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Sydney Health Law
Exploring all areas of health law
Sydney Health Law is the focal point for health law research, teaching, and community engagement at Sydney Law School. It builds on nearly three decades of excellence in teaching and research across all areas of health law.
Sydney Health Law is a centre in the University of Sydney Law School that is active in organising seminars and conferences on topics of relevance to health governance, law and ethics and in building links with academic, community and professional organisations in Australia and overseas.
Academic staff affiliated with the Centre teach in Sydney Law School’s extensive offerings in health law, at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels.
The centre aims to encourage, promote and support innovative and important scholarship in health law, policy and bioethics – through teaching, research, consultancy and advocacy in all areas of health law, including health policy and bioethics.
These objectives include work both within the University of Sydney, with other centres in Australia and overseas, with the legal profession more generally, and the wider community, both in Australia and internationally
The centre's activities include:
- sponsoring conferences, seminars, workshops, lectures and other similar activities
- arranging visits of distinguished scholars from Australia and overseas
- supporting high-quality postgraduate study in the field, including the Master of Health Law and Graduate Diploma in Health Law, and supervision of postgraduate research by thesis or dissertation
- advising upon and contributing to the development of the undergraduate curriculum in health law at the University of Sydney
- engaging in innovative research and inquiry into the impact of health law on Australia
- undertaking a range of external advice, opinion work, consultancies and projects in the area of health law, within Australia, the Asia Pacific, and other parts of the world
- fostering collaborative links across institutions and across fields related to health law
- supporting the dissemination of scholarly publications, reports and other works, as well as supporting other means of dissemination of scholarly publications
- collaborating with professional associations and societies engaged in promoting health law
Directors
- Professor Roger Magnusson
- Professor Cameron Stewart
Members
- Professor Margaret Allars
- Emeritus Professor Terry Carney AO
- Professor Roger Magnusson (Co-Director)
- Emeritus Professor Barbara McDonald
- Dr Olugbenga Olatunji
- Associate Professor Belinda Reeve
- Dr Chris Rudge
- Professor Cameron Stewart (Co-Director)
Research Affiliates
Neil Francey
- Neil Francey holds an LLB from the University of Queensland and an LLM Hons from the University of Sydney. He practiced as a barrister in Sydney for 25 years spending much of his time on ground breaking tobacco litigation. He has also published internationally on various aspects relating to tobacco.
Visitors
2023 visitors
- Dr Yixian Li, Lecturer, Faculty of Law, Yunnan University School of Law
- Professor Kuei-Jung Ni, Professor of Law, Institute of Technology Law, School of Law, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Taiwan
Food governance research
Located in the Charles Perkins Centre, the Food Governance node provides a platform for collaboration between lawyers, nutritionists, policy analysists, and health scientists. Our focus is on developing practical solutions to the problems of poor nutrition and diet-related disease, through submissions to government, developing grant applications, generating new multidisciplinary research, and more.
Strengthening local food systems governance
Beginning in 2019, this ARC Discovery project aims to investigate the role of law, policy, and regulation in enabling local governments and communities to contribute to healthy, sustainable, and equitable food systems. Visit the strengthening local food systems governance website.
Past events
2024 Food Governance Conference
The 2024 Food Governance Conference was held on 14-16 February 2024. The conference explored the promotion of healthier diets via food policy and governance, Indigenous Peoples food system governance, equity and social justice in food systems, food security, and sustainability, and commercial determinants of health, and aims to create new opportunities for collaboration between researchers, policymakers, and practitioners working in all aspects of food governance.
2021 Food Governance Conference
In December 2021 the Food Governance Node at the Charles Perkins Centre (University of Sydney) hosted the Global Food Governance Conference, in collaboration with the George Institute for Global Health and the Global Center for Legal Innovation on Food Environments (Georgetown University Law Centre).
2019 Food Governance Conference
In conjunction with the University of Sydney's Charles Perkins Centre, Sydney Law School hosted the second Food Governance Conference from 3-5 July 2019.
Future internship opportunities will be advertised via the Law Student Portal and SULS jobs board.
2024
Sydney Health Law's interns for 2024 are:
- Matthew Catanzariti
- Jessica Heaney
- Oscar Loughnan
2023
Sydney Health Law's interns for 2023:
- Sophia Bleakley
- Helen Zhang
- Clare Gim
Sydney Health Law recruited three Law students to explore the status of vaping regulation in Pacific Island Countries and Territories and options for regulating e-cigarettes. Their research project informed the Public Health Division of the Pacific Community (SPC) and the legislative draftsperson leading the further development of the Pacific Legislative Framework.
2022
Sydney Health Law's interns for 2022:
- Jonna Mathiessen
- Maja Vasic
- Nina Qiu
Sydney Health Law's 2022 internship project is summarised here: Law student interns making a difference in the Pacific.
Food Governance Conference
Exploring how law, policy, and regulation address food system challenges