ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the theoretical and comparative space for considering Australia's exceptionalism in being the last English-speaking democracy without a judicially enforceable bill or charter of rights. It reports on an initial investigation of the support structure for legal mobilization (SSLM) in Australia. The chapter summarizes the limited scope for judicial innovation in human rights protection allowed by the Australian Constitution, which does not include a bill of rights. It examines the high court's foray into implied constitutional rights and its more substantial transformation of native title law in the 1990s. The chapter suggests that Australia has in fact had a fully blown rights revolution mainly through political means. It also suggests that the primary effect of adopting a bill of rights is institutional, shifting primary responsibility for making decisions about rights claims from legislatures to courts. The key element in Epp's theory – a SSLM – exists in Australia, albeit in a relatively weak and under-developed form.
