Staff


ALC_Nicholson_Pip

Director (Asian Law Centre, Comparative Legal Studies Program)
Associate Director (Vietnam)

Professor Penelope (Pip) Nicholson

Professor Pip Nicholson was appointed Director of the Asian Law Centre in 2013. She is also Associate Director (Vietnam) and Director of the Comparative Legal Studies Program at the Asian Law Centre. Her teaching and research are in dispute resolution, comparative legal studies, law and reform in Asia and law and society in Asia. Pip has degrees in Arts and Law from MLS, a Masters in Public Policy from the ANU and a doctorate from the MLS. Pip was also a barrister and solicitor of the Supreme Court of Victoria (1990 - 1992).

Pip’s publications include: Socialism and Legal Change: The Dynamics of Vietnamese and Chinese Reform (Asia Pacific Press and ANU E Press. 2012) (Co-edited with John Gillespie); Borrowing Court Systems: the Experience of Socialist Vietnam (Martinus Nijhoff, 2007); Examining Practice, Interrogating Theory: Comparative Legal Studies in Asia (Martinus Nijhoff, 2008) (co-edited with Sarah Biddulph); and New Courts in Asia (Routledge, 2009), co-editedwith Professor Andrew Harding (Routledge, 2009); Law and Development and the Global Discourses of Legal Transfers (Cambridge University Press, 2012) (co-edited with John Gillespie).

Pip, together with Camille Cameron, holds an ARC grant to investigate court-oriented legal reform in Cambodia and Vietnam. She also holds an ARC grant with Tim Lindsey to analyse ‘Drugs, Law and Criminal Procedure in Southeast Asia’.

Her current research interests include law and legal change (including court reform) in transitional countries, drug trials in Asia and the cross-cultural legal research and development. Pip has spoken on these issues in the USA, Canada, Japan, Vietnam, France, Thailand, Hong Kong, Sweden, UK and the Netherlands. Pip is an internationally recognised expert in courts and legal reform (particularly within socialist states). She has consulted widely on these issues.

Download a copy of Pip's CV

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 Farrah Ahmed

Associate Director (India)

Dr Farrah Ahmed

Farrah joined the Melbourne Law School in July 2012 and was made Associate Director of the India Program at the Asian Law Centre in 2013. Prior to this appointment, she was a Lecturer in Law at the Queen's College, University of Oxford. Farrah’s areas of interest are South Asian Law, Legal Theory, Law and Religion, Public Law and Family Law. Her educational history includes an LLB from the University of Delhi, a Bachelor of Civil Law, an MPhil in law and a DPhil in law from the University of Oxford.

Farrah is currently working on a project on the accommodation of religious norms in Indian family law. Her publications include: ‘The Coherence of the Doctrine of Legitimate Expectations’ Cambridge Law Journal (forthcoming, with Adam Perry); 'Expertise and the Duty to Give Reasons', Public Law (2012) 2: 221 (with Adam Perry); 'Religious Tribunals, Religious Freedom and Concern for Vulnerable Women', Child and Family Law Quarterly [2012] 363 (with Jane Norton); 'Religious Norms in Family Law: Implications for Group and Personal Autonomy' in John Eekelaar and Mavis Maclean (ed) Managing Family Justice in Diverse Societies  (Hart 2013); 'How Religious Arbitration Could Enhance Personal Autonomy', Oxford Journal of Law and Religion (2012) 2:1 (with S. Luk); 'Personal Autonomy and the Option of Religious Law', International Journal of Law, Policy and the Family (2010) 24 (2): 222; 'The Value of Faith', Religion, State and Society (2010) 38 (2):169 and  'Religious Arbitration: A Study of Legal Safeguards', Arbitration  (August 2011) (with S. Luk)

 

ALC_Bidduph_Sarah

Associate Director (China)

Associate Professor and Reader Sarah Biddulph

Associate Professor and Reader Sarah Biddulph joined the Centre in 1989 and was appointed to a lectureship in the Law School in 1992. She is a graduate of Sydney University in Law and Chinese Studies and studied in Shanghai as one of the Attorney-General’s representatives under an exchange agreement with the PRC Ministry of Justice.  She worked as a lawyer in Shanghai with the Australian law firm Blake Dawson Waldron between 1998 and 2001 and has near-native fluency in Mandarin.

Sarah is the co-founder of the China Law Network and teaches and researches in the area of Chinese law. Her work has focussed on contemporary Chinese administrative law, labour and comparative law. Sarah currently holds an ARC grant with Sean Cooney and Zhu Ying to examine regulatory responses to the problems of failure to pay wages.  She is also currently part of a research team coordinated by the University of British Columbia, researching Cross Cultural Dispute Resolution.

Sarah completed her PhD in 2004, entitled 'The Legal Field of Policing in China: Administrative Detention and Law Reform'.  Her thesis looked at the development and legal reform of three administrative detention powers exercised by the Chinese public security organs; detention for education of prostitutes and clients of prostitutes, coercive drug rehabilitation and re-education through labour.

Her recent publications include Legal Reform and Administrative Detention Powers in China (Cambridge University Press, 2007) and co-editor of Examining Practice Interrogating Theory: Comparative Legal Studies in Asia (Brill, 2008). She is currently working on a project with Associate Professor Sean Cooney and Associate Professor Zhu Ying looking at the regulatory responses to non or delayed payment of wages in China.

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 ALC_Cooney_Sean

Associate Director

Associate Professor Sean Cooney

Associate Professor Sean Cooney joined the Centre in 1992 after four years in legal practice and completed his LL.M. in Asian law in that year. He completed his doctoral studies at Columbia University in 2005 and has been a  visitor at Australian National University, National Taiwan University and National Chengchi University in Taiwan.

Sean's research interests include East Asian employment and labour law, democratic transitions and sovereignty issues (with a particular emphasis on Taiwan), comparative law, and contract and regulatory theory. He researches and teaches in Chinese and is fluent in French and German. His publications include Law and Labour Market Regulation in East Asia (with Tim Lindsey, Richard Mitchell and Ying Zhu), as well as articles in a range of international journals in English and Chinese.  

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ALC_Godwin_Andrew

Associate Director (Asian Commercial Law)

Mr Andrew Godwin

Mr Andrew Godwin joined the Centre as an Associate Director in late 2006, after being appointed as an Associate of the Centre in early 2006. He was appointed Senior Lecturer in the Law School in early 2008.  He has 15 years experience in private practice, 10 of which were spent in Shanghai where he was a partner at Linklaters and Chief Representative of their Shanghai offices.

Since returning to Melbourne in 2006, Andrew's focus has shifted to legal education and professional training and development for lawyers. Andrew’s academic interests include Asian law, property law, insolvency law and legal education. Andrew also runs the Transactional Law Initiative at Melbourne Law School.  A former research assistant at the Asian Law Centre, Andrew has a BA (Hons), LLM (Hons) and LLM from the University of Melbourne. 

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ALC_Lindsey_Tim

Associate Director (Indonesia)

Professor Timothy Lindsey

Professor Tim Lindsey joined the Centre in 1990 and was appointed to the Law School in 1994. His appointments include: Professor of Asian Law (until July 2006), ARC Federation Fellow (from August 2006), Director of the Asian Law Centre (2000-2012), Associate Dean (International) in the Faculty of Law (until July 2006) and Director of the Centre for Islamic Law and Society (from 2005).

A graduate of the University of Melbourne Law School, Tim completed his doctoral thesis in Indonesian studies. His research interests are in the areas of Islamic law, Indonesian law, constitutional law, comparative law, law reform in developing countries and 'rule of law'. is Federation Fellowship 'Islam and Modernity: Syari'ah, Terrorism and Governance in South-East Asia' brings all these themes together. Tim researches and teaches in bahasa Indonesia and is a long-serving member and now Chair of the Australia-Indonesia Institute and a member of the Foreign Affairs Council, both in the Department of Foreign Affairs. He is an Associate Member of the Academie Internationale de Droit Comparé and of the International Council of the Asia Society. Tim worked previously at Mallesons Stephen Jaques and has been a practising member of the Victorian Bar since 1990, now specialising in Indonesian matters. He has near-native fluency in bahasa Indonesia.

Tim's publications include Indonesia: Law & Society (now in its second edition); Indonesia: Bankruptcy, Law Reform and the Commercial Court; Corruption in Asia: Rethinking the Governance Paradigm (with Howard Dick); Indonesia After Soeharto: Prospects for Reform; Law and Labour Market Regulation in East Asia (with Sean Cooney, Richard Mitchell and Ying Zhu); Chinese Indonesians: Remembering, Distorting, Forgetting (with Helen Pausacker), also in its second edition; and Law Reform in Developing and Transitional States.  Tim is a Founder and co-Editor of the Australian Journal of Asian Law and is currently writing monographs on Islamic laws in Indonesia, in Malaysia and Brunei, and in Singapore. He is also working on defamation law in Indonesia.   

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ALC_Steele_Stacey

Associate Director (Japan)

Ms Stacey Steele

Ms Stacey Steele joined the Centre in 1997 as a research associate and was appointed Associate Director (Japan) in January 2002. Born in Brisbane, Stacey holds degrees from the University of Queensland (BA (Jap)), Monash University (MA (Jap)) and the University of Melbourne (LLB (Hons) and LLM (by thesis)). Stacey commenced articles in March 2000 at a leading Australian commercial law firm and worked as a senior associate in its financial services group, focusing on project/infrastructure and corporate finance.

In October 2007, Stacey joined Standard and Poor's Melbourne office as Associate General Counsel with responsibilities for the Asia-Pacific. Stacey has taught Insolvency Law and Corporate Banking and Finance Law, as well as Issues in Japanese Law and in graduate subjects offered by the Centre. She recently co-edited Legal Education in Asia: Globalization, Change and Contexts (Routledge, 2010).

Her other research interests include Japanese insolvency law, law reform, the Japanese legal system and banking law. Stacey practices Chanoyu (The Way of Tea) and is a member of the Urasenke Melbourne Chapter. Stacey is fluent in Japanese.

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ALC_Whiting_Amanda

 

Associate Director (Malaysia) 

Dr Amanda Whiting

Dr Amanda Whiting joined the Faculty of Law at The University of Melbourne as a Lecturer in 2004. She been a member of the Asian Law Centre since  1999. She has taught in the LLB courses Land, Race and Law in Southeast  Asia, Law and Society in Southeast Asia, Law and Civil Society in Asia,  History and Philosophy of Law, Property and Principles of Public Law;  and in the Graduate subjects Islamic Law and Politics in Asia and  Citizens, Groups and States in Asia. Her research is in the area of human rights institutions and practices in the Asia-Pacific Region,  gender and religion, and Malaysian legal history. She is Associate  Director (Malaysia) of the Asian Law Centre.

Amanda completed her  honours degree in Arts at the University of Melbourne in 1981 and then  taught seventeenth and eighteenth century history at the University's  History Department over the next decade. She also has a Diploma of  Education (1988) and a Graduate Diploma of Indonesian (1995) which was  partly undertaken at Universitas Kristen Satya Wacana, Indonesia. She completed her LL.B. with First Class Honours in 2001. In 2007 she  completed her doctorate - a feminist analysis of mid-seventeenth century English legal and political history. In 2004 her article "'Some Women  can Shift it Well Enough': A Legal Context for Understanding the Women  Petitioners of the Seventeenth-Century English Revolution" appeared in  21 Australian Feminist Law Journal 77.

Amanda is the author of 'Situating Suhakam: Human Rights Debates and Malaysia's National Human  Rights Commission' (2003) 39 (1) Stanford Journal of International Law  59, and 'In the Shadow of Developmentalism: The Human Rigths Commission  of Malaysia at the Intersection of State and Civil Society Priorities in C Raj Kumar and DK Srivastava (ed) Human Rights and Development: Law,  Policy and Governance (Hong Kong: LexisNexis Butterworths, 2006), both  of which provide a contextualised reading of the meanings that human rights have in Malaysia and for Malaysians.

With Andrew Kenyon  and Tim Lindsey (of this Faculty) and Tim Marjoribanks (Faculty of Arts) she is engaged in an ARC-funded Discovery Project, 'The Media and ASEAN Transitions: Defamation Law, Journalism and Public Debate in Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore'.

With Dr Carolyn Evans of this Faculty she is the editor of Mixed Blessings: Laws, Religions and Women's Rights in the Asia Pacific Region (Leiden: Martinus Nijhoff, 2006), a book  about women's experiences of the dual regimes of law and religion in the Asia-Pacific region.

Amanda is currently writing about the  colliding and conflicting understandings of secular and religious law in Malaysia (particularly as they affect women and children); and she is  preparing to write a history of the legal profession in Malaysia,  focussing on its role as an agent of civil society.

Amanda has  been involved with the Australian Journal of Asian Law since its  inaugural issue in 1999 and has been an editor since 2002. With  Associate Professor Tim Lindsey, Director of the Asian Law Centre, she  edited and contributed to Doing Business in Indonesia (Singapore, CCH:  2000).

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ALC_Taylor_Kathryn

Centre Manager

Ms Kathryn Taylor

Ms Kathryn Taylor joined the Centre in 1998 as the Administrator. In 2005, she was appointed Manager of the Asian Law Centre and Manager of the Centre for Indonesian Law, Islam and Society (formerly, Centre for Islamic Law and Society). Kathryn was the Project Manager of Professor Tim Lindsey's ARC Federation Fellowship from 2006 to 2012, and is Project Manager of Asian Law Online, the largest bibliographic database of English-language materials on Asian legal systems in the world.

Kathryn completed her Arts degree with Honours in Chinese from the University of Melbourne in 1999, after spending 16 months studying Mandarin at National Cheng Kung University, Taiwan R.O.C. She completed a Master of Management (International Business) at Monash University in 2001. As part of this degree, Kathryn also completed a Winter Semester in Chinese Law at the East China University of Politics and Law. Kathryn's research interests include the Chinese language and culture, Asian legal systems (particularly the legal systems of China and Taiwan), international business, the current state of China-Taiwan relations and Islam in China. Kathryn is able to communicate in Mandarin.  She has recently co-edited a monograph with Stacey Steele, titled Legal Education in Asia: Globalization, Change and Contexts (Routledge, 2010)

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ALC_Shaw_Tessa

Centre Coordinator 

Ms Tessa Shaw

Tessa joined the Asian Law Centre in 2009. She is the Coordindator for the Asian Law Centre, the Centre for Indonesian Law, Islam and Society (formerly, Centre for Islamic Law and Society) and Professor Tim Lindsey's ARC Federation Fellowship (2009-2012).

Tessa moved to Australia from Singapore in 2002. She graduated with an Arts degree, majoring in English Language, from the University of Melbourne, in 2005. She also completed a postgraduate certificate in Editing and Communications at the University that year. Thereafter, she worked extensively in events management. She has also written for various publications in Australia, and later, in Singapore.

Returning to Australia to work at the University, Tessa is hoping to further develop her skills in communications, as well as in events and project management, especially within a diverse and internationally recognised organisation.

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ALC_Aikman_Vicky

Administrator (Centre Operations)

Ms Vicky Aikman


Ms Vicky Aikman joined the Asian Law Centre in December 2011 (while Kathryn Taylor was on maternity leave). Vicky is the Administrator (Centre Operations) for the Asian Law Centre and Centre for Indonesian Law, Islam and Society (formerly, Centre for Islamic Law and Society). She has rejoined the staff of the University of Melbourne after time away to assume family responsibilities and part-time study commitments. 

Previously she held departmental manager roles in the Schools of Languages and Earth Sciences.  She has also worked in the central administration of the University managing the examination and graduation processes, in the Faculty of Science administering research and graduate studies. Vicky holds a Bachelor of Arts with majors in history and politics from the University of Melbourne. She is a qualified horticulturalist and is currently studying applied landscape design.

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