July of 1969 was a big month. Whilst the ‘civilized’ world was focused on the deployment of three men to the moon, Indonesia was finalizing steps to wrest control of…
The criminal justice system consists of three main parts: (1) Legislative (create laws); (2) adjudication (courts); and (3) corrections (prisons, probation, parole, fines, community service). In a criminal justice system,…
Yesterday, Thursday I received a phone call from Captain Fred Martens, the man who spent a 1,000 days in jail, having been wrongly convicted of an offence under Australia’s Child…
For some years now I have been considering the concept of complicity. What constitutes complicity, how far does it extend, where does responsibility for wrongdoing cease? You can all blame…
Australia's lack of respect for indigenous rights and the rule of law should negate its participation in any international peace keeping operations.
Little fly, Thy summer’s play My thoughtless hand Has brushed away. Am not I A fly like thee? Or art not thou A man like me? For I dance And…
Racial classification today is commonplace; people routinely catalogue each other as members of this or that race, and seem to assume that everyone can be thus classified Bernard Boxill, "Introduction"…
In the late afternoon of May 22, 1787, a group of a dozen men officially assembled at James Phillips' bookstore and printing shop located at 2 George Yard, London. While…
The TNI under Suharto was seen as different from other armies because: Indonesian army sees itself as quite different from other armies in the world, because it was never created…
Carl Schmitt’s Political Theology: Four Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty is both famous and obscure. A twentieth-century political theory, containing two canonical sentences: "Sovereign is he who decides on…
Following is a response to the statement published by Ernst & Young. People with things to hide generally sneak around, aiming to placate those who can advance their situation. They…
Australia placed its own interests before those of West Papuans, favouring its relationship with Indonesia over those of an occupied people.
There’s been significant debate in the past year about the introduction of ethics classes in public schools in New South Wales. The St James Ethics Centre was tasked with developing…
As most readers of Blak and Black, indeed as most readers of any daily paper in Australia will be aware there has been an ongoing dispute between Fortescue Metals Group…
'Poetry, like the law, is a fiction’, wrote William Hazlitt in a critical essay of 1816. Hazlitt the critic took as his subject all aspects of his society’s culture, including…
I have spent the last few weeks travelling around remote Indigenous communities collecting signatures in support of a Royal Commission into the AFP and statements in support of my application…
Targeted racism of an Aboriginal man by an ACT public servant remains ignored by the AFP and ACT Government, denying an Indigenous man justice.
Do we want to bequeath the next generation a society where those with money and influence are exempted from the legal accountability?
Serious questions are being asked about the Australian Federal Police and their fitness as the nation's law enforcement body.
For very many Aboriginal Australians the phrase 'Australian justice system' is an oxymoron. There are any number of reasons, many of which are justified, why we as Aboriginal Australians think…