Biography
Dr Emilie McDonnell is an international lawyer and human rights advocate with expertise in international human rights law, refugee law and public international law. Her work focuses on advancing the human rights of people worldwide, particularly asylum seekers and migrants.
She is currently the Specialist Adviser in Immigration & OPCAT at the Australian Human Rights Commission. Prior to this, she worked at Human Rights Watch in London.
She is the author of Protecting the Right to Leave in an Era of Externalised Migration Control (Hart Publishing, 2026).
During her time at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar (2016-21), Emilie was awarded a Doctorate in Law on protecting the right to leave of asylum seekers, refugees and other migrants during externalised migration control, as well as an MPhil in Law and a Bachelor of Civil Law with Distinction. She also holds a Bachelor of Arts (Criminology) and a Bachelor of Laws with First Class Honours in Law from the University of Tasmania, and is a qualified Australian lawyer.
In 2013, she co-founded the Tasmanian Refugee Legal Service, where she served as a Director until 2016. She publishes regularly on human rights and refugee issues and has appeared in media outlets such as the BBC and Al Jazeera.
Emilie is an Adjunct Senior Researcher at the University of Tasmania School of Law, a Research Affiliate at the Refugee Law Initiative (RLI), a member of the RLI Externalisation Working Group and an Affiliate at the UNSW Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law. She has taught a range of subjects at both the University of Oxford and the University of Tasmania.