Katherine Nesbitt
 Katherine Nesbitt |
Fulbright Postgraduate Scholar
Media Profile
“In response to terrorist attacks, both the U.S. and Australia have implemented aggressive policies and practices aimed at broadening and strengthening law enforcement powers, including the power to arrest and detain terrorist suspects. In their zeal to win their war on terrorism, have governments lost sight of the very civil liberties and freedoms they seek to protect?”
Katherine Nesbitt is one of twenty Americans to win the Fulbright Postgraduate Award in 2005. Katherine will study at the Gilbert and Tobin Centre of Public Law in Sydney, located within the Faculty of Law at the University of New South Wales (UNSW). Katherine is a cum laude Juris Doctor from Duke University School of Law and received her undergraduate degree from DukeUniversity as well, specialising in Public Policy Studies.
She will undertake a Masters of Law, by conducting a comparative analysis of the U.S. and Australian legislation and executive orders relating to the detention of terrorist suspects and constitutional and jurisprudential implications from these policies and practices.
The Gilbert and Tobin Public Law Centre (GTPLC) at UNSW is currently developing a project involving research in the Australian legal response to terrorist acts such as September 11 and the Bali attack, and their impact on human rights, democracy and the criminal justice process. Due to the similarities in response from Australia and the U.S., Katherine’s research will analyse how those anti-terrorism laws have impacted constitutional protections of life, liberty and the democratic systems of law in Australia and the US.
As part of her comparative studies, Katherine will be analysing the Patriot Act (USA, 2003), a law which authorized an unprecedented expansion of law enforcement powers, and the ASIO [Anti-Terrorism] Bill (AUS, 2002), legislation which likewise gave Australia's domestic intelligence agency enhanced powers to detain and question terrorist suspects and witnesses.
“The question Australians must ask is…‘What are the best ways to ensure liberty and security, during the war on terror?’ Katherine explained. “My research will examine the constitutionality of counter-terrorism legislation in Australian and United States. As a comparative study, it will look specifically at the impact of this legislation on human rights in the context of two distinct systems of democracy.”