Beyond the Scientology case : towards a better definition of what constitutes a religion for legal purposes in Australia having regard to salient judicial authorities from the United States of America as well as important non-judicial authorities
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The changing relationship between the State and religion in Australia: 1788 to modern Australia. What has changed? What is the same? And what does that tell us?
The State and religion interact in a myriad of ways, one of them being their legal relationship. The purpose of this thesis is to both identify and analyse changes in this relationship in Australia over time. In identifying and analysing these changes the thesis demonstrates that changes in the legal relationship are not isolated incidents. Instead they are the result of individual changes, linked together in a continuum stretching back to the arrival of the first fleet in 1788 and forward into modern Australia. Previous work in this area has focused on either individual changes or on specific time periods. This approach misses broader patterns in the legal relationship between the State and religion because it does not link together these individual events and time periods. This thesis begins to remedy this oversight. When the legal relationship is viewed across Australia’s entire 225 years history these patterns emerge. Three cases studies demonstrate this continuum of change; State restrictions on religion, religion in education and State funding of religion. Each of the three case studies has their own unique pattern of change. First, State restrictions on religion shift from overt restrictions on entire religions towards more covert restrictions which are couched in neutral language and which target particular practices rather than the religion as a whole. Second, the pattern of religion in education is one of two journeys. In the 19 century the picture is one of a gradual reduction in the involvement of religion in education resulting in the establishment of a Sate runs system of secular education and the removal of State funding to religious schools. In the second half of the 20 century this situation is reversed with a gradual increase in religious involvement in education culminating with the creation of the National school Chaplaincy program (NSCP) in modern Australia. Third, the State funding of religion is a tug of war for control of both the quantum of funding and how that funding may be spent. While these patterns are interesting of themselves the thesis goes further. It also identifies a macro pattern that can be seen across all three case studies. This is a pattern of re-occurrence. In all three case studies there are periods of apparent stability in which there is little or no change in the legal relationship between the State and religion. However these periods of stability do not last forever. With changes in the religious composition of Australia d in the State itself the issues of how the State and religion should interact in the various case studies reemerges. With this re-emergence comes legal change in the relationship. The question of how the State and religion should interact is so fundamental that it cannot be settled once and for all. Instead it is re-negotiated as both the state and religion themselves change over time.
The Area of Freedom, Security and Justice ten years on: Successes and future challenges under the Stockholm Programme. CEPS Paperbacks. June 2010
This book celebrates the tenth anniversary of the Area of Freedom, Security and Justice (AFSJ) by bringing together the views of key practitioners and policy-makers who have played an outstanding role in thinking about and shaping EU policies on freedom, security and justice. 
 
Ten years ago, the member states transferred competences to the EU for law and policy-making in the fields of immigration, asylum and border controls, and began the transfer process for criminal justice and policing. This decade of European cooperation on AFSJ policies has experienced very dynamic convergence, the enactment of a large body of European law and the setting-up of numerous EU agencies working in these domains. Such dynamism in policy-making has not been without challenges and vulnerabilities, however. As this collective volume shows, the main dilemmas that lie ahead relate to an effective (while more plural) institutional framework under the Treaty of Lisbon, stronger judicial scrutiny through a greater role for national courts and the Court of Justice in Luxembourg, better mechanisms for evaluating and monitoring the implementation of EU AFSJ law and a more solid fundamental rights strategy. The contributions in this volume address the progress achieved so far in these policy areas, identify the challenges for future European cooperation in the AFSJ and put forward possible paths for making more progress in the next generation of the EU’s AFSJ.