Melbourne Law School - Research Publications

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    Making robo-advisers careful? Duties of care in providing automated financial advice to consumers
    Paterson, JM (ROUTLEDGE JOURNALS, TAYLOR & FRANCIS LTD, 2021-01-01)
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    Boulevards of broken dreams
    Thorburn, M ; Weir, B ; Bell, M (Law Institute of Victoria, 2024-03-01)
    Lawyers commencing legal action to enforce clients' rights can feel like they are confronted with an impenetrable maze. A raft of regulatory reforms proposed or in train at the start of 2024 offer a pathway through that, maze, but one which requires careful navigation.
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    Helping and not Harming Animals with AI
    Coghlan, S ; Parker, C (Springer, 2024-03-01)
    Ethical discussions about Artificial Intelligence (AI) often overlook its potentially large impact on nonhuman animals. In a recent commentary on our paper about AI’s possible harms, Leonie Bossert argues for a focus not just on the possible negative impacts but also the possible beneficial outcomes of AI for animals. We welcome this call to increase awareness of AI that helps animals: developing and using AI to improve animal wellbeing and promote positive dimensions in animal lives should be a vital ethical goal. Nonetheless, we argue that there is some value in focusing on technology-based harms in the context of AI ethics and policy discourses. A harms framework for AI can inform some of our strongest duties to animals and inform regulation and risk assessment impacts designed to prevent serious harms to humans, the environment, and animals.
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    Can money buy you (climate) happiness? Economic co-benefits and the implementation of effective carbon pricing policies in Mexico
    Dibley, A ; Garcia-Miron, R (Elsevier, 2020-12)
    It is difficult for governments to implement effective climate change mitigation policies because they often create short-term costs for concentrated industry groups who oppose them. As such, climate policy scholars have theorized that governments will be more willing and able to implement mitigation policies where they align with other economic policy objectives. The logic of this “economic co-benefits” argument is that co-benefits create short-term gains for governments to offset the immediate costs they face in introducing mitigation policies. Through a most-similar systems design comparative study of a carbon tax and an emissions trading scheme (ETS) in Mexico, this article interrogates the economic co-benefits theory of mitigation policy adoption. By comparing the motivations underpinning two carbon pricing policies in a single country, the article suggests that the presence of immediately accruing fiscal revenues created short-term incentives for the Mexican government to implement the carbon tax, whereas such short-term incentives were not present with respect to the ETS. However, in both cases concentrated affected industry groups were able to dilute the carbon prices to which they were subject. The implications of this study are that economic co-benefits may not be as useful in achieving effective mitigation policy outcomes, in the absence of measures which also independently change the interests of concentrated industry groups.
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    Decarbonization in state-owned power companies: Lessons from a comparative analysis
    Benoit, P ; Clark, A ; Schwarz, M ; Dibley, A (Elsevier, 2022-06-25)
    A rapid decarbonization of the electricity system is urgently required for the Paris Agreement objectives to stand a reasonable chance of being met. While state-owned power companies (SPCs) are the dominant firm type in the global electricity sector, representing nearly two thirds of global electric power generation capacity, most climate policy literature focuses on private sector companies when analyzing decarbonization interventions. SPCs’ distinct corporate governance structures, objectives, relationships with government, and sources of finance, however, can be markedly different from those of private companies. Here, we develop a framework for analyzing the extent to which common and divergent features of SPCs, and the markets in which they operate, affect their relationship to government interventions on decarbonization. We also consider the implications of these relationships for the effective implementation of sector-wide decarbonization strategies. We then apply this framework using a comparative case study analysis of six major SPCs, and highlight how differences in their agency, motivation, capacity, and market exposure may result in different potential responsiveness to government regulatory, policy and market interventions on decarbonization. We generalize these findings by developing four SPC archetypes and illustrate how they might respond differently to government interventions targeting decarbonization. Our analysis posits that SPCs can, under the guidance of governments pursuing ambitious climate policy, be more effective vehicles for decarbonization relative to private sector companies, particularly when they operate with a high degree of operational independence, are insulated from competitive pressures, and have the financial and technical capacity to invest in the decarbonization of their asset base. Similarly, market-wide policy interventions, such as carbon pricing mechanisms, could in practice be less effective interventions with respect to SPCs than their private counterparts when the SPC is ill-equipped to translate these incentives into decarbonization action because it is mandated to pursue supplementary objectives other than profit maximization alone. Ultimately, governments will need to step up their climate action to achieve carbon neutrality. SPCs can, and where they are major market players, must be key actors in driving decarbonization when the appropriate interventions are utilized and therefore deserve significantly more attention in the climate policy debate.
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    National COVID debts: climate change imperils countries' ability to repay
    Dibley, A ; Wetzer, T ; Hepburn, C (Nature Research, 2021-04-06)
    Analysis reveals three ways to boost green investment and achieve a resilient recovery from the coronavirus pandemic.
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    When does “Leviathan” innovate? A legal theory of clean technological change at government-owned electric utilities
    Dibley, A (Harvard Law School, 2023)
    The electricity system in the United States comprises thousands of government-owned power utilities. Globally, such government-owned companies remain the dominant corporate structure through which electricity is produced and transmitted. Given their prevalence, the willingness and speed of these firms to adopt new clean electricity generation and transmission technologies could have significant implications for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and the economic and social consequences that follow. Despite the importance of these companies, there have been few studies about why some public power utilities adopt new technologies more readily than others. Economists who have written about innovation at government-owned companies have tended to focus narrowly on how the resources and competencies of those firms shape innovation outcomes. In this Article, I put forward a legal theory to explain innovation. I suggest that the interaction between the corporate governance and financial rules of the firm, and the interests of host governments play a central role in shaping their innovation outcomes. I test the theory through a comparative case study of two significant public power utilities— the Tennessee Valley Authority and the New York Power Authority. To understand periods of clean energy innovation (or lack thereof) throughout their history, I draw on 43 confidential interviews with senior executives, officials, and observers of the firms. I also rely on historical, legal, operational, and financial documents of both firms dating back to the 1930s, to evaluate their technological investment decision-making over time. The theory and evidence in this Article suggest that policymakers eager to achieve technological change at government-owned utilities should reform the “creative” laws that govern the managers’ risk exposure in adopting new technologies. Also, they should reform the “destruction” rules on debt and tariffs that can lock in incumbent technologies.
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    Climate risk assessments must engage with the law
    Wetzer, T ; Stuart-Smith, R ; Dibley, A (AAAS, 2024-01-11)
    Climate-related financial risk is the dominant frame through which many companies, investors, and regulators engage with climate change. We argue that developments in legal action mean that the basis for these assessments, which focus on physical and transition risks (1), is no longer accurate. Accounting for the legal system substantially alters the distribution of climate-related risk between firms, governments, and the public. Drawing on analysis of climate litigation, regulatory enforcement, and other legal action, we propose a framework that accounts for how legal action shifts or amplifies physical and transition risk exposures and creates additional climate risk exposures. We then preview five qualitative and quantitative approaches that can be applied to assess the implications of legal action for firms’ climate-related risk exposure.
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    Alleviating the confusion around content analysis: A comment in response to Wainstein, Elliott & Austin 2023
    Lynch, F ; Gillam, L ; Vears, DF (Wiley, 2023)
    We came across, and applaud, the article from Wainstein, Elliott & Austin recently published in the Journal of Genetic Counseling (2023) for providing a much-needed overview of the considerations for the use of qualitative methodologies in genetic counselling research. We agree wholeheartedly that sufficient training and rigour is often lacking in the qualitative research conducted in this field and that this article offers a good overview of many of the most useful qualitative analysis methods. However, as researchers with extensive experience in both qualitative analyses and supervision of those undertaking such analyses, we were concerned about the description of a particular method of analysis: content analysis. We are particularly familiar with this method, having used it frequently in our own research, and also recently published an article clearly describing this methodology and its utility (see Vears & Gillam (2022)). As such, we felt compelled to add to Wainstein and colleagues’ description of what content analysis is and outline, from our shared experience, the potential uses of this incredibly valuable qualitative analysis method.
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    Film Review: Four Perspectives on Hanung Bramantyo’s Kartini
    Pausacker, H ; Afrianty, D ; Yulindrasari, H ; Cote, J (Indonesian Resources and Information Program (IRIP), 2017-07)
    Following the Melbourne screening of Hanung Bramantyo’s new film Kartini in May 2017, the University of Melbourne’s Indonesia Forum organised a symposium on the theme ‘The film Kartini and Kartini as a source of historical and contemporary inspiration in Indonesia’. Four speakers were invited to present their responses based on their particular areas of research. Here they briefly re-present their takes on director Hanung’s latest cinematic interpretation of Indonesia’s iconic female national hero.