High court review 2005: The manifestation of separation of powers in Australia

In 2005 questions were raised in public debate regarding the scope, meaning and manifestation of the constitutional separation of powers and the role of the High Court in interpreting these. In particular, the issue of the efficacy of checks and balances within the system of government against potential abuses of executive powers was raised, due to the dominance of the legislature by the executive for the first time in 24 years. This Review argues that while the High Court staunchly defended its independence and the role of the judiciary in a division of powers, it demonstrated a simultaneous reluctance to curb executive powers. This has implications for the manifestation of separation of powers in the Australian context, both in terms of its philosophical foundations and in so far as it signals a trend away from the likely realisation of public expectations of its role as expressed in appeals made to it.     

“…being weary,they had rebelled”: Pueblo subsistence and labor under Spanish colonialism

Native American responses to Spanish colonialism are explored through an analysis of multiple lines of evidence concerning subsistence practices, diet, and health in the Salinas Pueblo area of central New Mexico. Zooarchaeological and paleoethnobotanical data from three Pueblo villages that experienced different degrees of Spanish missionization are the focus of this study. In addition, human osteological data from one village provide important information on activity patterns and health. These data are used to document the kinds of changes that occurred in Pueblo labor patterns, food consumption, and health from the pre-colonial to colonial periods. Synthetic analyses document the development of some degree of inter-village specialization in large game hunting, hide processing, and corn farming, presumably in response to Spanish tribute levies in corn and antelope hides, and demands on Pueblo labor in other arenas. There also appears to be a degree of divergence in women’s and men’s lives in the colonial period. These southwestern data are then compared with similar information from the southeastern US to identify patterns of similarity and difference in Native American experiences of and strategies for dealing with Spanish colonization.     

Catastrophic Limestone Decay at the Central Sanctuary of Iupiter Dolichenus at Dülük Baba Tepesi in Southern Turkey: Causes and Implications for Future Conservation

Dramatic deterioration of Hellenistic-Roman limestone remains recently excavated at Dülük Baba Tepesi (Southern Turkey) has been observed following the cold, wet winter of 2011/2012. A conceptual model is presented to explain the dramatic deterioration in which case hardening develops and initially strengthens the stone against deterioration, but then makes it more prone to exfoliation and blistering. Data collected using non-destructive techniques (Equotip surface hardness tester and Karsten tube for water uptake) on F?rat and Gaziantep formation limestone time series excavated in 2005, 2007, and 2013 demonstrates the progress of case hardening and deterioration after excavation. In combination with meteorological data from Gaziantep weather station the results are used to test and revise the model taking into account non-linear and threshold effects. Future excavation and conservation efforts should take into account the often-complex interactions between post-excavation case hardening and extreme winter conditions which can cause catastrophic deterioration.     

Would Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) be welcomed by undergraduate students to support their learning during fieldwork?

This paper reports student perceptions of the benefits and challenges of Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) in a fieldwork context. Student perceptions from six field courses across two institutions have been gathered using questionnaires and focus groups. Whilst a number of studies have focused on BYOD in a classroom context, little research has been undertaken about BYOD in a fieldwork context. The key findings suggest that around one fifth of students were not willing to use their own device during fieldwork citing loss or damage as the main reason. This key challenge is different to that which are found in a classroom which generally focus on network security, connectivity etc. The findings also suggest that some students believe that BYOD can have a negative impact on group work. There is a misalignment here between student and practitioner thinking with previous literature which suggests that practitioners believe BYOD and smart devices can enhance group work. The one key challenge which is found regardless of learning environment is inequality between those who have a device and those who do not.     

Gender equality and economic empowerment in the Solomon Islands and Fiji: a place-based approach

The economic empowerment of women is emerging as a core focus of both economic development and gender equality programmes internationally. At the same time, there is increasing importance placed on measuring outcomes and quantifying progress towards gender and development goals. These trends raise significant questions around how well gender differences are understood, especially in economies dominated by the informal sector and characterised by a highly gendered division of labour, as is the case in many Pacific countries. How well do existing international and national indicators of gender equality reflect the experiences and aspirations of Pacific women and men? What do concepts such as gender equality and economic empowerment mean in this geographical context? How might local attitudes and practices be identified and measured? In this paper, we draw on Boaventura De Sousa Santos’ call to recognise and value knowledges of the majority world that have been rendered either largely invisible or non-credible by mainstream development and human rights policy agendas. Reflecting on an action research project conducted with partner organisations in Fiji and the Solomon islands, we explore a more nuanced place-based approach to understanding and measuring gender equality and economic empowerment. This approach takes account of diverse economic practices, such as non-market transactions, and forms of non-cash exchange and unpaid labour, and recognises the imbalance in women’s and men’s household and care work.     

High Court Review 2006: Australian Federalism—Implications of the WorkChoices Decision

This year's High Court Review focuses exclusively on the WorkChoices decision, in which the federal government's new industrial relations regime was upheld by the High Court as within the Commonwealth's powers under s. 51(xx) of the Constitution, the corporations power. The implications of the judgement are potentially momentous for Australian federalism. Thus, we begin with an overview of changes in Australian federalism over time, including its fortunes in the High Court of Australia. We then consider the WorkChoices decision itself, outlining the most important aspects of the decision. We argue that the decision is the most important High Court decision on the constitutional division of federal powers since 1983, especially in the context of the corporatisation of policy delivery in the past few decades. Moreover, it reinforces the dominance of an orthodoxy in constitutional interpretation, thus confirming the demise of ‘activist’ tendencies. Finally, the judgement demonstrates the Court's preparedness to confirm changes to the workings of Australian federalism that, the evidence suggests strongly, would not pass at referendum. However, this view of the centralist implications of the decision is mediated by a consideration of the workings of intergovernmental relations. An examination of the potential changes in this area reveals a more complicated outcome, one with important implications for the manner in which intergovernmental negotiations might be conducted in future.     

Re-analysis of faunal assemblages from the Haua Fteah and other late quaternary archaeological sites in Cyrenaican Libya

In preliminary reports based on approximately 5000 identified bones from the Haua Fteah, Cyrenaica, E. S. Higgs concluded that changes in the abundance of bovines versus Barbary sheep reflected climatic change from drier (=last interglaciation) to wetter (=last glaciation) and back to drier (=present interglaciation). Higgs also reported the earliest occurrence of domestic caprines in Africa, in Haua Fteah “Neolithic” layers dated to about 6800 bp. A new analysis, based on roughly 9000 identified specimens, supports the broad pattern of faunal change that Higgs found, but suggests that it reflects wetter when Higgs proposed drier and vice versa. The new analysis failed to confirm the early date for domestic caprines, mainly because of uncertainty concerning the stratigraphic provenience of key specimens. Finally, the new analysis produced some additions to the species list (most notably eland) and provided previously unavailable information on skeletal part representation and on the ages of animals at time of death. With respect to skeletal parts, smaller ungulates tend to be represented by a wider variety than larger ones, a contrast that is almost universal in Stone Age sites. With regard to age profiles, the largest and most reliable one (for Barbary sheep from the “Neolithic” layers) implies the animals were captured by driving over cliffs or into other traps. Restudy of small additional samples from the Cyrenaican sites of Hagfet et Tera, Hagfet ed Dabba, and Sidi el Hajj Creiem fully supports taxonomic and paleoenvironmental conclusions drawn earlier by Higgs and Bate.