Racism Undermines High-Performance Democracies

Introduction B.G. Ramcharan I. The Protection Role of the Australian Human Rights Commission The Hon. John von Doussa, Q.C. II. The Protection Role of the Danish Human Rights Commission Morten Kjaerum III. The Protection Role of the Fiji Human Rights Commission Dr. Shaista Shameem IV. The Protection Role of the Ghana Human Rights Commission Anna Bossman V. The Protection Role of the Indian Human Rights Commission Justice (Dr.) A.S. Annand VI. The Protection Role of the Mexican Human Rights Commission Dr. Jose Luis Soberanes Fernandez VII. The Protection Role of the Nepalese Human Rights Commission Nayan Bahadur Khatri VIII. The Protection Role of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission Prof. Brice Dickson IX. The Protection Role of the Philippines Human Rights Commission Dr. Purificacion C.V. Quisumbing X. The Protection Role of the Uganda Human Rights Commission Justice Margaret Sekaggya XI. National Institutions and the Protection of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Orest Nowosad Conclusion B.G. Ramcharan Select Bibliography Principles Relating to the Status of National Institutions (The Paris Principles) Annex I: General Comment No 10 of the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR): The Role of National Human Rights Institutions in the Protection of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Annex II: Report of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights to the 56th Session of the Commission on Human Rights (2000).

Natural data on the Australian Human Rights Commission’s website outlining the complaint cases generated from Disability Discrimination Act, 1992 (DDA) were used to examine the social construction of disability employment discrimination. Using a social model and human rights citizenship lens, some 987 complaint cases were analysed to assess the prevalence of disability discrimination in employment, and its relationship to the types of disability, gender, entity undertaking the actions and organisational context. Of all complaint cases across the Australian Human Rights Commission’s operations, by far the largest proportion involves disability discrimination. Within the disability discrimination complaint cases, employment makes up the greatest proportion of these cases. In examining the patterns of discrimination seven major themes emerged involving: distinctive patterns across disability type; access to premises; human resource mismanagement; selection of new employees; integration of assistive technology; perception of cost of disability inclusions; and inflexible organisational workplace practices. The discussion examines the underlying reasons for the emergent themes where employers misunderstood key legal concepts that underpin the DDA including: unjustifiable hardship; inherent requirements; reasonable adjustment; direct; and indirect discrimination. The paper concludes by discussing the implications of the findings as a way of understanding the social construction of disability discrimination in employment to signal ways to better develop inclusive organisational practice.

As the 40th anniversary of the Australian Human Rights Commission nears, we draw on the lessons from the AHRC’s work on asylum and refugee policy to identify areas of strength and of weakness in its contemporary context. We begin by describing the role of the AHRC in asylum and refugee policy. We then examine three key areas. First, we examine the independence of the AHRC, and the institutional and other protections needed to sustain this. Second, we examine structural features impacting on the effectiveness of the AHRC in promoting human rights. Third, we examine the AHRC’s role as an enabler and connector within the international and national human rights frameworks.

While the idea of a gender-sensitive parliament is over 20 years old (Childs & Palmieri, 2023), institutional reforms in the name of gender equality have been slow to materialise around the world. Where change has occurred, it appears to have been catalysed by a limited range of—sometimes confluent—factors including the public airing of allegations of sexual misconduct in the #MeToo era, the increasing salience of gender-sensitive parliament international norms, and the role of feminists in the academy. Celis and Childs (2020) identify feminist academic critical actors as those who rather than simply researching parliamentary change, explicitly undertake institutional (re)design and (re)building work (see also Childs, 2024). In this article, we uncover the work undertaken by feminists in an Australian academic institution to support the 2021 independent inquiry of the Australian Human Rights Commission into Commonwealth parliamentary workplaces. This work—undertaken by the authors as both insiders and outsiders—informed the analysis and recommendations in the Australian Human Rights Commission’s report, and since its launch, has also kept pressure on the various bodies entrusted with implementing gender-sensitive changes. We argue that feminists in the academy are uniquely positioned to navigate insider and outsider roles in support of gender-sensitive parliamentary reform.

Age discrimination in the workplace: The more things change ….

Despite most young people rating their health positively, significant morbidity is attributable to mental health conditions and risk taking behaviour during these formative years (Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, 2014). There is a lack of research of Australian university associated general practices despite the youth-centricity of such practices (Staunton Smith, 2018). For universities looking to improve services there is little Australian-centric literature on what makes an ideal service. In 2010, a white paper ‘Considerations for Integration of Counseling and Health Services on College and University Campuses’ (ACHA, 2010) recognised the lack of knowledge of integrated medical and counselling services at colleges and universities and called for research to understand motivations and mechanics of such mergers (ACHA, 2010). Further to striving to provide best-evidenced models of care for students, Australian universities and their health services should be aware of monitoring by the Australian Government Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (TEQSA). Wellbeing and safety are incorporated within the Learning and Environment domain of the HES framework and include; avenues and contacts for support for students if needed; availability of specific types of personal support services; and, ensuring that support services offered reflect the needs of student cohorts (Australian Government Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency, 2018). Minor framework adjustments followed the release of the Australian Human Rights Commission’s ‘National report on sexual assault and sexual harassment at Australian universities’ urged universities to audit their counselling services (Australian Human Rights Commission, 2017). With this background in mind, this Show Case report describes an initiative undertaken by Swinburne University Health Service to service redesign towards an expanded and alternative service delivery model.

Quality career development learning (CDL) is critical to support the lives and careers of people with disability who experience lower employment rates (Australian Human Rights Commission, Willing to work: National inquiry into employment discrimination against older Australians and Australians with disability, Australian Human Rights Commission, 2016), underrepresentation in post-school education (Ranasinghe, Chew, Knight, & Siekmann, 2019), and weaker graduate outcomes (QILT. (2021). 2021 Graduate Outcomes Survey. Victoria, Quality Indicators for Learning and Teaching.). Research which is inclusive, accessible and framed critically is urgently required in order to understand what best practise CDL support looks like for this group of individuals. At the same time, there is a need for a disability inclusive response to the physical distancing restrictions imposed on research by COVID-19. The aim of this chapter is to discuss how research methods, made accessible by technologies, were employed to explore the educational and vocational experiences of university students with disability. Through an analysis of interview video recordings, interviewer reflections, and email correspondence with participants, the chapter highlights how the needs of students with disability interacted with, and were accommodated in, research processes to enable data collection. Specifically, the chapter discusses the invisible but critical recruitment and rapport-building work required to engage students with disability in research, and the use of videoconferencing as an enabler of research participation. The discussion concludes by offering suggestions as to how inclusive virtual methods can be successfully applied in future CDL and social science research.

Australia, being rather an outlier, does not have a national Bill of Rights. The Australian Human Rights Commission (‘AHRC’) has recently sought to reinvigorate the issue, recommending the enactment of an Australian Human Rights Act. Its proposed model went before the Commonwealth Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights, as part of the Inquiry into Australia’s Human Rights Framework. This article considers the need and support for an Australian Human Rights Act, incorporating recent developments during the COVID-19 pandemic. It provides a detailed critique of the AHRC’s proposed model and elements for human rights protection. In doing so, the article draws upon the experiences of certain Australian state and territory jurisdictions with Bills of Rights. It concludes by strongly endorsing the AHRC’s proposed model, subject to some reservations (about a participation duty, equal access to justice duty and power to exempt certain public authorities) and suggested clarifications or enhancements.

Introduction In 1996, within the Asia Pacific region, there were only five national human rights institutions (NHRIs): the Australian Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, the National Human Rights Commission of India, the Indonesian National Commission on Human Rights, the New Zealand Human Rights Commission, and the Philippines Commission on Human Rights. In July 1996, representatives from the NHRIs of Australia, India, Indonesia, and New Zealand met in Darwin, Australia, to attend a meeting sponsored by the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR). The meeting was also attended by representatives of eight governments considering the establishment of NHRIs (Fiji, Mongolia, Nepal, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Sri Lanka, and Thailand) and representatives of several nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). The NHRI participants at the Darwin meeting decided to form the Asia Pacific Forum of National Human Rights Institutions (APF), a network to enhance regional cooperation and capacity building among NHRIs. The conclusions of the Larrakia Declaration, which emanated from that first meeting of NHRIs from the Asia Pacific region, stated that The promotion and protection of human rights is the responsibility of all elements of society and all those engaged in the defense of human rights should work in concert to secure their advancement; NHRIs should work in close cooperation with nongovernmental organizations and wherever possible with governments to ensure that human rights principles are fully implemented in effective and material ways; Regional cooperation is essential to ensure the effective promotion and protection of human rights; and To ensure effectiveness and credibility, the status and responsibilities of NHRIs should be consistent with the Principles relating to the status of national institutions adopted by the General Assembly that provide that NHRIs should be independent, pluralistic and established wherever possible by the Constitution or by legislation and in other ways conform to the Principles.

This article discusses the efforts of the Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) to reduce cases of racial discrimination in Australia 2015-2018. The AHRC's efforts are defined in five rules and procedures for resolving complaints of racial discrimination. Among them are socialization or early warning, complaints and investigations, compliance, continuation of legal action, and public hearings. The moment Australia ratified the United Nations Human Rights Commission (UNHRC) rules, namely the CERD rules on the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination which sparked the 1975 Racial Discrimination Act that could form the formation of the AHRC in 1986. In principle UNHRC is an organization known as the regime adopted in Australia in the form of the AHRC. This journal aims to discuss, describe, and find out the efforts of the Australian Commission on Human Rights in reducing cases of racial discrimination in Australia 2015-2018. Describes the rules and procedures for resolving racial discrimination complaints received by the AHRC through the five stages of resolution. After that it analyzes whether the five rules and procedures applied by the AHRC are implemented optimally to reduce cases of racial discrimination that occurred in Australia in 2015-2018.

A Culture of Neglect: Climate Discourse and Disabled People

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to show the extent to which work on how to manage gender in resource industries fails to draw on the body of knowledge which explores gender in the workplace.Design/methodology/approach– This paper explores the efficacy of a recently published toolkit within the context of the current debate about gender in resource industries (such as mining, and oil and gas).Findings– The Australian Human Rights Commission’s toolkit speaks to this debate, but fails to analyse existing strategies to deal with the “gender problem”; it simply repeats them as successful examples of what to do. The authors of the toolkit also fail to ask a question which is fundamental to the success of any intervention into gender: what is the definition of “gender” on which the work is based?Originality/value– The debate about gender in resource industries fails to take into consideration contemporary ideas about gender as they have appeared in academic research and human practice.

Recently, the Human Rights Commission of New Zealand has conducted an inquiry that has officially documented ‘the obstacles to dignity, equality and security for trans people’. The Australian Human Rights Commission has also recently conducted a sex and gender diversity project, and in 2006 the Equalities Review in the United Kingdom commissioned the largest research project ever untaken globally on trans people’s lives, reported in Engendered Penalties: Transgender and Transsexual People’s Experiences of Inequality and Discrimination. This article reflects on the implications of the issues raised by these recent reports and research for transgendered people immigrating to and from New Zealand. It also raises some parallel issues for Australia.

This issue of the Cosmopolitan Civil Societies Journal was conceived as an outcome of the conference Sport, Race and Ethnicity: Building a Global Understanding, which was staged by the University of Technology Sydney from 30 Nov – 2 Dec 2008. The event was organised in partnership with the Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) and the Department of Immigration and Citizenship, and supported by the School of Leisure, Sport and Tourism, UTS Kuring-gai and the Cosmopolitan Civil Societies Research Centre at UTS. The conference was opened by Graeme Innes (AM), Australian Human Rights Commissioner and Disability Discrimination Commissioner, and the Honourable Laurie Ferguson, Parliamentary Secretary for Multicultural Affairs and Settlement Services. The third day of the symposium featured an AHRC led ‘Sport and Cultural Diversity Forum’, chaired by Paul Oliver, author of the 2007 report What’s the Score? A Survey of Cultural Diversity and Racism in Australian Sport, and David Peachey, a Wiradjuri man who is best known for his contribution to rugby league football and his commitment to young Aboriginal people through the David Peachey Foundation. The eighty speakers at the conference included Indigenous peoples from Australia, New Zealand and Canada, together with people of different colour, ancestry and religion from places as diverse as North America, South Africa, the United Kingdom, Brazil and South-East Asia.

Framework for human rights protection in Australia - report of the National Human Rights Consultation Committee - the role of resolution of human rights complaints in the enforcement of human rights - use of alternative dispute resolution (ADR) - current role of the Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) - future role as an advocator and crusader for victims of human rights abuses - need for recognition and protection of the special status of the AHRC.