Legal journal articles and commentary provide analysis, critique, and interpretation of legal issues that are typically written by academics, judges, and legal practitioners.
They are useful for:
- Exploring current legal debates or reforms
- Understanding different perspectives on case law or legislation
- Finding references to key authorities (cases, statutes, academic writing)
Tips:
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Use legal commentary to support your arguments in essays and assignments.
- Articles may not always reflect the current law—cross-check with primary sources like legislation and case law.
- Use filters in databases to narrow by jurisdiction or topic.
Where to search
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Informit database collections This link opens in a new windowJournals and news published in Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific, on a range of topics including law, criminology, business and social sciences, many of which contain an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Subset (ATSIS).
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Westlaw Australia - Secondary sources This link opens in a new windowFrom the Secondary Sources homepage, select By Type: Reviews and Journals to browse or search the Australian Legal Journals Index (ALJI) and the Australian legal journals published by Thomson Reuters.
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Lexis+ Australian journals collection This link opens in a new windowBrowse or search the Australian legal journals published by LexisNexis.
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AustLII : Australasian Legal Information Institute This link opens in a new windowProvides full text searching of Commonwealth and NSW acts and regulations, federal and state court decisions, decisions of federal and some state administrative tribunals, and reports of the NSW Law Reform Commission. Also offers full text of the High Court of Australia bulletin.
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HeinOnline This link opens in a new windowFull-text and abstracting database of legal journals covering a range of jurisdictions and legal topics. Also contains an Index to foreign legal periodicals, US Congressional materials, and US and Canadian legislative materials.
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Westlaw International This link opens in a new windowFeatures case reports, legislation and law journals for Canada, the European Union, Hong Kong, Korea, United Kingdom and other jurisdictions.
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Oxford bibliographies in international relations This link opens in a new windowBrowse or search the curated bibliography of authoritative articles on a variety of international law topics, including foreign language articles.
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Criminal justice abstracts via EBSCO This link opens in a new windowComprehensive coverage of international journals, books, reports and more on criminology and related disciplines.
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Law review commonsSearch or browse the collection of Open Access law reviews and legal journals. Contains both current and archival content spanning over 100 years.
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