Abstract: Book synopsis: (B)ordering Britain argues that Britain is the spoils of empire, its immigration law is colonial violence and irregular immigration is anti-colonial resistance. In announcing itself as postcolonial through immigration and nationality laws passed in the 60s, 70s and 80s, Britain cut itself off symbolically and physically from its colonies and the Commonwealth, taking with it what it had plundered. This imperial vanishing act cast Britain's colonial history into the shadows. The British Empire, about which Britons know little, can be remembered fondly as a moment of past glory, as a gift once given to the world. Meanwhile immigration laws are justified on the basis that they keep the undeserving hordes out. In fact, immigration laws are acts of colonial seizure and violence. They obstruct the vast majority of racialised people from accessing colonial wealth amassed in the course of colonial conquest. Regardless of what the law, media and political discourse dictate, people with personal, ancestral or geographical links to colonialism, or those existing under the weight of its legacy of race and racism, have every right to come to Britain and take back what is theirs.

Abstract: After a long spell of neglect, historians in the last twenty years have started again to take an interest in the economics of the ‘British World’: an entity centred on Britain and the dominions. Their approach emphasises shared culture and networks. By contrast this article reasserts the importance of institutions of governance in shaping economic transactions and hence the importance of political (not cultural) economy. In order to re-emphasise the connected importance of co-ordination between states within the Empire, it prefers the term Empire-Commonwealth to British world, a term more closely grounded in contemporary language. It argues that the Empire-Commonwealth possessed complex, patchy, but discernible practices of economic governance which the paper delineates and argues were shaped by the overriding concern to maximise the autonomy of self-governing members (Britain and the dominions). These practices let to cooperation over preferential trading arrangements, currency, taxation, migration and investment, law and regulation, and transport and communications. After 1945 the international framework which sustained these practices transformed, while the internal dynamics of the post-imperial Commonwealth made significant cooperation on matters other than aid and development in the global south unlikely. The possibility of broad-ranging governance receded even as intra-Commonwealth trade and investment declined.

Abstract: This special issue of the Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History explores several historical entanglements between distinct expressions of imperialism and colonialism, and diverse trajectorie...

Abstract: The world currently faces unprecedented health challenges as COVID-19 poses a huge threat to health systems, economies and societies as we know it. The events of the current COVID-19 pandemic have further emphasised existing issues within our health systems. There is no better time than now to come together in global solidarity to tackle these evolving threats of COVID-19 pandemic. The Commonwealth is an ideally placed network to tackle these global health challenges, with its wide-reaching networks of governmental, non-governmental and civil society organisations across all continents. Although the biennial Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) originally scheduled to take place in Kigali in Rwanda 22-27 June 2020 has been postponed in view of COVID-19, Commonwealth country discussions are continuing, centred on the CHOGM key theme of 'Delivering a Common Future: Connecting, Innovating, Transforming', and five subthemes of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) and Innovation; Trade; Environment; Governance and the Rule of Law; and Youth. The planned CHOGM and Commonwealth itself provides all members a timely platform to consider innovative ways to connect, innovate and transform healthcare to meet the needs of their populations. This commentary considers these five CHOGM subthemes and how member nations can be supported to achieve universal health coverage through optimising medicines use and outcomes, in the midst of a global pandemic in line with the global health agenda.

Abstract: This chapter examines the main features of the Australian employment relations system. After outlining the key aspects of the regulatory and institutional framework, it looks at the changing roles and functions of the main actors and processes. The chapter explores significant issues in the contemporary employment relations landscape: workplace productivity, gender equality and precarious work. When the former colonial governments agreed to establish the Commonwealth of Australia, the new federal government was given a limited jurisdiction over employment relations. The Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) is the main confederation for manual and many non-manual unions. It was formed in 1927 and includes around 95 percent of all unionists. In 1994, the ACTU initiated an ‘organising works’ program, based partly on the experience of United States unions, in order to build the organising skills and capacities of Australian unions and to give effect to an ‘organising model’.

Abstract: This chapter draws attention to the multilayer nature of the term ‘inequalities’, which embraces many different types of inequalities—social, cultural, economic and so on. We argue that digital inequalities, which are the key point of this book, are closely intertwined with other existing types of inequalities. We illustrate this idea by focusing on the three levels of the digital divide (access, skills and benefits people are gaining through their online activities). The chapter provides a detailed overview of theoretical approaches to the study of digital inequalities across the globe (Europe, the U.S., Arab and Middle Eastern nations, ‘Emerging States’, Commonwealth of Independent States [CIS] countries, etc.) and justifies the need for a more detailed approach to the analysis of digital inequalities in the Global South.

Abstract: Public Finance and Parliamentary Constitutionalism analyses constitutionalism and public finance (tax, expenditure, audit, sovereign borrowing and monetary finance) in Anglophone parliamentary systems of government. The book surveys the history of public finance law in the UK, its export throughout the British Empire, and its entrenchment in Commonwealth constitutions. It explains how modern constitutionalism was shaped by the financial impact of warfare, welfare-state programs and the growth of central banking. It then provides a case study analysis of the impact of economic conditions on governments' financial behaviour, focusing on the UK's and Australia's responses to the financial crisis, and the judiciary's position vis-a-vis the state's financial powers. Throughout, it questions orthodox accounts of financial constitutionalism (particularly the views of A. V. Dicey) and the democratic legitimacy of public finance. Currently ignored aspects of government behaviour are analysed in-depth, particularly the constitutional role of central banks and sovereign debt markets.

Abstract: Recreational fishing is popular in Australia and is managed by individual states in consultation with the Commonwealth for those fisheries that they regulate and also for Australian Marine Parks (AMPs). Fishers regularly access both state and offshore Commonwealth waters but this offshore component of the recreational fishery is poorly understood. Our study tested the functionality of existing state-based surveys in Western Australia (WA) and New South Wales (NSW) to better inform Commonwealth fisheries and AMP managers about recreational fishing in their jurisdictions. Catch estimates for nine species of interest to the Commonwealth were developed and two case study AMPs [Ningaloo (WA) and The Hunter (NSW)] were also chosen to test the ability of the state survey data to be disaggregated to the park scale. As each state’s fishery survey designs were contextual to their own management needs, the application of the data to Commonwealth jurisdictions were limited by their statistical power, however aspects of each states surveys still provided useful information. Continued evolution of state-wide survey methods, including collection of precise spatial data, and regional over-sampling would be beneficial, particularly where there are multiple stakeholder and jurisdictional interests. National coordination, to temporally align state surveys, would also add value to the existing approaches.

Abstract: This chapter considers the impact of the First World War on Australia's position in world affairs. It examines whether, as Latham claimed, the war created opportunities for the expression of Australian interests in imperial or international forums, or whether Australian leaders struggled to have their voices heard in a Eurocentric war and peace. The chapter focuses on two perspectives on Australian involvement in international affairs, namely Australia's distinctive interests, and Australia's relationships with Britain and the other Dominions. It contends that such celebrations of Billy Hughes can be misleading. As the Paris Peace Conference shows, one of the central themes in any study of Australia's role in the world in the first half of the twentieth century is the importance to Australia of membership of the British Empire or Commonwealth. Bureaucratic support within Australia for the conduct of foreign relations was, up to the First World War, negligible.

Abstract: Objective:We aim to spark renewed discussion of the need for a more effective corporate governance structure for mental health services in Australia. While acknowledging clinical governance faces c...

Abstract: Until December 2017, there were no legal provisions within the Commonwealth of Australia for same-sex couples to marry in the same sense that their heterosexual friends and family can. Civil unions...

Abstract: Exploring republican ideas and concepts that developed in sixteenth-century Poland under the impact of humanism and the Renaissance, as well as political and constitutional changes, this is a landmark study of republican discourse in sixteenth-century Poland-Lithuania. It provides a conceptual and contextual analysis of the rich political literature and debate which animated intellectual life and political reasoning during the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, and effectively demonstrates its republican character. Using a comparative perspective, Dorota Pietrzyk-Reeves situates the Polish republican discourse within both the classical and early modern republican traditions, bringing together contexts and ideas that have traditionally been overlooked by scholars of early modern Europe. In addition, she also underlines the originality of Polish concepts such as the relationship between law, liberty and virtue as key elements of a well-ordered commonwealth and the vision of a mixed res publica that had a monarchical character. This book is an invaluable resource for anyone interested in European intellectual history and the early modern republican tradition.

Abstract: This article shares lessons from the field with program evaluations in the English-Speaking Commonwealth Caribbean (ESCC) region. The research highlighted that the challenges faced by evaluators wo...

Abstract: Following an international trend, South Africa and Russia entered into a "strategic partnership" in 2006 and in 2013 upgraded it to a "comprehensive strategic partnership". This article examines the formal architecture of the partnership by means of Wilkins's "strategic partnership model". One of very few analytical devices for the study of bilateral partnerships between states, Wilkins's template probes three phases in the development of such alignments, namely their formation, implementation and evaluation. Based on a set of international instruments devised by South Africa and Russia, the institutional features of their comprehensive strategic partnership are set out and a tentative evaluation of its operation is offered. A comparative dimension is introduced by referring to formal aspects of South Africa's strategic partnerships with its other BRICS partners, namely China, India and Brazil. 1. Introduction It is an age-old phenomenon that certain bilateral relationships between states are in some ways "special" or "privileged" and hence more important, better or closer than "ordinary" inter-state ties. In the 19th century, for instance, relations between Germany and Austria and between Russia and France were considered as exceptional by the parties involved (Evans and Newnham 1992:304). In modern times the notion of a 'special relationship', especially when written in capital letters, is reserved more or less exclusively for that between America and Britain (Evans and Newnham 1992:304). The term itself was coined by Winston Churchill in March 1946, when he was the leader of the Opposition in the British Parliament. In an historic address delivered in Fulton, Missouri, Churchill warned that "an iron curtain has descended across the Continent" (Europe) and that Western powers should stand together against the perceived Soviet threat. What he called "a special relationship between the British Commonwealth and Empire and the United States" would be at the heart of a united front. Such a "fraternal association", as Churchill portrayed it, "requires not only the growing friendship between our two vast but kindred Systems of society, but the continuance of the intimate relationship" in the military and security domains (Modern History Sourcebook, undated). The so-called Atlantic Alliance between Britain and America endured--with ebbs and flows --throughout the Cold War. In part due to the huge inequalities between the two partners in economic and military terms, the designation "special relationship" lost favour in recent years. In 2011, President Barack Obama and Prime Minister David Cameron opted for the expression "essential relationship" between the United States (US) and Britain (quoted by Blanco 2011:15). Many other states have since 1945 also claimed a form of "specialness" for their bilateral relationships. Consider, for instance, ties between some former imperial powers and their ex-colonies, which are said to constitute "families of nations" (Haugevik 2010: 2-3); the Commonwealth, born of the British Empire, is the best-known embodiment of such an historical association. Since the 1990s states began displaying a preference for the adjective "strategic" to depict bilateral relationships that are supposed to be deeper and stronger than "standard" interactions, but usually without extending to alliances (understood as formal agreements for military cooperation in the face of common threats). The terms "strategic partnership" and "strategic relationship" are nowadays used the world over (Blanco 2011:1-2). Among numerous examples are strategic partnerships/relationships between India and the US (Teja 2014: 183-194), Syria and Iran (Lawson 2007:29-47), the US and Israel (Miller 2013:16), the US and Saudi Arabia (Miller 2013:1-6), China and South Korea (Kim 2008: 97-121), and Brazil and Japan (Lessa 2010: 123). Variations on the "partnership" theme include "constructive strategic partnership" (as the US and China envisaged in the 1990s) (Shambaugh 2004: 97); "comprehensive strategic partnership" (as between Russia and South Africa); "privileged strategic partnership" (Russia and India); and "fundamental partnership" (the US and Brazil) (Lessa 2010: 120). …

Abstract: This article examines Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and Commonwealth Funding data to explore the relationship between the level and means of funding of 11 different ...

Abstract: The post-war reconstruction period is exceptional in Australian metropolitan planning history for the integration of economic and social policy with housing and planning strategies. Although the consensus around the new paradigm of integrated planning focused on national development had unravelled by the end of the 1940s, the advances in legislation, administration and professional development provided the main framework for post-war metropolitan planning. The rhetoric and idealism of post-war reconstruction created unrealistic expectations about the ability of planning to achieve radical change, and much of the analysis of this period develops a vision and reality duality. Accepting the political reality of resistance from the states and within his own party, John Dedman, who had replaced Chifley as minister for post-war reconstruction, reduced the Commonwealth role in housing to assisting states through grants and low-interest loans to build rental housing for those in most need.

Abstract: This article assesses the role and powers of the Queen as Head of State during the political crises surrounding Brexit and the prorogation of parliament in 2019. These crises in Westminster highlig...

Abstract: The military lifestyle is common to all Commonwealth armed forces and is characterized by intense demands on military personnel and their families. These demands include frequent separations and re...

Abstract: This article examines the compatibility of extra-departmental executive agencies, a defining feature of the modern regulatory state, with responsible government, one of the architectonic principles...

Abstract: The Colombo Plan developed out of a conference of Commonwealth foreign ministers in 1950, with its main aim being to provide economic recovery aid to Asian countries affected by the Second World Wa...

Abstract: In 1965, the Australian government and Australian Elizabethan Theatre Trust (AETT) debated which performing arts ensembles should represent Australia at the London Commonwealth Arts Festival. The AETT proposed the newly formed Aboriginal Theatre, comprising songmakers, musicians, and dancers from the Tiwi Islands, northeast Arnhem Land and the Daly River. The government declined, and instead sent the Sydney Symphony Orchestra performing works by John Antill and Peter Sculthorpe. In examining the historical context for these negotiations, I demonstrate the direct relationship between the historical promotion of ‘Australianist’ art music composition that claimed to represent Aboriginal culture, and the denial of the right of representation to Aboriginal performers as owners of their musical traditions. Within the framing of Wolfe's settler colonial theory and ‘logic of elimination’, I suggest that appropriative Australian art music has directly sought to replace performances of Aboriginal culture by Aboriginal people, even while Aboriginal people have resisted replacement.

Abstract: This article, on the basis of a consideration of the development of the law relating to the use of passports as a tool of national security in the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, challenges the common law conception of passports, arguing that passports effectively confer rights and so, consequentially, that the refusal or withdrawal of a passport represents a denial of rights. From this conclusion a number of points flow. Though these consequences are most acute for the United Kingdom and Canada, in which passports remain regulated by, and are issued under, prerogative powers, there are also a number of points of significance for Australia and New Zealand, where passports have a statutory basis.

Abstract: In 1988 the 'Hughes Report' of the Aboriginal Education Policy Task Force, chaired by South Australian Aboriginal educator Dr Paul Hughes, made 57 specific recommendations to change education systems. Unlike the Hughes Report, the policy was widely seen as fitting Aboriginal education into existing systems-there was not a word on teacher education or racism. If they were taught at all, it was mainly by imported teachers with little knowledge of the local Aboriginal language or culture. The 1991 Commonwealth languages policy, Australia's Language: The Australian Language and Literacy Policy, stressed the urgent need to preserve and maintain Aboriginal languages. Racism and stereotyping of Aboriginal people must be addressed-issues that were particularly acute when Australians were forced to confront the real history and nature of Australia, and a White Australia backlash released 'free speech' from the constraints of so-called 'political correctness'.