Lost in Translation: A History of Moral Rights in Australian Law

Abstract

This thesis is a history of moral rights in Australian law. It traces the historical discourse about moral rights in Australian law and demonstrates how that discourse has shaped the meaning moral rights have come to assume in their current form under the current regime contained in the Copyright Amendment (Moral Rijghts) Act 2000. This history examines the reception and Inter production of a moral rights discourse in Australian law, and reveals that the historical discourse about Australian moral tights was dominated by the three themes; foreignness, international obligation and economic impact. I contend these three themes fundamentally shaped moral rights as they now appear in the moral rights regime. As the history unfolds, it will become clear that the moral rights regime was organised around a specific repertoire of arguments and imaginings, and it is this discourse that informs this thesis. My argument is pursued in three stages. Section One of the thesis provides the historical detail of the moral rights trajectory in Australian jurisprudence, and reveals, within that history, the emergence of three dominant themes, which are pursued in subsequent detail. In addition to the history, this section also provides detailed discussion of the legislative provisions in order to illustrate moral rights as a product of the history, and it highlights some of the shortcomings of the regime and provides some background for the case study in Section Two. Section Two of the thesis interrogates the structure of the moral rights regime by applying the Act's provisions to the case study of indigenous creators, thus providing a contemporary example of how these rights may work in practice, as the result of the historical discourse. Thus this section sets the scene for final part of the thesis, which delves further into the historical discourse. Section Part Three follows the themes of the moral rights debate as they emerged historically. Reconceptualizing the moral tights discourse in this way helps to explain why the debates about moral rights took a particular course and produced the outcomes it did. The starting point for these discussions is a detailed examination of the themes of foreignness, international obligation and economic impact, and follows these themes as they evolved chronologically. In particular, the discussion reveals that the debates about moral rights effectively fall into two eras. The first era (1928-1988) centred around the question of whether Australia should introduce moral rights and the debates about the appropriateness of the reception. At the commencement of the second era (1988-2000) the question shifted to what form moral rights should take. This then provides a backdrop with which to understand why specific discussions about moral rights were sidelined during the years of debates leading up to the legislation; in particular, the subject and the object; which form the fulcrum of a moral rights action. This is an essential part of the history because it explains why the subject and the object came to be imagined and constructed in such a narrow and limited way and clarifies why the moral rights provisions appear manifestly ineffective, particularly for indigenous creators and their communities. This thesis contributes to legal history in three important ways. First, it provides a detailed account of a discourse about moral rights in Australian law, and in doing so challenges the long held assumptions about their reception and production. Second, it highlights the importance of history to legal discourse. Just as regulatory regimes, institutions, and rules are integral to the law, so too are the informal practices, discourses and contexts on which they were based. Third, it reminds the reader that history is a signpost, and this history of moral rights demonstrates that the way this law was derived, imagined and constructed has significance for the social, cultural and legal context in which that process takes place.