This study examines former U.S. Supreme Court Justice William Brennan, Jr.'s opinions on the following administrative law topics: civil rights, civil liberties, human resource management, due process, and privacy. The purpose of this examination is (1) to apply Rohr's regime values framework to Brennan's case law, (2) to determine the usefulness of Brennan's regime values to discretionary decision making, and (3) to consider the effectiveness of these regime values as a pedagogical approach to ethics. A purposive sample of 25 cases was selected for the study. Case briefing and discourse analysis were the primary research methods used. I found eight regime values in Brennan's opinions: freedom, accountability, flexibility, equity and equality, unconstitutional conditions, property, and social justice. Social justice was his dominant regime value and is the basis for all of his jurisprudence. Brennan's regime values reconcile two approaches to ethics, the low road and the high road, by emphasizing a Constitutional basis for the latter. Brennan's values may help administrators learn how to think through the important decisions they make daily by providing both a foundation and justification for their choices. Public administrators can be taught how to use the regime values method to extract additional values. / Ph. D.

University of Macau / Faculty of Law

Étant donné la croissance progressive du rôle du gouvernement dans la plupart des activités de la vie sociale et économique d'aujourd'hui, il existe bien évidemment plusieurs préoccupations pour trouver les moyens efficaces qui permettent de contrôler les pouvoir excessifs des administrations publiques. Si dans la première moitié du XIXe siècle, rares étaient les cas dans lesquels l'un des aspects des droits de la défense était respecté, le juge français a dans un siècle reconnu ces droits comme principe général du droit devant être respecté même en l'absence de texte. Contrairement à la France, l'histoire de jeune droit administratif iranien démontre bien que la formation des règles concernant les droits de la défense était trop difficile. Aussi bien en France qu'en Iran, il est aujourd'hui difficile de trouver des échappatoires à ce principe. Au demeurant et par le biais de la motivation, le juge sera mieux à même d'apprécier les circonstances d'une décision défavorable. L'administré a certes le droit de se faire assister d'un représentant ou d'un avocat de son choix, pour présenter efficacement sa défense. Il faut que toute personne, française ou iranienne, soit à même d'accéder aux documents administratifs la concernant. Il importe que les documents non-communicables soient strictement déterminés. Que ce soit en France ou en Iran, le rôle de la transparence est devenu de plus en plus remarquable, à l'égard de l'efficacité des administrations. Ainsi, la motivation en tant qu'aspect essentiel des droits de la défense pourra favoriser l'atteindre de cet objectif. En France comme en Iran, lorsque l'autorité administrative prend une décision défavorable sans que l'intéressé soit préalablement entendu et en connaisse les motifs, cette décision est entachée d'illégalité et l'administré peut demander l'annulation pour excès de pouvoir. Si avant, il n'était même pas possible de faire reconnaître la responsabilité de l'administration, il est, aujourd'hui et sous certaines conditions, loisible de solliciter la réparation de la violation des droits de la défense, par le biais des évolutions du droit administratif. / Given the progressive growth of the role of government in most activities of today's social and economic life, there are evidently several concerns about finding effective ways to control the excessive power of public administrations. If in the first half of the nineteenth century, there were few cases in which one of the aspects of the rights of defense was respected, in a century, the French judge has recognized these rights as a general principle of law that must be respected even in the absence of a text. Unlike France, the history of young Iranian administrative law shows that the formation of rules concerning the rights of the defense was too difficult. In France as well as in Iran, it is now difficult to find loopholes to this principle. Moreover, through the motivation, the judge will be better able to appreciate the circumstances of an unfavorable decision. The person concerned has the right to be assisted by a representative or a lawyer of his choice, to effectively present his defense. It is also necessary that any person, French or Iranian, be able to access the administrative documents concerning him. In this regard, it is important that non-communicable documents be strictly determined. Whether in France or in Iran, the role of transparency has become more and more remarkable with regard to the efficiency of administrations. Thus, motivation as an essential aspect of the rights of defense may promote this objective. In France as in Iran, when the administrative authority makes an unfavorable decision without the interested party being first heard and knows the reasons, this decision is tainted by illegality and the person concerned can ask for the annulment of ultra vires. If before, it was not even possible to recognize the responsibility of the administration, today and under certain conditions, it is permissible to seek compensation for the violation of the rights of defense, through the evolutions of administrative law.

This study evaluates the court's approach towards the interpretation of administrative justice with specific reference to Roman v Williams 1997(2) SACR 754(C). Section 33 of the Constitution Act 108 of 1996 guarantees the right to administration justice. The elements of this right are lawfulness, reasonableness and procedurally fairness. Our courts are bound constitutionally to promote, develop, advance and protect the fundamental rights. This study provides the most effective approach towards the development of the fundamental right in our democratic society where the Bill of Rights binds legislature, executive and judiciary. / Administrative Law / LL.M. (Administrative Law)

The thesis is a comparative legal analysis of environmental principles in environmental law. Environmental principles are novel concepts in environmental law and they have a high profile in environmental law scholarship. This high profile is promoted by two factors – the high hopes that environmental law scholars have for environmental principles, and the increasing prevalence of environmental principles in legal systems, particularly in case law. This thesis analyses the latter, mapping doctrinal developments involving environmental principles in two jurisdictions and court systems – the courts of the European Union and the New South Wales Land and Environment Court. This doctrinal mapping has both narrow and broad aims. Narrowly, it identifies the legal roles in fact taken on by environmental principles within legal systems. Broadly, and building on this assessment, it responds to scholarly hopes that environmental principles (can) perform a range of significant roles in environmental law, including solving both environmental problems and legal problems in environmental law scholarship. These hopes are based on assumptions about environmental principles that have methodological weaknesses, including that environmental principles are universal and that they fit pre-existing models of ‘legal principles’ drawn from other areas of legal scholarship. The thesis exposes these methodological problems and concludes that environmental principles are not panaceas for pressing and perceived problems in environmental law. It does this by showing that the legal roles of environmental principles, which are significant in environmental law and its current evolution, can only be understood by closely analysing the legal cultures in which they feature. This is a conclusion for environmental law scholarship generally – while environmental issues and problems may be urgent and often global, legal analysis of the law that applies to those problems requires close engagement with legal systems and cultures, as they are and as they develop.

The impressive growth of antidiscrimination law in liberal democracies in the past few decades belies the inadequacy of the normative bases on which it has been sought to be justified. Popular ideals such as rationality, equality and dignity have been unsuccessful in providing a coherent liberal framework for the fundamental aspects of the practice of antidiscrimination law. In this thesis, I have argued that a unified normative framework comprising autonomy and dignity-as-autonomy does a markedly better job of justifying the most fundamental aspects of these laws. The ideal of personal autonomy is understood here as a principle that seeks to guarantee an adequate range of valuable options to individuals. Dignity-as-autonomy is understood to be an expressive norm, which forbids certain persons from expressing contempt for the autonomy of another. These ideals have different forms: autonomy is a non-action-regarding principle, while dignity-as-autonomy is action-regarding. They are also distinct substantively: it is often possible to violate one of them without affecting the other. When these ideals make incompatible demands, I argue that those made by autonomy should prevail. Mandating positive action and reasonable accommodation on the one hand, and prohibiting indirect discrimination and harassment on the other, are essential features of a model of antidiscrimination law based on this framework. Further, under this framework, antidiscrimination law is not vulnerable to objections such as ‘levelling down’ and responds well to claims of discrimination on ‘intersectional grounds’. Furthermore, it is not essential to find an ‘appropriate comparator’ in order to prove discrimination. This model also explains when, and under what conditions, can some forms of discrimination be ‘justified’. Finally, on an autonomy-based model, antidiscrimination law is only one of several complementary tools that should be employed to protect and promote personal autonomy.

This thesis examines the views of freedoms of press and speech held by the twelve earliest justices of the U.S. Supreme Court, as the Sedition Act of 1798 raised their earliest First Amendment questions including the breadth of those freedoms and of seditious libel. The thesis discusses three aspects of the early justices' views, which add to existing studies. First, the context of those justices' views was growing challenges to the restrictive Blackstone and Mansfield definition of freedom of press as only freedom from prior restraint (licensing) and as not also freedom from subsequent restraint such as seditious libel prosecution. Those challenges were reflected in broad language protecting freedoms of press and speech, and in the absence of language stating that the English common law of rights or of seditious libel was left unaltered. That crucial context of growing challenges has not been detailed in existing literature. (Chapter 3.) Second, the views of each early justice on press and speech are chronicled for the period 1789-1798. That discloses express commitments to those freedoms, which are absent from existing literature, and no adoption of the Blackstone definition before the 1798 crisis. (Chapters 4-5.) Third, the cases and reasoning of the six sitting justices upholding the Sedition Act of 1798 are chronicled and assessed, along with the views of the six remaining justices. That reveals that most remaining justices and also a significant minority within the Federalist party rejected the Sedition Act. Yet positions on the Sedition Act have been only cursorily discussed for four sitting justices and have been overlooked for the other eight justices, as well as for the Federalist party's minority, for the critical period 1798-1800. (Chapters 6-7.) The thesis proposes reasons for that divergence between the pre-1798 commitment of all justices to freedoms of press and speech, and the support given by most sitting justices to the Sedition Act, in contrast to apparent opposition by most remaining justices. The primary reasons are their opposing positions on several connected issues: the extent of rights to dissent, the challenges to the Blackstone definition and to seditious libel, the effect of new state and federal constitutions on seditious libel and on common law rights, strength of attachment to freedoms of press and speech and to seditious libel, and most sitting justices' changes of position to embrace the Blackstone definition. The thesis calls into question conventional views in existing literature on each of those three aspects. First, Levy and others express the dominant view that freedom of press in state declarations of rights and the First Amendment 'was used in its prevailing common law or Blackstonian sense to mean a guarantee against previous restraints and a subjection to subsequent restraints for licentious or seditious abuse,' so that contrary evidence 'does not exist,' and that 'no other definition of freedom of the press by anyone anywhere in America before 1798' existed. Instead, opposition to the essence of seditious libel had been mounting over the decades. Second, the early justices are usually portrayed as having nothing to say about freedoms of press and speech before 1798. Instead, nearly all exhibited commitment to those freedoms before that crucial year, though half the early justices upheld the Sedition Act during 1798-1800. Third, the Federalist party, the early justices, and the states except Virginia and Kentucky are all usually described as unanimously supporting the Sedition Act. Instead, the Federalists divided over the Act, and the early justices did as well, with an unrecognized but significant minority of the party, and nearly half of the early justices, opposing the Sedition Act, as did several additional states.

This thesis explores the roles played by implied constitutional principles in fundamental rights cases in the common law jurisdictions of Canada, Australia, the Commonwealth Caribbean, and the United Kingdom. The two principles selected for this research are the separation of powers and the rule of law, both of which are relied upon in courts in common law states. The thesis examines the types of cases in which such principles are used, the possible reasons for the appeal of these principles, and the functions that they play in fundamental rights adjudication. The thesis begins with a brief discussion of the applications of the rule of law and the separation of powers, outlining the content of these principles as applied by the courts. However, the bulk of the analysis throughout the thesis is concerned with a thematic study of the functions played by the principles. It is argued that the principles are used as interpretative aids, as independent grounds for invalidating legislation, and as gateways to comparative legal analysis. The thesis ends by showing the necessary preliminary work that must be undertaken in order to engage in a thorough normative analysis of the use of implied principles in rights adjudication. Throughout the thesis, several themes are identified as key to our understanding of the functions played by implied principles in the cases discussed. One such theme is legitimization, specifically the role the principles play in the attempt to legitimize arguments, state institutions (particularly the courts), and the state itself. The theme of institutional self-protection also arises; it is evident in the use of principles to protect the jurisdictional sphere of the courts. The analysis of the operation of implied constitutional principles also highlights the legacy of Empire and the deployment of traditional principles to signal the maintenance of democratic traditions and institutions.

The present DPhil research attempts to develop an appropriate method for the historiography of ideas by taking into consideration cultural, linguistic and socio-political limitations and obstacles to free thinking in a predominantly closed society like Qajar Iran. By applying such a method the study then investigates the history of the idea of freedom in Iran during one of the most important periods in the evolution of this concept. The research method is grounded in a hermeneutical interpretation of Collingwood's logic of question and answer. It also employs MacCallum's meta-theoretical frame of analysis which states that freedom is always of something (an agent or agents), from something (conditions), to do something (actions). Using this methodological framework, the research shows how most locutions about freedom uttered in the last century of the Qajar period were formed within the horizon of the question of decline and were somehow related to remedy such situations. It then explores how late Qajar interpretations of the three variables of freedom manifest themselves in the socio-political life of early 20th century Iran. During the first constitutional period (August 1906-June 1908), the major concern of the first majlis was to establish the rule of law. In legislating the constitution and its supplement, the majority of the majlis believed that the main obstacle to freedom was arbitrary rule. Therefore, they endeavoured to restrain the government’s illegal and arbitrary interferences in the people's freedom. However, they did not develop a rational criterion for identifying legitimate and justifiable legal interferences. During the second constitutional period (July 1909– February 1921), the main concern of the second majlis was to restrain chaos and to strengthen the central government in order to put an end to domestic insecurity and foreign threats. To rectify such a situation, the majlis empowered the government to interfere even in the freedoms guaranteed by the constitution. As a result, the situation began to turn from chaos towards arbitrary rule. The research also argues that in most of their interpretations of the aim of freedom, constitutionalists considered an action permissible only if it was compatible with public interest as well as the material and spiritual progress of individuals and society. Theoretically, the aim of freedom could not have been the doing of an action that harmed another person or violated his/her freedom. Furthermore, 'the right to be wrong,' even if it harmed no one, was never defended. Nonetheless, in practice, freedom turned into chaos and licence in both the first and in the second constitutional periods. Finally, this study investigates how the Iranian pioneers of the freedom-seeking movement responded to the question of the eligibility of the agent of freedom, and the question of the equality of agents in having freedom. Iranian society was taking its first steps in experiencing the rule of law and had a long way to go to rectify its discriminatory culture and to establish equal rights. In such conditions, accepting a set of equal fundamental rights for all Iranians should be considered a great achievement for the constitutional movement.

Les pouvoirs implicites, dans une acception large, sont les pouvoirs déduits par le juge et faisant appel à une argumentation distincte de celle fondée sur le seul sens accordé aux termes d’une disposition expresse. Le lien entre ce pouvoir et les textes est susceptible de varier, selon que le pouvoir est reconnu sur le fondement d’une disposition précise ou sur une appréhension globale des attributions de l’autorité qui en bénéficie. Pourtant,indépendamment de cette distinction, les pouvoirs implicites correspondent tous à la mise en oeuvre d’un raisonnement similaire : il faut considérer que l’auteur d’un texte désire que celui-ci puisse produise tous ses effets. Les textes doivent alors être entendus comme confiant non seulement tous les pouvoirs prévus expressément, mais aussi ceux qui sont nécessaires à l’accomplissement des objectifs confiés par leur auteur. Ce principe d’interprétation posé, le juge est ensuite conduit à apprécier cette nécessité au regard d’une ou d’un ensemble de dispositions. La jurisprudence administrative témoigne de la reconnaissance de pouvoirs implicites. Leur identification est cependant le plus souvent incertaine. Par ailleurs,les termes par lesquels le juge admet ces pouvoirs lient étroitement la reconnaissance de ceux-ci à la nécessité de fait des mesures adoptées, en dépit d’une distinction indispensable. Enfin, l’origine le plus souvent textuelle des pouvoirs conditionne leur régime : issus du texte, ils y restent soumis. / Broadly defined, implicit powers are powers that the judge deduces by interpreting the text of an express provision beyond the very meaning of the terms.The link between the power and the text from which it is deduced may vary: the power can be admitted on the basis of a specific provision or can derive from an extended view of the remit of the authority which receives this power. However, the same reasoning is at work in each case: we must presume that the author intended that his text shall fully take effect. Then we also assume that the authority has received not only all the powers explicitly described by the text, but also all those which are necessary to achieve the goals the author has assigned to this authority. Once this principle of interpretation set, the judge evaluates the requirement of an implicit power in relation with one or a body of provisions. Implicit powers have been admitted by the administrative case law. However, their designation is most often doubtful. Furthermore, the terms used by the judge fortheir recognition tightly connect their acceptance to the de facto necessity of the measures taken, despite a necessary differentiation between the one and the other. At last, the fact that this powers most often originate from a text determines their status, for the spirit of the text, if not the letter, still limits them.