Communicative Justice and COVID-19: Australia’s Pandemic Response and International Guidance
Keywords:
progressive realisation of the right to health, immediate realisation of the right to linguistic non-discrimination, crisis translation, social inclusion, communications policy, effective communicationsAbstract
This article is driven by concerns over communicative justice and the author’s earlier research finding that only a patchy framework of laws and policies guides decision-making for Australian governments’ multilingual public communications. The article investigates the additional guiding role of international law, specifically the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and recent commentary by international organisations, alongside an original, empirical case study of Australian governments’ COVID-19 communications. In analysing the Australian case study in light of the international guidance, the article concludes that although Australian COVID-19 communications were available in a relatively high number of languages, they were characterised by inefficiencies and limited community input or strategic planning, leaving Australia arguably falling short of progressively realising its right-to-health obligations.
