Enabling a rich cross-fertilization of experiences and discourses, this book addresses the legality of indefinite detention in various commonwealth countries, including Canada, Australia, and the UK. The issue has arisen where a government is frustrated in its inability to apply a removal order to a non-citizen subject and employs a power to detain him until removal. The cases raise fundamental questions about the nature and extent of immigration powers, the legal position of non-citizens, and counter-terrorism law and policy. More broadly, the judgments have become key reference points in discussions of constitutionalism, rights, and a range of contemporary issues in public law. The book analyzes the legal context, reasoning, and implications of the case law on indefinite detention. It argues that the law of each jurisdiction contains ample resources to support a ruling that indefinite detention is illegal. Taking into account variations in legal frameworks and doctrines, it demonstrates that a judge's response to indefinite detention is determined by his or her answer to the question of whether a non-citizen, who is subject to a removal order, retains a right to liberty. The book details how a judge's answer flows through his or her adjudication on the scope of the relevant exception to liberty.

(The thesis on which this book is based won the 2010 Marks Medal from the University of Toronto Law Faculty for the best graduate thesis.).