BA, LLB (Hons) (Melbourne), MA (Oxford); LLD h.c. (Melbourne; Carleton University, Canada; Sydney; Queen's University, Ontario)
,
Law and Legal Studies
2012
Professor the Hon Gareth Evans AC QC FASSA FAIIA has been Chancellor of the Australian National University since January 2010. He was a Cabinet Minister in the Hawke and Keating Labor Governments from 1983-96, in the posts of Attorney General, Minister for Resources and Energy, Minister for Transport and Communications and - from 1988-96 - Foreign Minister. During his 21 years in Australian politics he was Leader of the Government in the Senate (1993-96) and Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the House of Representatives (1996-98). From 2000 to 2009 he was President and CEO of the Brussels-based International Crisis Group, the independent global conflict prevention and resolution organisation.
He has written or edited 13 books - including Incorrigible Optimist: A Political Memoir (2017), Nuclear Weapons: The State of Play 2015 (co-author), Inside the Hawke-Keating Government: A Cabinet Diary (2014), and The Responsibility to Protect: Ending Mass Atrocity Crimes Once and for All (2008); has published many newspaper articles and nearly 150 journal articles, chapters, and reports on foreign relations, human rights and legal and constitutional reform; has honorary doctorates from Melbourne, Sydney, Carleton and Queen’s Universities; and has lectured at many universities around the world, including Oxford, Cambridge, Princeton, Yale, Stanford and the Central European University.
He has co-chaired two major International Commissions, on Intervention and State Sovereignty (2000-01), and Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament (2008-10), and has been a member of a number of others. He currently Co-Chairs the International Advisory Board of the New-York based Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect, and is Patron and Emeritus Convenor of the Asia Pacific Leadership Network for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament.
Gareth Evans was made a Companion of the Order of Australia (AC) in 2012 for his eminent service to international relations, particularly in the Asia-Pacific region, as an adviser to governments on global policy matters, to conflict prevention and resolution, and to arms control and disarmament, and in the same year was elected an honorary Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences of Australia (FASSA). In 2016 he was awarded by the Sir Edward 'Weary' Dunlop Asialink Medal for long-term commitment to improving Australia-Asia relations. In December 2015 he was made a Companion of the Order of O.R. Tambo by South Africa for his contributions to the anti-apartheid movement. Foreign Policy magazine cited him as one of the Top 100 Global Thinkers for 2011 for making 'the responsibility to protect' more than academic. In 2010 he was awarded the Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt Institute Four Freedoms Award for Freedom from Fear, for his pioneering work on the Responsibility to Protect concept and his contributions to conflict prevention and resolution, arms control and disarmament.
- Member of the Carnegie Commission on Preventing Deadly Conflict, co-chaired by Cyrus Vance and David Hamburg (1994 - 1997)
- Co-Chair (with Mohamed Sahnoun) of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty (ICISS), appointed by the Government of Canada which published its report, The Responsibility to Protect, in December 2001 (2000 - 2001)
- Member of the United Nations Secretary-General's High Level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change, whose report A More Secure World: Our Shared Responsibility was published in December 2004
- Member of the Commission on Weapons of Mass Destruction, sponsored by Sweden and chaired by Hans Blix, which reported in June 2006
- Member of the International Task Force on Global Public Goods, sponsored by Sweden and France and chaired by Ernesto Zedillo, which reported in September 2006, and
- Member of the Commission of Eminent Persons on the Role of the IAEA to 2020 and Beyond, whose report Reinforcing the Global Nuclear Order for Peace and Prosperity was launched in June 2008
- Co-Chair (with former Japanese Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi) the Australia and Japan sponsored International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament (2008 - 2010). Its report Eliminating Nuclear Threats: A Practical Agenda for Global Policymakers, was published in December 2009
- Member of the UN Secretary-General's Advisory Committee on Genocide (current)
- Chair of the International Advisory Board of the Canberra-based Centre for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament (current)
- Convenor of the Asia-Pacific Leadership Network on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament (current) and
- Co-chair of the International Advisory Board of the Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect (current)
- Member of the Global Leadership Foundation, chaired by F W de Klerk (current)
- Member of the Aspen Atlantic Group, chaired by Madeleine Albright (current)
- Member of the Supervisory Council of the International Luxembourg Forum on Preventing Nuclear Catastrophe (current)
- Member of the International Council of the Asia Society (current)
- Member of the Advisory Council of the Independent Diplomat (current)
- Member of the International Advisory Board of the Asia-Pacific College of Diplomacy, Australian National University (current)
- Member of the jury of the Nuremberg International Human Rights Award (current), and
- Fellow of the Foreign Policy Association
- In June 2008 Gareth Evans was made an Inaugural Fellow of the Australian Institute of International Affairs, in recognition of his outstanding contribution to Australian international relations.
- Elected Honorary Fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford (May 2004)
- Member of the Editorial Advisory Board of the Cambridge Review of International Affairs
- Member of the International Advisory Board of the Leuven Centre for Global Studies; and
- Member of the International Board of Advisors of the International Peace and Security Institute affiliated with SAIS (John Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies).
Gareth Evans has written or edited thirteen books including:
- Cooperating for Peace: The Global Agenda for the 1990s (Allen & Unwin, 1993)
- Australia's Foreign Relations (Melbourne University Pess 1991, 2nd edn 1995; and
- The Responsibility to Protect: Ending Mass Atrocity Crimes Once and for All (Brookings Institution Press, September 2008, paperback edition 2009.
Inside the Hawke-Keating Government: A Cabinet Diary (Melbourne University Press, 2014)
Incorrigible Optimist: A Political Memoir (Melbourne University Press, 2017)
He has published around 150 chapters in books and journal articles (and many more newspaper and magazine articles) on foreign relations, politics, human rights and legal reform.