Writer
Allan Patience
Dr Allan Patience is an honorary fellow in political science in the University of Melbourne.
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Scott Morrison. Politics and Pentecostalism 101
Scott Morrison’s personal religion is entirely his own business. However, given recent public statements about his beliefs, by himself and in the media, it is legitimate to ask about Pentecostalism in Australia and its relationship, if any, to politics and politicians. Continue reading »
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PNG: the colony Australia tries to forget
Australia’s ham-handed history of colonialism, in what today is the independent state of Papua New Guinea, began in 1883 when Queensland pre-emptively annexed the southeastern corner (Papua) of the great island of New Guinea in the name of the British Crown. (The British were not amused). Continue reading »
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On the death of PNG’s first PM, Sir Michael Somare
The death of Sir Michael Somare, first Prime Minister of PNG, has occasioned an outpouring of national grief and heartfelt obituaries for “the Father of the Nation”, “the Chief”. That he was, and remains, widely respected, even loved, across the country is beyond dispute. However, it is disturbing that the posthumous record presently being confected Continue reading »
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America is a foreign county for Australians
Scott Morrison: “The great thing about the United States, it is a great democracy and it does have great institutions and we have a deep and wide relationship with the United States which is incredibly important to Australia. We are both like-minded and [a]like in so many ways – our values, our partnerships, economics, security Continue reading »
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Charlie Hebdo: free speech or provocation?
Terrible events in France – a teacher beheaded, stabbings of innocent bystanders, and the shooting of a Greek orthodox priest – are recent examples of a clash of cultural identity systems that remain stubbornly alien to each other. It appears that hopes for a cosmopolitan world in which cultures converse amicably and learn from each Continue reading »
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Charlie Hebdo: free speech or provocation?
Terrible events in France – a teacher beheaded, stabbings of innocent bystanders, and the shooting of a Greek orthodox priest – are recent examples of a clash of cultural identity systems that remain stubbornly alien to each other. Continue reading »
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The hyper-masculinised culture of the Australian economy
With eminent justification, feminists have long criticised the patriarchal structuring of the Australian economy. Yet women continue to hold only a tiny fraction of CEO positions, board memberships and senior management appointments across the country. Continue reading »
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Your ABC is turning into their ABC
The combined savagery of the Murdoch media, the jejune fogies in the Young Liberals, their fogy elders on the extreme right, as well as their urgers in reactionary organisations like the Institute of Public Affairs, is culminating in an unhappy deterioration in the ABC’s programming and in the quality of its presenters. Continue reading »
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COVID-19’s lessons for Australia’s post-pandemic governance
The notion that government is the problem not the solution for the political failures of the late twentieth century was the most devious and destructive attack on representative government, ever. It’s time to bring government back to centre stage. Continue reading »
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The politics of the coming generation.
ANU’s 2019 Australian Electoral Survey showed that among young people in Australia today there is “evidence of a growing divide between the voting behaviour of younger and older generations”. Continue reading »
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Frydenberg, the hollow man: Thatcher and Reagan’s political grandson.
It has never been clear what ethical principles guide Josh Frydenberg’s politics. He appears to be a hollow man, especially with his recent declaration that he will look to the economic policies of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Regan for inspiration to shape Australia’s economic future. Continue reading »
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Australia’s American dreaming is turning into a nightmare.
Since the signing of the ANZUS treaty in 1951, Australians have been living a dream that America shares their country’s cultural values, language and democratic institutions. They dream that they are safely cacooned in Tony Abbott’s beloved “anglosphere”, with the USA in the lead. As with all dreams, this fantasy has always had the flimsiest Continue reading »
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Dan Tehan, BA (Hons): Biting the educational hand that fed him
Someone recently observed that Education Minister Dan Tehan is “as dumb as Peter Dutton”. Tehan’s latest foray into higher education policy certainly puts him in the same class as Dutton as a hoary wielder of a sledgehammer when it comes to making public policy. Continue reading »
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It’s time to reform Australia’s higher education system.
The drying up of international student numbers because of the coronavirus border closures, plus the Coalition government’s indifference (indeed, hostility) to universities, is undermining morale right across the country’s higher education sector. Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE. Dealing with China.
Scott Morrison and Marise Payne’s call for an international “independent” inquiry into the Coronavirus pandemic demonstrates the ham fistedness of the Morrison government’s approach to diplomacy. Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE. The Future is global.
The closing of borders because of the coronavirus pandemic has inflamed opinion around the world that the era of globalisation is coming to an end. Governments are raising the sovereignty flag, hunkering down behind their borders. Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE. The coronavirus pandemic and the crisis of Australian federalism.
Despite the Prime Minister’s daily press conferences in which he fatuously tries (as is his wont) to reassure “all Australians” that they are “on the bridge to the other side” of the coronavirus pandemic, confusion and fear continue to stalk the land. Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE. The Leaderless Country
Australia has been leaderless since the federal election last May. Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE. The Flimflam man.
Amid the devastation of the bushfires and drought, what has become bleedingly obvious is that Australia is bereft of the leadership so urgently necessary at this time of national crisis. Morrison is the emperor without clothes, revealing his total lack of moral authority. Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE. The shonk from the shire.
Maybe Australians took to Scott Morrison during the election campaign for two main reasons: (1) He was not Bill Shorten; (2) He cunningly presented himself as an authentic bloke, a “daggy dad”, Mr Mainstream. There were no airs and graces. He was happy to be photographed goofily playing amateur soccer or wearing a baseball cap Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE. The ALP and the religious right in Australian politics
The religious right is casting a darkening cloud over Australia’s democracy. Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE. Schmoozing America, antagonising China
The Morrison government is cleaving ever more closely to the USA, asserting that the two countries have shared values and aligned interests. Meanwhile it has taken to lecturing China about human rights abuses and emphasising how the values of the Chinese Communist Party are anathema to Australia’s cultural values and democratic politics. Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE. Getting Morrison’s boot off Labor’s throat.
The Guardian’s political editor, Katherine Murphy, recently observed that Scott Morrison and his band of merry ministers were recklessly ignoring the most pressing policy issues while making a pretence of being in opposition. Labor, the Morrisettes insist, is responsible for all the country’s woes, giving the impression that somehow Labor is still in power. Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE. Re-imagining Australia’s higher education sector
Recently a report commissioned by Education Minister, Dan Tehan, recommended a tightening of the criteria by which any tertiary education institution can call itself a university. Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE. W(h)ither Labor?
The election loss in May devastated the ALP. The loss was made worse as the party realised that those voters who were heartily fed up with the shenanigans of the Liberal-National Coalition had nonetheless avoided turning to Labor. Since then, Labor MPs and the administrative machine of the party have been licking their wounds while Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE. Complacency is the opiate of the Australian masses.
So, QANTAS CEO Alan Joyce’s annual salary is now some $24 million dollars. This is over three hundred times the average Australian salary. Other CEOs are also being paid well into the tens of millions of dollars. Meanwhile the wages of the vast majority of Australian workers are flat-lining as the cost of living relentlessly Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE. American realism versus Australian independence.
During his recent visit to Australia, the American International Relations scholar, Professor John Mearsheimer, warned his Australian hosts that the United States superpower would not tolerate any serious deviation by Canberra away from the ANZUS alliance – for example, by aligning with China against the USA. He was echoing George W. Bush’s warning that “you’re Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE: What are Australia’s values?
There has been talk of late about Australia’s values which are said to parallel the values of related countries, especially America and Britain. Implied in this talk is a view that these values characterise civilised – even superior – nations, in contrast to certain countries in our region, especially China. However, precisely what constitutes Australia’s Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE. How to advance Australia.
In his important new book How to Defend Australia, Hugh White has placed before us a very clear picture of the contemporary security challenges now confronting Australia. First and foremost is China’s re-emergence as a (or maybe the) major power in the Western Pacific. This challenge for Australia is heightened by the Trump administration’s confusing Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE and GARRY WOODARD. Morrison as a middle power statesman?
In attempting to predict how Scott Morrison will develop as a foreign policy Prime Minister, the obstacles in his way should first be noted. While his potential authority within the party room is considerable, he lacks the foreign policy experience of previous Prime Ministers such as Menzies, Whitlam, Hawke and Rudd. Continue reading »