Shireen Morris

Shireen Morris researches constitutional law and constitutional reform,  specialising in the concept of a First Nations constitutional voice and the 2023 failed referendum. Her research includes work on free speech and the implied freedom political communication, Australian republicanism, Australian monetary sovereignty and the role of central banks in constitutional democracies, and challenges of inequality and political polarisation, social media and democratic decline.

Shireen was honoured to deliver the recent John Button Oration, making the case for radical centre economic reform in pursuit of true full employment. 

Prior to coming to Macquarie Law School, Shireen was a McKenzie Postdoctoral Fellow at Melbourne Law School, and before that she spent 7 years working at Cape York Institute as the senior adviser on Indigenous constitutional recognition. Shireen completed her PhD at Monash University, with a thesis on Indigenous constitutional recognition through a First Nations constitutional voice - now published as a book, A First Nations Voice in the Australian Constitution, with Hart Publishing. She completed a Juris Doctor (Master of Laws) at Monash and a Bachelor of Arts (English Major) at the University of Melbourne. 

Other books include Broken Heart: a true history of the Voice referendum (2024, La Trobe University Press); Radical Heart: Three Stories Make Us One (MUP, 2018), A Rightful Place: A Roadmap to Recognition (Black Inc, 2017) and The Fogotten People: Liberal and Conservative Approaches to Recognising Indigenous Peoples (MUP, 2016). Shireen has also published in journals like the Australian Law Review, Melbourne University Law Review, Sydney Law Review, UNSW Law Journal, Monash University Law Review and the Public Law Review. She regularly contributes opinion pieces to The Australian, The Guardian, The Age, Sydney Morning Herald, Courier Mail, and ABC Religion and Ethics, and often appears on TV and radio.

Shireen is available to supervise PhD students in the areas of constitutional law, constitutional reform, Indigenous rights, free speech, democratic decline and issues related to contemporary law reform and public policy.