This book investigates the problems and possibilities of plural legal orders through an in-depth study of the relationship between the state and customary justice systems in Vanuatu. It argues that there is a need to move away from the current state-centric approach to law reform in the South Pacific region, and instead include all state and non-state legal orders in development strategies and dialogue.

This book represents the first critical survey of a section of a rich Australian corpus of chamber music. The author has included various instrumental combinations with piano as well as vocal music with piano. The survey is chronological, as well as by composer. An appendix to the work provides source material for future research into this area. The research has concentrated on progressive modernist music by Australian composers. The commentary utilises the author’s rich experience as composer, pianist and educator.

The German missionary Carl Strehlow (1871-1922) had a deep ethnographic interest in Aboriginal Australian cosmology and social life which he documented in his 7 volume work Die Aranda- und Loritja-Stämme in Zentral-Australien that remains unpublished in English. In 1913, Marcel Mauss called his collection of sacred songs and myths, an Australian Rig Veda.

China’s accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO) has had profound consequences for the structure of its economy, and there will many more before the full benefits of an open trading regime will be realised.

“China is so large that its trading interests and influence are global. But its interests are disproportionately powerful in its immediate Western Pacific and Asia Pacific partners. The evolution of China’s economic relationships with its Asia Pacific partners, in which APEC came to play a significant role in the 1990s, is thus a central part of the story of China’s rapidly growing and changing interaction with the global economy.”

- Ross Garnaut

In this collection of essays, we reflect on what it means to practise the social sciences in the twenty-first century. The book brings together leading social scientists from the Asia-Pacific region. We argue for the benefit of dialogue between the diverse theories and methods of social sciences in the region, the role of the social sciences in addressing real-world problems, the need to transcend national boundaries in addressing regional problems, and the challenges for an increasingly globalised higher education sector in the twenty-first century.