Professor Peta Spender is an Emeritus Professor and a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Law. She has served as a Presidential and Senior Member of the ACT Civil and Administrative Tribunal. Her research passions straddle corporations/financial markets law and litigation. She has published widely in both areas and made submissions to various law reform bodies including special commissions of inquiry, parliamentary committees, and the Australian Law Reform Commission.
Professor Spender is a co-author of the leading Australian casebook on litigation and specialises in class actions and collective redress. She is also a respected corporate law scholar and has been honoured with life membership of the Society of Corporate Law Academics. Her works have been cited by the Australian High Court and in amicus briefs filed in the US Supreme Court. She is currently working on a number of projects that critically examine class actions and the conduct obligations of corporations.
Grants
Funds provider: Australian Research Council
Project ID: DP0988956
Project title: A Comparative Law and Economics Analysis of Class Actions in Australia, the US and the UK
Lead Investigator : A/Professor George Barker
Other Investigators: Professor Theodore Eisenberg (Cornell University); Professor Paul Fenn (The University of Nottingham)
Funding amount: $356,000
Books & edited collections
Contemporary Australian Corporate Law (with S Bottomley, K Hall, B Nosworthy) Cambridge University Press
- Second edition 2021
- First edition 2018
Civil Procedure - Commentary and Materials (with S. Colbran) LexisNexis, Australia.
- Eighth Edition 2022
- Seventh Edition 2019
- Sixth Edition October 2015
- Fifth Edition October 2012
- Fourth Edition July 2009
- Third Edition November 2005
- Second Edition January 2002
- First Edition March 1998
'Progressive possibilities in corporate law’ (2013) Australian Journal of Corporate Law, Vol 28 No 1, with Kath Hall
‘100 years of Salomon’ (1999) Federal Law Review, Vol 27 Number 2, with Stephen Bottomley
Refereed journal articles
- 'Constructing legal personhood: corporate law’s legacy' (2021) 30 Griffith Law Review (with Michelle Worthington)
- 'Gender Quotas on Boards - Is it Time for Australia to Lean in?' (2015) 20 Deakin Law Review 95
- 'The end of the ‘End of History for Corporate Law’?' (2014) 29 Australian Journal of Corporate Law 147 (with Michelle Welsh, Irene Lynch Fannon and Kath Hall)
- 'Wavering alternations of valour and caution: Commercial and regulatory litigation in the French CJ High Court' (2013) 2 Journal of Civil Litigation and Practice 111
- 'Gender diversity on boards in Australia — Waiting for the great leap forward?' (2012) 27 Australian Journal of Corporate Law 22
- 'Adventures on the Barbary Coast: Morrison and Enforcement in a Globalised Securities Market' (2011) 35 Melbourne University Law Review 280 (with Michael Tarlowski)
- 'Corporate Constitutionalism' (2009) 31 Sydney Law Review 147 (with Angus Corbett)
- 'After Fostif: Lingering Uncertainties and Controversies About Litigation Funding' (2008) 18 Journal of Judicial Administration 101
- 'Negotiating the Third Way: Developing Effective Process in Civil Penalty Litigation' (2008) 26 Company and Securities Law Journal 249
- 'Weapons of Mass Dispassion: James Hardie and Corporate Law' The Second Michael Whincop Memorial Lecture (2005) 14 Griffith Law Review 280
- 'How to Do Things with Contractarianism: Michael Whincop's Contribution to Corporate Law Scholarship' (2004) 13 Griffith Law Review 9 (with Stephen Bottomley)
- 'McCabe: Unresolved Questions about truth and justice' (2004) 12 Torts Law Journal 155
- 'Blue Asbestos and Golden Eggs: Evaluating Bankruptcy and Class Actions as Just Responses to Mass Tort Liability' (2003) 25 Sydney Law Review 223
- Book Review - 'Christine Parker, The Open Corporation: Effective Self-Regulation and Democracy' (2002) 25 University of New South Wales Law Journal – Special Issue Contemporary Issues in Corporate Governance, 611
- 'Securities Class Actions: A View from the Land of the Great White Shareholder' (2002) 31 Common Law World Review 123
- 'Resurrecting Mrs Salomon' (1999) 27 Federal Law Review 243
- 'Guns and Greenmail: Fear and Loathing After Gambotto' (1998) 22 Melbourne University Law Review 96
- 'Family Companies and Women's Proprietary Entitlements' (1997) 11 Australian Journal of Family Law 196
- 'Exploring the Corporations Law Using a Gender Analysis' (1996) 3 xCanberra Law Review 82, Special Edition on Corporate Law Research Methods and Theory
- 'The Legal Relationship between the Australian Stock Exchange and Listed Companies' (1995) 13 Company and Securities Law Journal 240
- 'Women and the Epistemology of Corporations Law' (1995) 6 Legal Education Review 195
- 'Compulsory Acquisition of Minority Shareholdings' (1993) 11 Company and Securities Law Journal 83
- 'Estoppel and Restitution' (1991) 4 Journal of Contract Law 158
Book chapters
- 'Class Actions: Insights from Regulatory and Institutional Theory' in James Metzger and Michael Legg (eds), The Australian Class Action: A 30 Year Perspective (Federation Press, 2022)
- ‘Excellence, Innovation and Courtesy: Federal Court Procedure and Modernity’ in Pauline Ridge and James Stellios (eds), The Federal Court’s Contribution to Australian Law: Past, Present, Future (Federation Press, 2018)
- “The Class Action as Sheriff: Private Law Enforcement and Remedial Roulette” in J Berryman and R Bigwood (eds.) The Law of Remedies: New Directions in the Common Law (Toronto: Irwin Law, 2010)
- 'Scenes from a Wharf: Containing the Morality of Corporate Law', Chapter 3, International Corporate Law Volume 1 F McMillan (ed) Hart Publishing, Oxford, 2000
- 'Women as Directors of Companies', Corporations Law Chapter, in Regina Graycar and Jenny Morgan (eds) Work And Violence Themes: Including Gender Issues in the Core Law Curriculum, 1996
Conference papers & presentations
Selection of presentations:
- ‘Directors’ Duties and Responsibilities’, Prospects of Corporate Governance against the Backdrop of Company Law Reform Conference, Tsinghua Commercial Law Research Center, Law School, Tsinghua University, Beijing, October 2022
- ‘Class Actions in Australia: Controversy and Critique’, Australian Academy of Law Seminar 2 August 2022
- ‘Reconsidering class actions through the lens of regulatory and institutional theory’, Melbourne Law School, University of Melbourne, 25 July 2022
- ‘Class actions as legal mobilisation: a reckoning from the south’, Governing Corporations and Industries: Rule-making, Litigation, and Reform, Rage, Reckoning and Remedy, Global Meeting on Law & Society, Lisbon, 16 July 2022
- ‘Lawfare: what is it good for?’ Civil Justice Symposium, Monash Law School, 2 February 2022
- ‘Access to justice and the future of class actions’, Monash University Business School Webinar, 11 November 2021
- ‘Rolling in the deep: Can class actions seriously regulate corporate misconduct?, Law School, University of Newcastle, 26 May 2021
- 'Key principles in administrative law – some recent cases’, Australian Institute of Administrative Law and Centre for Public Law, Canberra, 15 July 2020
- ‘Regulatory capture? Why not litigate!’, University of NSW, February 2020
- ‘Class Actions in Australia: Rent-Seeking Entrepreneurs or Regulatory Node?’, Monash University, 4 February 2020
- ‘Financial advice and fiduciary duties in Australia: law reform, bootstraps and scandal’, 21st Century Business Law Forum, Law School, Tsinghua University Beijing, October 2019
- ‘Constructing legal personhood: corporate law’s legacy’, Corporate Law Teachers Association Conference, Law School, University of Auckland, 5 February 2019
- ‘Excellence, innovation and courtesy: Federal Court procedure and modernity’, Federal Court of Australia and ANU, 8 September 2017,
- ‘What are courts for?’ Panel Session, Reforming Civil Justice: Key Challenges for Future Policy and Research Conference, Law School, Flinders University, 17 February 2017
- ‘Securities Law’, Seminar, Faculty of Law, University of Yangon, 9 December 2015
- ‘Empirical research in corporate law and corporate governance’, Plenary Panel Session, Corporate Law Teachers Association Conference, Melbourne Law School, 2 February 2015
- ‘Gender Quotas on Boards – Is it Time for Australia to Act?’, Mandatory Gender Quota Legislation: Will Australia Follow Europe? International Corporate Governance and Law (ICGL) Forum hosted by Deakin Law School and the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, Melbourne, 20 October 2014
- ‘A Different Justice? The Role of Procedure in Public Law Adjudication’, Public Law Conference: Process and Substance in Public Law, University of Cambridge, 17 September 2014
Currently supervising
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Topic: Reconceiving the National Security Regulation of Foreign Investment in Australian Critical Infrastructure
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Topic: Reconceptualising Legal Principles for Implantable Medical Device Failure
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Topic: Developing a Legal Framework for Third-Party Funding in International Commercial Arbitration in Malaysia
