Asia Law and Policy Forum

This collaborative research project is on Reimagining Vulnerability in the Light of COVID 19 in Sri Lanka’ (2021-2023). Dr Mario Gomez of the International Centre for Ethnic Studies, opens in a new window and Melissa Crouch are collaborating on a two-year project under the DFAT Sri Lanka grant scheme on Knowledge and Linkages for an Inclusive Economy. As the international partners on the grant, Melissa Crouch will produce a report on the impact of covid-19 on rights and governance in the region, with a particular focus on Indonesia, Myanmar and Sri Lanka. Academics including Theunis Roux and Rosalind Dixon, and HDR students who are part of the Constitutionalism in the Global South Project, will contribute to a stakeholder workshop.

The project, funded by the Asian Development Bank (ADB), is led by Melissa Crouch (2016–19). The focus is on improving legal education and skills integral to the transactional practice and adjudication of commercial law. 

The project includes developing a training program for the practical legal needs of private lawyers, government lawyers, prosecutors and judges in commercial and financial law.   

This project, which began in 2013, is a joint enterprise of various law schools, including UNSW Sydney, the University of Sydney and the Australian National University (ANU). UNSW is currently responsible for it. 

We aim to directly increase the capacity of local actors to participate positively in the process of constitutional reform in Myanmar. We do this by expanding the constitutional vocabulary of different groups within society (such as ethnic communities, grassroots organisations, political leaders and members of the media) so they can contribute to political discourse. 

Our objective is to expand the democratic political space during a critical time in Myanmar’s transition towards constitutional democracy. Our project aims to support increased constitutional stability, leading to an environment where there is greater prospect for peaceful and equitable development. 

We have held 10 workshops in various locations in Myanmar. Past sponsors include Rotary Australia, the Australian Embassy in Yangon, Konrad Adenauer Stiftung, the University of Sydney, UNSW, the ANU, the National University of Singapore (NUS), KOICA and the Community of Democracies. 

Team

• Professor Martin Krygier
• Professor Theunis Roux
• A/Professor Melissa Crouch
• Adam Czarnota
• A/Professor Catherine Renshaw (Australian Catholic University)
• Professor Wojciech Sadurski (University of Sydney)

This workshop series brings leading experts and researchers from Australia, Thailand and Indonesia together to focus on the role of digital entrepreneurship in enabling women’s economic empowerment and financial inclusion in developing communities and develop a capacity-building road map. The series is funded by an Australia-ASEAN grant.

Our workshops – held in Jakarta (November 2019), Thailand (March 2020) and Canberra (June 2020) – provide a platform for dialogue among academics, government, businesses, communities and media on issues of women’s economic empowerment and financial inclusion. Key participants share case studies of kampung digital programs, the effect of digital marketplaces, and the current state of women’s digital entrepreneurship initiatives and SMEs in farming communities in West Java and South Sulawesi of Indonesia. These workshops promote and support knowledge development on women in leadership.  

This interdisciplinary project involves UNSW faculties of Business, Law and Arts & Social Sciences, UNSW’s Institute for Global Development (IGD) and in-kind collaboration with the Ford Foundation, the Social Trust Fund and the State Islamic University (Jakarta) and Thammasat Business School (Thailand). 

Team

• Dr Felix Tan (Business School) 
• Dr Carmen Leong (Business School) 
• A/Professor Wing Wah Tham (Business School) 
• A/Professor Minako Sakai (UNSW Canberra) 
• A/Professor Melissa Crouch

In 2019, a conference was held around the theme of constitutional democracy in Indonesia. This resulted in the collaborative edited volume: Constitutional Democracy in Indonesia (OUP 2023). The Indonesian Constitution is an important legal text that governs the world’s third largest democracy. After decades of authoritarian rule, a key aspect of the transition to constitutional democracy was the amendment of the 1945 Constitution. The amended Constitution introduced profound changes to the legal and political system, including an emphasis on judicial independence, a bill of rights and the establishment of a Constitutional Court. This volume explores the ongoing set of debates over the meaning, implementation and practice of constitutional democracy in Indonesia. This includes debates over the powers of the legislature, the role of the military, the scope of decentralisation, the protection of rights and permissible limits on rights, the regulation of elections, the watchdog role of accountability agencies, and the leading role of the Constitutional Court. These legal issues are analysed in light of the contemporary social, political, and economic environment that has seen a decline in tolerance, freedom and respect for minorities. Contributions to this volume review the past two decades of reform in Indonesia and assess the challenges to the future of constitutional democracy amidst the wide-spread consensus on the decline of democracy in Indonesia. Demands for amendments to the Constitution and calls to revert to its initial form would be a reversal of Indonesia’s democratic gains.

This book project is an outcome of a workshop hosted by UNSW Law. In this volume, experts on Indonesian law and courts reflect on the growth and changes in the role and function of courts in Indonesia. Indonesia’s judiciary is a critical part of its democratic system. Since the transition from authoritarian rule in 1998, a range of new specialized courts have been established, from the Commercial Court to the Constitutional Court and the Fisheries Court. In addition, constitutional and legal changes have affirmed the principle of judicial independence and accountability. A raft of judicial reform programs have been pursued to address various issues within the judicial system, not the least of these being corruption. The growth of Indonesia’s economy, combined with the size as the fourth most populous country in the world, means that the courts are facing greater pressure to resolve an increasing number of disputes – from contracts to property disputes, criminal matters, or family law. The aim of this volume is to offer in-depth reflections on the role of the courts and legal reform in Indonesia. The chapters acknowledge that late Professor Dan S Lev was a leading scholar of the politics of courts in Indonesia. The chapters share a common concern by reconsidering the relevance of Lev’s work in light of the changes to the judiciary in Indonesia. Not least of these is the question of whether Lev’s reflections on legal culture, and particularly his concerns about the increase of corruption and the decline in professionalism, remain true today and to what extent legal reforms have addressed these concerns. This volume will be of interest to scholars of law, political science, law and development, Asian Studies, the politics of courts, and law and society.

Full details on the book are available here.

Professor Graham Greenleaf and Philip Chung of the Australasian Legal Information Institute (AustLII), in consultation with Melissa Crouch, have established a Myanmar/Burma online law database as part of the AsianLII program. A guide on how to use the database is available online. AsianLII was established in 2006 and provides for searching and browsing over 400,000 documents in more than 400 databases of legislation, case-law, law reform reports, law journals and other legal information, from all 28 jurisdictions in the region. All databases can be searched simultaneously, or searches limited to one country’s databases or other combinations. Search results can be ordered by relevance, by date, or by database. For each country, AsianLII also contains an extensive catalogue of law-related websites, and a ‘Law on Google’ facility which assists users to search Google only for legal materials from that country. AsianLII is operated by AustLII in cooperation with partner institutions in Asian countries, and other legal information institutes (LIIs) in the Free Access to Law Movement with Asian databases. Part of the aim of the AsianLII project is to assist in the development of the local capacity of our partner organisations to develop and maintain independent local legal information to the standards of world’s best practice, and to integrate them into international free-access law networks such as AsianLII, WorldLII and LawCite. This may include the provision of AustLII’s Sino search engine and other software for LII development, joint development of new databases, AustLII support for applications by local partners to obtain resources, and some in-country training.

In 2014, UNSW Law School signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Mandalay Law Department, at the University of Mandalay. This was the initiative of Professor Carolyn Penfold and Professor Brendon Edgeworth, and was the result of their visit to Mandalay University in 2013. In February-March 2015, two law professors, Daw Htin Htay Ei and Daw Nu Nu Yee, from the Law Department at Mandalay University visited the UNSW Law School. In July 2015, Professor Brendon Edgeworth and Dr Melissa Crouch gave guest lectures at the Law Department in Mandalay to about 100 students and staff. In March 2016, Professor David Dixon, Dean of UNSW Law, visited the University of Yangon, met with the Myanmar Centre for Responsible Business and the Australian Embassy. Further cooperation on legal education is planned in the future, and there are plans to sign an MOU with the University of Yangon. Melissa Crouch has also undertaken curriculum development and teaching at the University of Yangon from 2013-2020. In January 2020, Melissa again visited the University of Mandalay. Melissa has also contributed to teaching initiatives and programs on constitutional democracy and legal education run by the Yangon School of Political Science, International IDEA, and the Open Society, among others.

The purpose of this project is to support and equip key local actors to contribute to constitutional reform, democratic consolidation and lasting peace in Myanmar. This project builds on the work of the Australia-Myanmar Constitutional Democracy Project of UNSW Law. The project has three main components. The first component is to host an international workshop on “Peace Processes, Federalism and Constitution-making” at UNSW from 6-7 December 2018. Five Distinguished Visiting Scholars from Myanmar will be sponsored to attend and present at the event. The second component of the project is the publication of a book, The Constitution of Myanmar: A Contextual Analysis (with Hart Publishing’s leading series on Constitutions of the world). The English and Burmese version of the book will be published and disseminated in 2019-2020. This book by Crouch is the first to analyse the 2008 Constitution of Myanmar (Burma) in its historical, political and social context. 

This accessible book provides an in-depth exploration of the key elements of the 2008 Constitution in theory and practice. This book will be an invaluable resource for students, scholars and local political actors to facilitate greater understanding and appreciation of constitutional law in Myanmar, and inform strategies for reforming the current constitution. The third component of the project is to initiate a series of workshops in Myanmar, which will use the book as the basis for capacity building on constitutional literacy. This builds on previous capacity building initiatives on constitution-making. In 2016, the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (International IDEA) established a Myanmar Constitution (‘MyConstitution’) Centre in Yangon. The Centre focuses on education and advice to all Myanmar stakeholders, including political parties, members of parliament, ethnic armed groups, military, media and civil society organizations. Melissa Crouch was invited by International IDEA to provide recommendations for curriculum design, detailed in a report on “Curriculum Guidelines on Constitutional Design for the MyConstitution Centre” (2016), which aims to integrate best practise and knowledge in comparative constitutional design with deep knowledge of local Myanmar constitutional context. The following modules have been developed:

• Feb 2017: Melissa developed and delivered the module on ‘Principles and Processes of Constitution-making’ in Yangon.
• June 2017, Theunis Roux developed and delivered a module on ‘Land and Natural Resource Governance in Constitutional Design’ in Yangon.
• Nov 2017, Melissa developed and delivered a module on Judicial Independence and Accountability to the Myanmar Supreme Court in Naypyidaw. 
• Nov 2017, Melissa developed and delivered a module on Checks and Balances in Constitution-making to the International Relations Committee of parliament.
• Feb 2018, Melissa delivered a series of lectures, workshops and consultations with parliament, civil society, ethnic groups, Yangon University and the Supreme Court around federalism, the role of courts in a federal system and judicial independence
• June 2018, Melissa contributed to the Constitutional Academy Bootcamp in Pyin Oo Lwin
• Jan 2019, Melissa taught at the University of Mandalay and the University of Yangon
• Jan 2019, book launch hosted by The Asia Foundation in partnership with Mosaic Myanmar, with panellist Dr Lian H Sakhong, Saw Kapi and Htet Min Lwin
• May 2020, Melissa delivered a course on the Constitution of Myanmar for Yangon School of Political Science
• Nov 2020, Melissa delivered two courses on the Constitution of Myanmar for civil society, run by International IDEA
• Jan 2021, Melissa delivered a course on the Constitution of Myanmar for law professors, run by International IDEA (onlin

This ARC Discovery Project aims to explain and evaluate constitutional populism or regimes that have come to power in a global wave of ‘populist’ parties challenging traditional ones. 

We will identify, reconstruct and evaluate legal and constitutional aims of, and institutional solutions adopted by, such regimes. We’ll examine whether they respect the forms of democracy or just pay lip service to, for example, principles of the rule of law and constitutionalism while working to subvert such principles.  

Our project will focus on what ‘new populists’ do with power once they have it, what the consequences are for a global view of democracy and informing Australia’s geopolitical engagement with such regimes. Our project includes a focus on the Philippines.

Team  

• Professor Martin Krygier
• Adam Czarnota  
• Professor Wojciech Sadurski (University of Sydney) 

This ARC Discovery Project aims to understand how and why constitutions change in authoritarian regimes. 

After decades of authoritarian rule, there is lively public debate about formal amendment of the Myanmar constitution. Based on rigorous qualitative methods, including archival research and in-depth interviews, our project will investigate why Myanmar's constitution is both a constraint and an enabler of democratic reform. 

Our timely socio-legal project seeks to inform Australia’s political, economic and cultural engagement with Myanmar as a strategic neighbour in southeast Asia and a new market for foreign investment.

Sole Chief Investigator: A/Professor Melissa Crouch

Melissa Crouch and Edward Aspinall (ANU) are co-leading a major educational review of trends in Asian Studies in Australia, in partnership with the Asian Studies Association of Australia (ASAA). Roughly every twenty years, a review of teaching and research in Asian Studies is undertaken. 

The report is available for download here.

For about half a century, Australia has been a global leader in the study of Asia. The ASAA is the peak academic association for the study of Asia in Australia. The report is the fifth in a series of reports since the 1970s. The report focuses on trends in the promotion of Asia literacy in Australian universities from 2000 to 2022, highlighting both achievements and challenges. 

The report identifies a decline in government, and in many cases, university support, pointing to growing challenges in Australia’s efforts to promote Asia literacy among Australian graduates at a time when Asia’s global prominence and influence is more obvious than ever. The report proposes a set of recommendations to the government and to universities in order to renew and strengthen national commitment to Asia literacy.