Joo-Cheong Tham

Professor Joo-Cheong Tham is a Professor at Melbourne Law School, University of Melbourne. He graduated from the University of Melbourne with a first class honours degree in law and holds a Master of Laws and Doctorate of Law from the same university. Prior to his appointment at Melbourne Law School, he taught at the law schools of Victoria University and La Trobe University. Tham has held several prominent roles, including National Tertiary Education Union’s Victorian Assistant Secretary (Academic Staff), inaugural Director of the Centre for Public Integrity, Deputy Chair of the Migrant Workers Centre, and inaugural Director of the Electoral Regulation Research Network from 2012 to 2023, an initiative sponsored by the New South Wales Electoral Commission, Victorian Electoral Commission, and Melbourne Law School.

Tham’s research specializations encompass labour law and public law. His labour law work focuses on the regulation of precarious work—his doctoral thesis examined the legal precariousness of casual employment—with a significant body of scholarship on migrant labour and labour protection under trade agreements. In public law, his research centers on law and democracy, particularly the role of money in politics, counter-terrorism laws, and, more recently, the climate crisis; he is presently working on a book project concerning labour law, the climate crisis, and democratic solidarity. He is a Fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia and has received visiting fellowships including the Fernand Braudel Fellowship at the European University Institute, British Academy Visiting Fellowship at the Law School, King's College, University of London, Rydon Fellowship for Australian Politics and History at the Menzies Centre for Australian Studies, King's College, University of London, Australian Bicentennial Fellowship, and fellowship under the Genest Global Faculty at Osgoode Hall Law School. Key publications include *Money and Politics: The Democracy We Can’t Afford* (2010), *Electoral Democracy: Australian Prospects* (2011), *The Funding of Political Parties: Where Now?* (2012), *Democracy, Social Justice and the Role of Trade Unions* (2021), and *Global Labor Migrations: New Directions* (2022). He has produced reports such as *Climate Change and Democracy: Insights from Asia and the Pacific* (2023) for International IDEA and reports for the New South Wales Electoral Commission and Independent Commission Against Corruption on political finance and lobbying. Tham regularly speaks at public forums, presents lectures at the Commonwealth, South Australian, and Victorian Parliaments, and gives evidence to parliamentary inquiries on labour migration, terrorism laws, and political finance.

Professional Email: j.tham@unimelb.edu.au