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Universities are created by law as corporations, separate from government and from the people who work and study in them. In the past they were run democratically by academics or faculty members, and sometimes by students as well.

Now they are run by highly paid management teams, and governed by small boards. From the outside, legally they look similar to large for-profit companies. "Corporate governance" ideas apply to both.

But is this appropriate? Universities are vastly different from large companies. Their management and governance is not particularly accountable to anyone in practice. So more and more money goes into more and more management. Failures keep on occurring and little happens.

Governments are waking up to this but their response is more regulation. We argue for a return to a modernised academic democracy. Drawing on our recent paper for the University of Melbourne, Imagining a Revolution in University Governance, we talk about a model constitution for our own Australian Exemplar University. See https://melbourne-cshe.unimelb.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0009/5477778/Imagining-a-Revolution-in-University-Governance.pdf

For more information about your dashing hosts and the Law in Context podcast series visit our website at About - Law in Context

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What exactly is a " State"? It's not the same as a country, or a nation, or a government. States do need a government to be recognised as a state, as well as a permanent population and territory, but it gets complicated. There are parts of the world, such as Northern Cyprus and Taiwan, that have territory and a government, but are not states.

It's an important issue, and indeed a vital one at the moment in the Middle East. Is Palestine a state? Should it be recognised as one?

This episode describes the state as a political and legal construct. It isn't a cultural or ethnic one. Most of the world's land mass is within the state system. And who knows? Could the Moon be next?

For more information about your dashing hosts and the Law in Context podcast series visit our website at About - Law in Context

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The adversarial system of justice came from the English common law and spread. In this one minute snapshot, we contrast it with the inquisitorial system found in non-Anglo democracies.

For a full version of the episode and further reading, visit https://lawincontext.com.au/adversarial-system/

For more information about your dashing hosts and the Law in Context podcast series visit our website at About - Law in Context