Scope of Freedom of Expression

This article provides a review of the history, structure and form of the law of sedition, focusing on the new provisions inserted into the Criminal Code Act 1995 in 2005 as part of a wider counter-terrorism package. A short historical review of sedition in Australia is followed by a critical analysis of the new offences, which explores the constitutional and human rights implications of these new offences. It concludes that the law does not achieve the proposed balance between national security and human rights.

This article examines the new phenomenon of sedition laws being used to counteract speech considered offensive to racial and religious groups in Singapore. It investigates the manner in which these laws have been employed and jurisprudentially developed to restrain speech on race and/or religion in Singapore. The article argues that the current state of the law is highlyproblematic for its adverse impact on free speech as well as for its conceptual confusions with alternative bases for restraining speech.

This article advances a new understanding of the original guarantee of freedom of speech under the American Constitution, before the First Amendment. It is also about the modern implications of the original guarantee about speech-how it provides tougher and more juridical standards for limiting discretionary government power over speech and how it avoids costs to speech that America presently tolerates under a wholly rights-oriented and litigation-intensive mode of protecting speech.

This book is an analysis of the draconian provisions in the Sedition Act 1948 of Malaysia,its history and how it affects the citizen’s constitutional right to freedom of speech and expression as enshrined in the Constitution. It provides some understanding of, and reasons why, the Sedition Act as enacted and adopted in 1948 by the British colonial government must be abolished, or alternatively, reformed to reflect the changes in national and global political dimensions, particularly the threat of terrorism.

This is a report submitted to the Australian Law Reform Commission’s Review of Sedition Laws. The report is relevant for the arguments it advances against sedition Laws from a constitutional perspective. While the report is set in an Australian context, it includes international perspectives of sedition law, and is therefore relevant of other jurisdictions.

This article analyses sedition and related laws in the United States of America and the United Kingdom to determine the circumstances under which the interests of the State are secured and the opportunism of terrorist organizations avoided. It argues that the changes in the American or British law that were touted to protect free speech, are more restrictive than is widely understood. The article concludes that the national security exceptions are too broad, and has led to the use of counter-terrorism measures against non-violent opposition.

This article debates the question of whether the First Amendment repudiated seditious libel at the time of its adoption. It discusses the widely criticized Sedition Act of 1798 and concludes that even though the modern consensus is that the 1798 Act violated the First Amendment guarantees of right to freedom of speech and press, the proposition that the First Amendment at its adoption repudiated the common law crime of seditious libel remains doubtful.

Discusses the doctrine of prior restraint, its nature and development as well as the speech and speech acts in respect of which it has been applied by the U.S. Supreme Court.

“The objective of this publication is to present inter-American jurisprudence that defines the scope and content of this right in a systematic and updated way. Among the most important topics it highlights: the importance, function, and characteristics of the right to freedom of expression, as well as the types of speech protected; the prohibition of censorship and indirect restrictions; the protection of journalists and social communications media; the exercise of freedom of expression by public officials; and freedom of expression in the area of electoral processes.”

This Article argues that the law on seditious libel is essentially anti-democratic. It seeks to demonstrate that authoritarianism, political insecurity, diabolization of dissenters, and a hysterical fear of opposition have traditionally accompanied waves of prosecution for seditious libel. In conclusion, it proposes a theory of how courts should decide these cases under an enlightened view of freedom of speech and suggest the outlines of a first amendment theory that would spell the death of seditious libel.