Administrative justice theory and benchmarks in mandatory immigration detention: principled tensions or power imbalance?

ABSTRACT The controversial mandatory immigration detention framework in Australia restricts individual freedoms in the most fundamental way and warrants close scrutiny. This article takes a pre-formulated theory of administrative justice as a lens to consider law-making and decision-making in mandatory detention cases where people sought asylum in Australia without a valid visa. In so doing, the article takes novel steps beyond defining the concept of administrative justice to applying a comprehensive administrative justice theory to this particular Australian setting. It provides a basis for analysing the limitations of the mandatory detention framework from a normative legal perspective and highlights areas of concern that are ripe for reform in the delivery of administrative justice. The article proposes a set of normative benchmarks that are founded on four administrative justice themes: the proper exercise of power, equal treatment, due process, and accessibility. These immigration detention-specific benchmarks are drawn from domestic law and policy, international law and literature in public administration and human rights. The article then analyses overseer recommendations, law reform reports and scholarly material to reveal the extent to which immigration detention practices meet normative administrative justice values. The article analyses how power imbalances destabilise the principled tensions that should exist between administrative justice properties and the subsequent effect that such imbalances have on those subject to mandatory immigration detention. This article proves that administrative justice theory provides a suitable lens for normative analysis of a public law system and emphasises the need for principled tensions between administrative justice properties.