Writer
Greg Bailey
Greg Bailey is Honorary Research Fellow in Asian Studies, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, La Trobe University.
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Tunnel vision: the media’s love affair with Craig Kelly and conflict
The media’s focus on divisive figures like Craig Kelly simply excuses the equally dangerous views of his less vocal, climate change denying colleagues. It is on these politicians that the media should focus…. Continue reading »
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2020 and beyond. Comeback, but to what?
Scott Morrison’s government has been spruiking its life and economy saving program named Comeback on television and digital platforms. This means comeback from the unexpected changes imposed on individuals and the economy in 2020 by the COVID virus. But comeback to what?… Continue reading »
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COVID 19 and Victoria: responsibility in Australian politics – Part 2
The COVID epidemic has laid bare many of the stresses that have been building up in Australian society, polity and economy over the past four decades…. Continue reading »
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COVID 19 and the transformation of Victoria – Part 1
As Melbournians waited with bated and unbated breath for the announcement last Sunday about relief from the Stage Four lockdown, the pressure that has been increasing dramatically for the past month has eased. Will a new normal be reached?… Continue reading »
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Lobby Land. Influencers or influenced?
Who lobbies the lobbyists? Not the voting public, not the politicians who are part of the reception and creation of knowledge which is the raison d’être of lobbyists, consultants, public relations firms and government relations officers in the large corporations. Only a few journalists like Michael West, the Grattan Institute and journals like P &… Continue reading »
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The IPA, Tim Wilson, human rights and influence
That Tim Wilson used his Human Rights Commission email account for political purposes when he became the Human Rights Commissioner may seem trivial or “utterly irrelevant” as he calls it. Yet surely it risked compromising the independence of the Commission and represents a new form of politicization of the public service…. Continue reading »
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Australia and the USA as ambiguous mirror images (Part 2 of 2)
If Australian governments over the past three decades have been unrepentant in intensifying our alliance with the USA it is because many conceive us of having identical interests rather than just as having identical values? But does the identity of interests arise from a perception of identical values and historical development?… Continue reading »
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Australia and the USA as ambiguous mirror images (Part 1 of 2)
Australian governments still cling like a lichen to the USA in foreign policy, neoliberal values, a bi-polar view of the world (China vs. freedom) and so-call democratic values. But is Australia as close to the culture (s) of the USA as seems to be uncritically accepted and are these values really those which some believe… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. COVID-19 and Tax Havens
Now that three governments in the EU have announced that during the COVID-19 crisis they will give no government funding to companies registered in tax havens, we wait to see if this prohibition is continued after the crisis is over. Will it be extended to countries beyond the EU, especially those in the Anglo-Celtic sphere?… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. Covid-19 and personal liberty.
It has been many years since Australians experienced a crisis like the present one where all paradigms have been turned upside down. The social implications of the need for physical isolation are immense and the economic costs, both personal and national, are equally significant…. Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. Predictability, Society and the COVID 19 Virus
The economic stimulus must adopt a whole of society approach, focusing on those of lower income, of a kind that it has consistently refused to do. If it does this and, above all, can be seen to be doing it, then Australia may emerge out of this crisis as a better country than it was… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. On Values, Australia Day and Community Resilience
The Age of 26/1/20 published on a single page, under the title Comment, lengthy statements by the Prime Minister and the Opposition leader, both accompanied by pictures that could be described as entirely neutral. Any illumination of either statement regarding what the future policies of either party might be was largely doomed to darkness, as… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. Climate Change Politics in Theory and Practice (3). The Liberal National Party
It is really the LNP government over the last six years that should have been making the run on climate change mitigation, but it has done nothing apart from giving handouts-Direct Action–to certain favoured recipients. Any efforts it might have made on climate change mitigation were completely derailed by Tony Abbott when he became prime… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. Climate Change Politics in Theory and Practice (2). The ALP
Arguably the ALP since its election loss in 2013 has not been able to legislate for climate change mitigation though it was able to make some contribution when the National Energy Guarantee was proposed in 2017–only to be defeated by the right of the LNP. However, It had played a significant role in its genesis,… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. Climate Change Politics in Theory and Practice (1).
Given the centrality of the problem of an emerging climate catastrophe in the consciousness of many Australians now, it is timely to canvas the progress of the two main parties in conceptualizing and dealing with climate change. Not just because of what they might or might not have done in the past, but because of… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. The New South Wales Fires, the National Party and Climate Change. PART 1
In responding on Monday to the severity of the NSW and QLD fires two senior NP politicians made statements attacking the Greens in a manner that was most intemperate and which has attracted almost universal criticism? But was their underlying motivation genuine concern for those affected by these predictable fires, or a desperate attempt to… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. The New South Wales Fires, the National Party and Climate Change. PART 2
The intemperate language used by McCormack and Joyce points to the Nationals’ own desperation about their constituency. Equally it has given an opportunity to the prime minister to appear statesman-like and the ALP to remain silent. Both illustrate how politicians regard the attention span of the electorate in regard to worsening environmental conditions…. Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. For A New Enlightenment
It has been pointed out numerous times that neoliberalism, the prevailing orthodoxy of governance, grew off the carcass of neo-classical economics. That this intellectual paradigm has failed is obvious to most people except for politicians in the Anglo-Saxon world and the EU. A new paradigm that brings together rigorous rationalistic thinking based on empirical evidence… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. Lobbyists, corruption and neoliberalism
The revelations surrounding the fast tracking of visas for Chinese high rollers coming to Crown Casino and betting gargantuan amounts of money have been extensively covered over the last week in the media. Corruption there certainly seems to be and not a little incipient anti-Chinese sentiment in sheeting this back mainly to wealthy Chinese gamblers…. Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY: Christopher Pyne: Consultancy as government
The sudden elevation of Christopher Pyne – formerly Minister for Defence Industries – to defence consultant with Ernst & Young may have taken some people by surprise. Surely, though, it was always on the cards, especially since he retired from parliament at a relatively young age of fifty-one and with a pre-election likelihood of not… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. The Australian Electorate and the ‘Sensible Centre.’
Now that the grieving over the electoral loss of progressive political forces is beginning to be transformed into sustained soul searching about the characteristics of the Australian electorate and the tactic used by the ALP, it is time to ask whether the ALP could have won given the forces rallied against them. In truth the… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. Problematic Trends Emerging from the 2019 Federal Election.
Irrespective of who finally wins Saturday’s election-and it looks like the ultra-conservative forces–, certain deeply disturbing observations can be made about the state of the Australian polity and the electorate. These evoke cultural and regional fissures long existing in Australia and an apparent shift away from any kind of critical thinking in making political and… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. Reflections on Five Years of Political Theatre and Nihilism (Part 2)
For the last three decades the Australian public has been told there will be massive changes which they will have to run with or just suck it up. Now, after five and a half years of floundering and negativism by the government, the people are waking up to what these changes have produced. Such changes… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. Reflections on Five Years of Political Theatre and Nihilism (Part 1)
Retrospective reflections are now beginning on what might be the heritage of the five and a half year long Abbott, Turnbull and Morrison governments. In advancing such reflections attention should not just be focussed on the political infighting within the government, and between it and the opposition. Consideration should also be given to what has… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. An oldie at the climate march.
After travelling for an hour from outside of Melbourne, I reached the Treasury Gardens at about 12.05pm to concerted cheering from thousands of young voices. On the train teenage boys and girls from various local high schools in the northeast suburbs of Melbourne were working on signs they had made from pieces of cardboard, and… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. The Coal Wars. Where next?
In writing on this subject I was initially going to focus on the manner in which a lobbying company funded by Glencore had undertaken a marketing campaign in support of coal and to plant doubts about the capacity of renewable energy to substitute for coal. If this might have represented the beginnings of a conflict… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. The Liberal National Party, the Baby-boomers and the quest for victory in the May Election.
If, as seems likely from the polls, the ALP wins the next federal election it will not be through the failure of the LNP to throw up a massive scare campaign. Conservative parties ranging from the medium to the far right adopt lowest common denominator strategies to foment an underlying sense of fear that seems… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. State Labor Triumphs and Fear Campaigns Wilt
On Monday morning two days after the Victorian state election the ALP had 51 seats, the LNC 24, the Greens 1, other independents 1, with 11 still in doubt, but the outcome of which will not affect the Labor Party’s massive majority. No doubt there will be considerable speculation as to the causes of this… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. Is the instability in Australian politics reflected in the society and economy?
Australia has had six Prime Ministers since 2008, with the likelihood of a seventh in May 2019. Is this an index of instability in Australian politics and society, one perhaps marked also by the massive swing in last Saturday’s Wentworth by-election? Is this instability a consequence of the emergence of a series of extremely ambitious,… Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. On Lobbyists And the System That Sustains Them.
Lobbyists are increasingly being recognized as a blight on the political landscape and as one of the negative forces in the progressive weakening of democratic processes in government. That they have come to form a distinct component in creating and distorting policy, indeed in creating politics almost as a “privatized sphere” is now become incontestable…. Continue reading »
