Constitutional, Administrative and Other Public Law

At the Faculty of Law, research and teaching ranges across the full gamut of public law scholarship.

There is a core group of public lawyers whose work covers both traditional constitutional and administrative law and the two main modern additions, namely study of the Bill of Rights and the Treaty of Waitangi. In addition, there is a wider grouping of staff that works in specialist fields such as local government and resource management, health and mental health law, and immigration and refugee law.

The faculty regularly attracts visits from leading international public law scholars and has hosted several conferences on aspects of public law in recent years, often in conjunction with the Legal Research Foundation.

Academic staff researchers and teachers

The following members of staff conduct teaching, research and postgraduate supervision in the area of Constitutional, Administrative and Other Public Law.

Claire Charters | Associate Professor
Email: c.charters@auckland.ac.nz
Phone: +64 9 923 9436

Field of research: Indigenous peoples' rights in international and constitutional law

Andrew Erueti | Senior Lecturer
Email: a.erueti@auckland.ac.nz
Phone: +64 9 923 8010

Field of research: Treaty of Waitangi, Māori land law, Māori customary law, human rights and indigenous rights

Caroline Foster | Associate Professor
Email: c.foster@auckland.ac.nz
Phone: +64 9 923 5636

Field of research: Public law, public international law

Anna Hood | Senior Lecturer
Email: a.hood@auckland.ac.nz
Phone: +64 9 923 2242

Field of research: Public and international public law, particularly refugee law, the law of security and disarmament, history of public and international law

Jayden Houghton | Lecturer
Email: jayden.houghton@auckland.ac.nz
Phone:+64 9 923 8645

Field of research: The Waitangi Tribunal process and its effect on Māori claims, indigenous peoples' rights to mātauranga Māori and taonga Māori (particularly Māori rights to mātauranga Māori and taonga Māori), and New Zealand legal history (particularly historical issues involving land or intellectual property)

John Ip | Senior Lecturer
Email: j.ip@auckland.ac.nz
Phone: +64 9 923 2387

Field of research: Law and security, counterterrorism law, public law, Bill of Rights

Jane Kelsey | Professor
Email: j.kelsey@auckland.ac.nz
Phone: +64 9 923 8006

Field of research: International trade and investment agreements, financial crises, neoliberalism, policy and regulation

Janet McLean | Professor
Email: j.mclean@auckland.ac.nz
Phone: +64 9 923 9720

Field of research: The public-private distinction, the nature of the Crown, Bills of Rights, bureaucratic design, public contracting, freedom of information, the nature of unwritten constitutions

Jane Norton | Senior Lecturer
Email: jane.norton@auckland.ac.nz
Phone: +64 9 923 8118

Field of research: Constitutional law and legal theory, discrimination law, religious freedom, freedom of expression, freedom of association, charitable trusts, voluntary associations and unincorporated societies

Paul Rishworth | Professor
Email: pt.rishworth@auckland.ac.nz
Phone: +64 9 923 8031

Field of research: Bill of Rights, comparative human rights law, constitutional and administrative law, South Pacific constitutions

Arie Rosen | Senior Lecturer
Email: a.rosen@auckland.ac.nz
Phone: +64 9 923 6738

Field of research: Legal philosophy, social and political theory, constitutional design, adjudication and legal reasoning, legislation and statutory interpretation

Katherine Sanders | Senior Lecturer
Email: k.sanders@auckland.ac.nz
Phone: +64 9 923 8005

Field of research: Land law, including property and the constitution, land and human rights, New Zealand legal history

Andrew Stockley | Honorary Professor
Email: a.stockley@auckland.ac.nz

Field of research: Constitutional law issues, including the role of the Crown, judicial independence and electoral reform

Hanna Wilberg | Associate Professor
Email: h.wilberg@auckland.ac.nz
Phone: +64 9 923 4232

Field of research: Administrative law, public authority liability, Treaty of Waitangi, Bill of Rights, statutory interpretation

Edward Willis | Lecturer
Email: edward.willis@auckland.ac.nz
Phone: +64 9 923 9355

Field of research: Constitutional law and legal theory, including the nature of unwritten constitutionalism, the role of public law values in shaping private markets, and regulatory design and implementation

Courses available in Constitutional, Administrative and Other Public Law

Subject to availability the following courses may be offered:

Undergraduate courses

Postgraduate courses

Recent research supervision topics

  • The Authority of Legislation and the Maori Seats in Parliament
  • The preventive detention of terrorist suspects
  • Narrowing the scope of the European Convention on Human Rights in the Control Order Cases
  • Review of Administrative Interpretations of Law in NZ and the US
  • Public Authorities, Systemic Failure and Personal Injury
  • Damages for breach of the right to life where public authorities have failed to use their powers to protect individuals against violence
  • Swimming lessons, police negligence and the state: the developing relationship between tort and human rights in the United Kingdom
  • The Application of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and other Human Rights Treaties to Extraterritorial Military Operations
  • Sacrificial Land: The Inter-American Court of Human Rights' Evolutionary Interpretation, Extractive Industries and Indigenous Lands, Territories and Resources
  • Employment Preferences for Māori in the Public Health Sector: Is Māori descent a genuine occupational qualification?
  • A Case for a Parliamentary Human Rights Committee
  • Sites and Places of Significance and Value to Mana Whenua in the Proposed Auckland Unitary Plan: Justified Layers of Complexity or an Over-the-Top Approach?
  • Contagion, Containment, Consent: Infectious disease pandemics and the ethics, rights, and legality of state-enforced vaccination
  • Don't mourn for me, I'm already dead': Does the absolute prohibition on assisted suicide contravene the fundamental human rights to life, liberty and security?
  • The Meaning and Purpose of the Secular Clause in the 1877 Education Act
  • Standing Issues in the ECJ
  • EU integration and social welfare

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