Dr Miranda Forsyth is a Postdoctoral Fellow at RegNet in the College of Asia and Pacific at the Australian National University. Prior to this she spent eight years working in Vanuatu, first as a Public Prosecutor and then as a lecturer in criminal law at the University of the South Pacific. Her doctoral research investigated the relationship between the state criminal justice system and the customary justice system in Vanuatu and proposed a new method for assistingthe two systems to work in a more mutually supportive way. The results of this research have been published in the book A Bird that Flies with Two Wings: State and Kastom Justice Systems in Vanuatu (2009) ANU ePress. More information about Miranda’s activities in the past decade can be found in her cv, attached here.

Dr Katharina Serrano Dr graduated from Groningen University and continued her postgraduate study at the Universities of Leicester as well as Central Lancashire in the UK. Following a lectureship at the University of Halle-Wittenberg (Germany), Katharina worked on a Jean Monnet research project at the University of the South Pacific where she researched the area of EU law and policy in relation to Pacific Island countries. This experience has inspired her to undertake further research at the intersection of EU law and International law. In her PhD, Katharina focused on the trade-development nexus in Economic Partnership Agreements between the EU and African, Caribbean and Pacific countries. Following her PhD, Katharina researched and published in the area of WTO law (addressing issues of trade in sugar and special and differential treatment under the WTO regime) and European Commercial law in relation to non-EU countries. Her current research interest covers areas of international trade and development law in relation to Small Island Developing States (SIDS) of the Pacific region. Under an ARC-funded research project, she is looking at the impact Intellectual Property regimes (existing and under negotiation in trade agreements) can have on sustainable development in Pacific island countries. Here, Katharina's specific interest lies in the area of legal regimes related to traditional knowledge and (intangible) cultural heritage.

Professor Sue Farran received most of her university education in South Africa, first in Social anthropology and English and then in Law. Her Academic career started at the University of Natal in Pietermaritzburg, but since then she has held posts at the University of the West of England, the University of the South Pacific (in Fiji and Vanuatu), the University of Dundee in Scotland and is now at Northumbria University in England. She has also taught at the University of Angers and Lyons III in France and at Stamford College, Kuala Lumpur, a private college in Malaysia. She retains links with the University of the South Pacific as a visiting lecturer and external examiner.

Sue's research interests and resulting publications are inspired by the island countries of the South Pacific region and focus on issues of human rights, particularly as they pertain to land and its related resources, the family – especially women and children, and intellectual property. Case studies from the region inform and are informed by much larger themes and concerns such as legal pluralism, the challenges of development and sustainability, globalisation and legal colonialism. As a comparativist Sue is interested in the interface between legal systems and normative frameworks within states and between states, and the relationship between national, regional and international players in shaping and developing legal responses to contemporary issues.