Public Seminar in Law and the Humanities
Redress of Jurisprudence: Treaty Thinking and Care for the Conduct of Lawful Relations (Victoria, Australia, 2017-2025)
Date: March 17, 2026 (Tuesday)
Time: 12pm-1pm
Venue: Academic Conference Room, 11/F Cheng Yu Tung Tower, The University of Hong Kong
Speaker: Shaun McVeigh (Professor, Melbourne Law School, University of Melbourne)
How does a tradition of jurisprudence, such as that of the ‘common law tradition’, address itself to new relations of law and of authority? And, how, in such situations, does a university faculty of a common law tradition and jurisdiction continue to fulfil its vocation?
With treaty relations being formalised between the Aboriginal peoples and people of Victoria and the state of Victoria, in Australia, these questions have also been addressed again to the University. The enactment of the Statewide Treaty Act (Vic) 2025 and associated arrangements has established new institutions of protocol, representation, and truth and justice appropriate for living with more than one law. Importantly it centres relations between Aboriginal law and lore, Indigenous rights, and governance as the mode of engagement of lawful relations.
For non-Indigenous legal scholars, one question that arises is how can a faculty of law of the common tradition respond well to its commitments to treaty relations and the conduct of lawful (as opposed to lawless) relations? I argue here for attending to the importance of maintaining the link between treaty and diplomacy as a practice of lawful relations. Diplomacy should be considered as articulating a substantive ethos, and a mode of conduct [also] belonging to common law jurisprudence in its ceremonial, political-legal, moral, and governmental aspects.
Professor Shaun McVeigh is visiting the HKU Faculty of Law on a Teaching Exchange Fellowship. He is a British-Australian academic who lives and works on Wurrundjeri lands in Australia. His academic research in the fields of jurisprudence and jurisography has concentrated on the conduct of the office of the legal scholar and jurisprudent through addressing questions of authority and jurisdiction, office and its conduct, prudence and judgment, and care of the dying and the dead. Over time his research has been largely undertaken in collaboration with others including Christine Black, Ann Genovese, and Shaunnagh Dorsett. His books include Law, Ethics and the Office of the Jurist (Routledge, 2025, edited with Peter Goodrich), Jurisdiction (Routledge, 2012, with Shaunnagh Dorsett), and Jurisprudence of Jurisdiction (Routledge, 2004, edited).
Chair: Valeria Vázquez Guevara (Assistant Professor, The University of Hong Kong Faculty of Law)
To register, please go to https://hkuems1.hku.hk/hkuems/ec_regform.aspx?guest=Y&UEID=105379.
For inquiries, please contact Ms. Grace Chan at / 3917 4727.