Mark Giancaspro

University of Adelaide · Adelaide Law School

Analysis of water theft remains challenging given poor data and limited cases, restricting assessments to higher levels where attempted. However, high-level research within key transboundary contexts can offer evidence for improved theft deterrence and critical legislative change requirements, along with institutional insights for other jurisdictio...

The shortage of law graduates outside the city raises adverse implications for access to justice for Australian regional, rural and remote (RRR), and Aboriginal communities. This article discusses an extracurricular educational initiative implemented at the University of Adelaide Law School in 2021 and 2022 geared towards contributing to a solution...

The High Court of Australia recently delivered its highly anticipated judgment in Stubbings v Jams 2 Pty Ltd (2022) 399 ALR 409 (‘Stubbings (HCA)’). The case represents the most recent examination of the unsettled statutory doctrine of unconscionability in the land’s highest judicial forum. Regrettably, the High Court spurned the opportunity to cla...

Australian businesses operate within a complex legal environment, so it's important students and professionals understand their legal obligations. Contemporary Australian Business Law is an authoritative text that makes key legal concepts accessible to business students, while maintaining academic rigour. Written for business students new to studyi...

Australian businesses operate within a complex legal environment, so it's important students and professionals understand their legal obligations. Contemporary Australian Business Law is an authoritative text that makes key legal concepts accessible to business students, while maintaining academic rigour. Written for business students new to studyi...

Australian businesses operate within a complex legal environment, so it's important students and professionals understand their legal obligations. Contemporary Australian Business Law is an authoritative text that makes key legal concepts accessible to business students, while maintaining academic rigour. Written for business students new to studyi...

Australian businesses operate within a complex legal environment, so it's important students and professionals understand their legal obligations. Contemporary Australian Business Law is an authoritative text that makes key legal concepts accessible to business students, while maintaining academic rigour. Written for business students new to studyi...

Australian businesses operate within a complex legal environment, so it's important students and professionals understand their legal obligations. Contemporary Australian Business Law is an authoritative text that makes key legal concepts accessible to business students, while maintaining academic rigour. Written for business students new to studyi...

Australian businesses operate within a complex legal environment, so it's important students and professionals understand their legal obligations. Contemporary Australian Business Law is an authoritative text that makes key legal concepts accessible to business students, while maintaining academic rigour. Written for business students new to studyi...

The small to medium-sized enterprise (SME) sector is the largest and most productive in Australia. Like all established market-based economies, ours is characterised by the use of contracts as a mechanism for exchange. Contracts often require variation in response to variables such as under-pricing, resource availability, changes in scope, and risi...

Cryptocurrency is a flagship technology of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Millions of crypto trades are occurring daily, with the global crypto market now having an estimated capitalisation of US$2.47 trillion. It was inevitable that cryptocurrency’s compatibility with existing legal frameworks would be questioned, though close to no attention h...

This chapter makes a case against the use of smart contracts in the context of employment. It discusses the general operation of smart contracts, followed by a consideration of their potential use in employment. With that information as a lens through which to view the remainder of the chapter, four key suggestions are then made as to why smart con...

This book provides a landmark survey of computational contracting: one of the most important legal and practical trends for centuries. Computational contracts introduce software functionalities to operationalize, rather than merely record, acts of commercial coordination. In doing so, they bring together software and law in interesting and uncharte...

Recent crises affecting Australia, including the Black Summer bushfires and Coronavirus pandemic, have devastated social morale and crippled our economy. Countless lives and properties have been damaged or lost. These conditions have inflated demand for basic consumer goods and services, such as hygiene products, staple foods, and utility services....

With the increasing role of technology in health care the clinical environment is becoming more complex and it is important to recognise that there is now a significant commercial player on the clinical stage. The relationship between the patient and the manufacturers/distributers of this technology is not a clinical one, neither is it necessarily...

An unprecedented number of consumer problems has been caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, not least with regard to refunds of prepayments and the ability of consumers to keep up their monthly payments under loan and rental agreements. Based on a notion of societal force majeure sketched in this paper, we propose guiding principles in respect of the in...

This article considers whether ‘comic contracts’, which incorporate aspects of visualisation, are legally valid under Anglo-Australian contract law. Comic contracting has been put forward as one method which can address issues associated with traditional text-based contracting, including contractor apathy and illiteracy. Use cases across a variety...

This article considers whether contracts to purchase ‘haunted’ objects are legally enforceable under Australian contract law. ‘Dybbuk boxes’, and related paraphernalia said to be possessed by spirits, are becoming increasingly popular on online shopping sites and as tourist attractions following recent high-profile incidents involving celebrities s...

The global prevalence and negative implications of traditional (face-to-face) workplace bullying are well documented and understood. However, the same cannot be said of workplace bullying facilitated through Information Communication Technologies, commonly referred to as "cyberbullying". From an Australian perspective, preliminary data indicate tha...

Swift developments in the emerging field of blockchain technology have facilitated the birth of ‘smart contracts’: computerised transaction protocols which autonomously execute the terms of a contract. Smart contracts are disintermediated and generally transparent in nature, offering the promise of increased commercial efficiency, lower transaction...

As organ donation rates remain unable to meet the needs of individuals waiting for transplants, it is necessary to identify reasons for this shortage and develop solutions to address it. The introduction of kidney paired donation (KPD) programs represents 1 such innovation that has become a valuable tool in donation systems around the world. While...

It is now common practice for employers to utilise policies in their workplaces to stipulate expected standards of employee behaviour and performance. An important consideration, which directly affects the issue of legal liability for employers and employees, is whether or not the terms of a workplace policy form part of the employment contract. Th...

The sporting industry is one of the most lucrative in the world. With growing social and media interest in sport, the values and salaries of professional players continue to increase exponentially, and fierce competition within individual sports makes the process of negotiating player contracts critically important. The inclusion in contemporary ti...

Whereas once data storage was confined to a computer’s hardware, now the sky is quite literally the limit. Cloud storage is flexible, simple, and cost-effective; however, it also introduces significant data security risks. One such risk is the unscrupulous misuse of data stored in the cloud so as to perpetrate acts of cyberbullying. Cloud storage u...

In 2012 the Federal Government commenced a comprehensive review of the Australian law of contract, with the aim of identifying those aspects of this legal framework which were not conducive to its efficient and effective operation for businesses and consumers. This article seeks to add to this live discussion by contemplating whether the highly con...

Clark v Macourt [2013] HCA 56 (18 December 2013) involved a unique dispute between two medical practitioners specialising in the provision of assisted reproductive treatment services. The High Court of Australia was required to consider how to quantify the damages payable to the appellant following the respondent’s breach of contract, which resulte...

Whether it be through the fault of the parties or as a consequence of external influences, those party to a contract often need to modify it to counteract the effects of any adverse variables threatening the agreement. More commonly the change affects only one of the parties directly, who then seeks a compromise which ultimately prompts the other p...

In Williams v Roffey Bros & Nicholls (Contractors) Ltd [1991] 1 QB 1 the English Court of Appeal famously invented the ‘practical benefit’ principle. This principle makes it far simpler for parties to satisfy the consideration requirement when modifying a contract. This article reviews the ensuing case law around the common law world addressing the...