Richard Stewart

My doctoral work was in the field of property law and theory. In my thesis, entitled 'The Rationality of Property', I employed the Personhood Theory of Property that is derived from the philosophy of G.W.F. Hegel to posit property as a human-thing relationship that emerges as an aspect of the human condition. Property law, I argued, is the socio-legal construct that responds to the reality of property as a human universal. By responding to property, which it does by recognising and regulating the human-thing relationship, the laws of property and the societal institution they constitute impact upon the extent to which the subjective human person can emerge, flourish, and have being in the objective world. Property laws are thus fundamental to healthy and well human persons and to the societies they together form, and offer as yet untapped opportunities to realise a more just, sustainable, and emancipatory world. Having now earned three degrees from Southern Cross University, most recently a PhD, it is my alma mater though I also earned an LLM at the University of Melbourne and undertook non-degree studies at the University of Tasmania (philosophy and applied sciences). Vocationally, I have been a practising lawyer since 2005 and since that time have also qualified as a public accountant, registered tax agent, and Chartered Tax Adviser. In July 2025 I joined the Faculty of Law at Monash University from where I will continue to develop my capacity and make a contribution to law and justice as a socio-legal scholar.