In his introduction to IJLI v. 27 no.2 (Summer 1999), “Looking Back to “Rome 1998,” Holger Knudsen encapsulated the special nature of the IALL annual courses: the opportunity to extend our learning in international law and librarianship, to travel to new places, the meeting of friends, and finally: the “Courses beautifully designed by selfless and magnanimous local colleagues, who manage to add that specific local flavour, or, ‘ambiente.'”

Australia has always been a place of legal pluralism. Before the British colonists brought with them the common law and the statute law of England, there were indigenous systems of law. Indeed, there were very many of them. They did not cease to exist just because English law was imported. Sadly, for over 200 years, their existence was not officially recognised by the Anglo-Australian legal system. In 1992, in Mabo v State of Queensland [No.2], the High Court of Australia did more than “invent” native title. It made this nation officially a legally pluralist one. The common law now recognises, and gives effect to, indigenous law with respect to land tenure and, possibly, with respect to other aspects of life and death as well. Native title is what indigenous law says it is, no more and no less, except to the extent that non-indigenous law operates to “extinguish” or “impair” native title. The first inquiry in any application for a determination of native title must be as to the continuing existence of an indigenous legal system and the manner in which that legal system deals with entitlements in relation to the relevant land. If such a system survives and gives entitlement to people, it must then be asked whether non-Aboriginal law has “extinguished” or “impaired” those entitlements. In truth, this inquiry is as to whether the non-indigenous legal system has withdrawn its recognition of those entitlements, because of its creation of interests, or recognition of activities, incompatible with the continuing existence of indigenous entitlements. The entitlements continue to exist in indigenous law, despite any “extinguishment” or “impairment.”

Since the beginning of the Reconciliation and Social Justice Project in 1996, AustLII has sought to contribute to the process of reconciliation through the provision of relevant legal and cultural information relating to indigenous people. Two important components of the project have been collecting material as well as making it as accessible as possible to as many people as possible. Another significant part of the Reconciliation and Social Justice Project has been connecting remote Aboriginal communities to the Internet and providing training to them in its use. The history and achievements of the project are set out here and some consideration is given to future directions for the various aspects of the project.

Canada, like Australia, is belatedly confronting a problem that has long been denied and ignored. Each country is now reckoning the social costs of past policies which sought to achieve the forced assimilation of indigenous children. In Canada this policy was mainly implemented through laws requiring the compulsory attendance of Indian children at school. Some 100,000 children were directed to church-operated residential schools where their cultural transformation could be effected in isolation from their families and the outside world. That isolation left them highly vulnerable to abuse and neglect.

“Indigenous peoples have been deprived of vast land holdings, and access to life sustaining resources, and they have suffered … activ[e] suppress[ion of] their political and cultural institutions. As a result indigenous people have been crippled economically and socially, their cohesiveness as communities has been damaged or threatened, and the integrity of their cultures has been undermined.”

Since my retirement from the High Court of Australia in April 1995, I have pursued various activities. As Chairman of the National Library 1995-1998, National Fellow at the Australian National University and Chancellor of the University of New South Wales, I have been concerned with some current issues concerning libraries, including funding and copyright reform. My main purpose on this occasion is to speak about my experiences as a judicial rover in Fiji, the Solomon Islands and Hong Kong, jurisdictions in which I have been sitting as a Judge and as a lecturer at the Chinese National Judges College in Beijing.

Since the late 1970's the Asian region has witnessed the paradox of socialist nations moving to market or “capitalist” economies. The experiment began with economic reforms in the People's Republic of China (PRC), spreading to the Soviet Union in 1985 with the adoption of perestroika, to Viet Nam under doi moi in 1986 and since then to the former republics of the Soviet Union after the ‘cold war’ in 1991. There are now nine countries in transition in the Asian region; the PRC, Viet Nam, Cambodia, Lao PDR, Mongolia, Myanmar, Kazakstan, Krygyz Republic and Uzbekistan.

Relationships with international universities for the purposes of benchmarking, international best practice and strategic partnerships for competitive advantage are all leading to practices which are shaping the destiny of the University of Melbourne. One of the “Guiding values” of the University is to “work with other international Universities to enrich intellectual discourse, educational quality and research activity in the international community. “

It is now thirty years since I commenced research work and teaching in the field of Asian Law, focussing mainly on Japanese Law. Over those three decades, there has been a substantial change in the resources available, the uses made of those resources, and the feasibility of establishing any sort of substantive collection. I thought it would be most useful if I attempt in the discussion today to outline some of the key policy issues and choices which seem to me to face Law librarians when they are subjected to the demands of a growing body of Asian Law specialists to focus on building an Asian legal materials collection. I have called in aid the experiences of three of my colleagues, one in the field of Japanese Law, one in the field of Indonesian Law, and the third in the area of Chinese Law, to highlight some of the challenges involved.

This paper attempts using Internet as a means to access and explore information and resources all around the world for Chinese law materials. Topics discussed cover the Internet development in China, Chinese character coding system, Chinese softwares, search engines and some useful Chinese Studies WWW sites for research purposes. It is intended for people who use the Internet for research, and would like to gain more knowledge on the Chinese law resources provided by the Internet.

Australia has a unique heritage in its wildlife - so much so that it has become a part of our folklore and national identity. The rest of the world has come to know and recognise us through our wildlife symbols.

Upon retiring from the High Court of Australia some two years ago, I was propelled, quite willingly, into the world of international commercial arbitration and I must confess that it is a world which has changed completely from the one which I had known previously.

Australia is both a federation and a constitutional monarchy. The Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act 1900, which made the Australian Constitution law, refers to the establishment of the federation “under the Crown of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.” In fact, however, since 1973, the appropriate style of the monarch in relation to Australia has been “Queen of Australia.” And ever since federation, the monarch has been represented in Australia by a Governor-General, who progressively has acquired a more significant role, in parallel with the acquisition of Australian independence.

Until a few years ago there were only 12 law schools in this country. That number has now grown to 28 with rumours of more, and with the additional introduction of programmes like those run by the University of London. Law student numbers in Australia country have risen by over 60% since 1987. It can be, and has been, argued that this is simply too many for our resources and many of the newer law schools were established more with an eye to the prestige of having a law degree within the institution.

Since the mid 1980's to the present time there has been an unprecedented attitudinal change by governments, both at the federal and state levels, regardless of political persuasion, towards the role of the public sector. There has been a sustained policy to wind back the size of the Public Service across the board.