Barry Jones
Barry Jones was Minister for Science 1983-90 and is a Fellow of four of Australia’s five learned academies. His book “What is to be done” was published in 2020.
Barry's recent articles
27 December 2024
2024: a year of racism and lying to ourselves
Anthony Albanese appears to be strikingly lacking in ambition. I am convinced that making some bold decisions, and explaining them, would strengthen his prime ministership significantly. Some influential Australians now call for moderation and centrism. This would be a grave mistake. What is the centrist position on killing children in war zones, child sexual abuse, domestic violence, corruption, torture, the death penalty, cruelty to refugees?
21 March 2024
Podcast: Rifts in the art world over Gaza
Quentin Dempster interviews Australias living national treasure, Barry Jones, on the rifts in the Australian art world over Gaza, and the pathways away from violence and towards a political settlement in the Israel-Palestine conflict.
28 April 2023
Fulfilling human potential and saving the planet
Australia, and my Party too, must make a commitment to restoring the primacy of reason, rejecting a paranoid view of history and telling truth to power. Our blind adoption of irrational policies, supine and unquestioning acquiescence to anything the United States proposes must end. Our species, facing an existential threat to civilisation from climate change, is infinitely complex, infinitely precious, infinitely vulnerable, infinitely destructive, but also infinitely capable of the sublime and transcendent.
14 April 2023
Vale John Kerin: an authentic hero of our time
The first Hawke Cabinet has been described, correctly, as the most talented since Federation. As a Minister outside the Cabinet I could observe it closely.
25 March 2023
China and the AUKUS submarine deal: unanswered questions
The challenge of 2045 Australia will have access to American nuclear submarines in the early 2030s and by 2045 will have been building its own. But it is not clear what problem will be solved when Australian long-range nuclear submarines are able to traverse the northern Pacific.
7 February 2023
Pearls and Irritations comforts the afflicted and afflicts the comfortable
Pearls and Irritations comforts the afflicted and afflicts the comfortable.
27 January 2023
Australia Day: a long perspective from 65,000 BCE
Australian history does not read like history but like the most beautiful lies. Mark Twain, 1897
22 December 2022
2022-23 Christmas - New Year Message
Last year I wrote about my growing concerns about the democratic crisis which seemed to threaten liberal democracy and Enlightenment values, admittedly a Western construct. In 2022 the situation has improved remarkably in some areas. Boris Johnson and Scott Morrison have gone, Lula defeated Bolsonaro in Brazil, Macron was re-elected in France.
3 December 2022
The great political crossover: the concept of elections as sporting contests has finally broken down
Education levels and cultural affinities rather than income and economic security are becoming the major determinants of how people vote, and whether they define themselves as progressive or conservative.
26 May 2022
Vehicle or destination? Parties down, policy up
The major parties, with the possible exception of The Greens, are in serious, probably terminal, decline, with habitual supporters largely disengaged, with a third of voters moving in a new direction.
4 January 2022
Dear friends: a notable Australian thinker looks to a better 2022
This is an extract from the ninth Christmas, Hanukkah and New Year message of the former Labor MP, science minister and national president of the ALP.
24 November 2021
A unity ticket to challenge the integrity vacuum in Canberra
Two former political heavyweights from different sides have joined forces to combat the corruption and damaging inaction of the Morrison government.
28 September 2021
The democratic crisis: Whatever happened to courage, principle, commitment, accountability?
Australian democracy is under serious threat, and neither of the major parties have any vision beyond the next election. Only an active citizenry can prevent us sliding towards authoritarian or populist democracy.
7 August 2021
Barry Jones speech for the Monash Medal at the Rotary Club of Melbourne 4.8.2021
The soldiers had to have a representative hero who was a volunteer; he was acceptable to the community as a seemingly unpretentious outsider, not really part of the Establishment. His commanding intellect was sensed as well as his basic honesty and decency. He was one tall poppy who was never cut down.
28 April 2020
BARRY JONES. From COVID-19 to Climate Change? Hoping for a miracle.
Australia handled the COVID-19 pandemic exceptionally well. Our success gives us confidence that our political leaders and institutions are capable of addressing other serious issues, such as climate change, the refugee crisis, redefining work, and setting a high international standard.