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1 results

  • 15 - First Nations Constitutional Recognition in Australia

  • Edited by David Capper, Queen's University Belfast, Conor McCormick, Queen's University Belfast, Norma Dawson, Queen's University Belfast
  • Book:
    Law and Constitutional Change
    Published online:
    26 September 2025
    Print publication:
    16 October 2025, pp 275-293
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  • Summary

    This chapter explores the complexity of the relationship between Australia’s rule of law claims and its historical and contemporary treatment of First Nations. It argues that there is a constitutional legitimacy crisis within the modern Australian state, sourced in its original denial of the legal existence of First Nations of the land alongside the denial and weaponisation of the ‘rule of law’ against them. The chapter traces these two strands of rule-of-law history in the broader context of the various rule-of-law debates that persevere in the Australian legal system, and the more immediate contemporary debate as to how to ‘recognise’ First Nations in the Australian Constitution. The objectives underpinning the proposed Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice (a representative advisory body) are examined, as well as the reasons for its failure at referendum, which resonate with the claims of equality and rule of law that underpinned the Australian state’s origins, and the origins of its ongoing constitutional crisis.