor, Michael and Roach, Kent (eds), Global Anti-Terrorism Law and Policy, 455, 479–88.Google Scholar
Ramraj, Victor R. Hor, Michael and Roach, Kent (eds) Global Anti-Terrorism Law and Policy, 533.Google Scholar
Ruddock, Philip (2004) ‘A New Framework – Counter-Terrorism and the Rule of Law’, The Sydney Papers 16: 113.Google Scholar
Senate Legal and Constitutional Legislation Committee, Parliament of Australia, (2002) Consideration of Legislation Referred to the Committee: Provisions of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation Legislation Amendment (Terrorism) Bill 2002.Google Scholar
Tesón, Fernando R. (2005) ‘Liberal security’ in Wilson, Richard Ashby, Human Rights in the ‘War on Terror’.Google Scholar
Tribe, Laurence H. and Gudridge, Patrick O. (2004) ‘The Anti-Emergency Constitution’, Yale Law Journal 113: 1801.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tushnet, Mark (2004) ‘Weak-Form Judicial Review: Its Implications for Legislatures’, Supreme Court Law Review (2d) 23: 213.Google Scholar
Tushnet, Mark, (2006) ‘Interpretation in Legislatures and Courts: Incentives and Institutional design’ in Bauman, Richard W and Kahana, Tsvi, The Least Examined Branch – The Role of Legislatures in the Constitutional State, 355.Google Scholar
Tushnet, Mark (2007) ‘The Political Constitution of Emergency Powers: Parliamentary and Separation-of-Powers Regulation’, International Journal of Law In Context 3: 275–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Waldron, Jeremy (2003) ‘Security and Liberty: The Image of Balance’, Journal of Political Philosophy 11: 191.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Williams, George (2005) ‘The rule of law and the regulation of terrorism in Australia and New Zealand’.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Williams, George (2007) A Charter of Rights for Australia.Google Scholar