Kieran Pender is an honorary lecturer at the ANU College of Law, a senior lawyer at the Human Rights Law Centre and an award-winning writer. He is a graduate of the ANU, where he was awarded the university medal, and now teaches and researches constitutional law, private international law, employment law and anti-discrimination law. Kieran is an internationally-recognised authority on whistleblower protections; he led the establishment of the Human Rights Law Centre's Whistleblower Project and has authored or co-authored numerous reports on whistleblowing. Kieran is also a frequent contributor to Australian and international media outlets, including The Guardian. He was previously a senior legal advisor with the International Bar Association's Legal Policy & Research Unit in London.

Kieran serves on numerous boards and committees: he is deputy chair of sports non-profit Women Onside, an independent member of the Victorian Courts Council's Health, Safety and Culture Committee, and a member of the Law Council of Australia's Equal Opportunity Committee, the Law Society of New South Wales' Diversity and Inclusion Committee, and the advisory council of the Global Institute for Women's Leadership. Kieran was named Young Lawyer of the Year in 2021 by the ACT Law Society and won Pro Bono/Community Lawyer of the Year at Lawyer's Weekly 30 Under 30 Awards in 2022. He was the ANU's 2022 Young Alumnus of the Year.

Significant research publications

• Castles, Madeleine, Tom Hvala and Kieran Pender, ‘Rethinking Richardson: Sexual Harassment Damages in the #MeToo Era’ (2021) 49 Federal Law Review 231
• Pender, Kieran, ‘Regulating Truth and Lies in Political Advertising: Implied Freedom Considerations’ (2022) 44 Sydney Law Review 1
• Pender, Kieran, ‘How Does the Implied Freedom of Political Communication Constrain Executive Power?’ (2022) 96 Australian Law Journal 704
• Pender, Kieran, ‘Protecting Press Freedom through Human Rights Charters in Australia’ (2023) 47 Melbourne University Law Review 192
• Pender, Kieran, ‘Open Justice, Closed Courts and the Constitution: Australian and Comparative Perspectives’ (2023) 42 University of Queensland Law Journal 155
• Getnick, Neil, Gregory Krakower and Kieran Pender, ‘Whistleblowers Beyond Borders: The Globalisation of Whistleblower Protection’ in Anti-Corruption Law and Practice Report 2017: Innovation in Enforcement and Compliance (International Bar Association, May 2017)
• Pender, Kieran, ‘Red Scare on Ice: Antarctica, Australian-Soviet Relations and the International Geophysical Year’ (2017) 14 History Australia 645
• Pender, Kieran, ‘The “Price” of Justice?: Costs-Conditional Special Leave in the High Court’ (2018) 42(1) Melbourne University Law Review 149
• Pender, Kieran, ‘“Silent Members of Society”? Public Servants and the Freedom of Political Communication in Australia’ (2018) 29 Public Law Review 327
• Pender, Kieran, ‘Before the High Court – Comcare v Banerji: Public Servants and Political Communication’ (2019) 41 Sydney Law Review 131
• Pender, Kieran, Sofya Cherkasova and Anna Yamaoka-Enkerlin, ‘Compliance and Whistleblowing: How Technology will Replace, Empower and Change Whistleblowers’ in Jelena Madir (ed), FinTech: Law and Regulation (Edward Elgar, 2019)
• Pender, Kieran, Us Too? Bullying and Sexual Harassment in the Legal Profession (International Bar Association, 2019)
• Pender, Kieran, 'Official Secrecy, Freedom of Information, Whistleblower Protections and Government Employee Speech: Pieces of the Same Puzzle? An Australian Perspective' in Costantino Grasso (ed), Whistleblowers: Voices of Justice (Springer, forthcoming)

View more publications on the ANU Researchers website