February 12, 2019

CHRISTIAN SORACE. From the Outside Looking In: A Response to John Garnauts Primer on Ideology (Made in China, 7.2.2019)

An introduction by Mobo Gao,Chair of Chinese Studies, Department of Asian Studies, University of Adelaide.

The article below is a response by Christian Solace, an American academic, to a speech given at an internal Australian government seminar in August 2017 by the respected Australian journalist John Garnaut who was once an advisor to a former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull.

It has to be pointed out that Solace does not argue, in this response to the Garnaut speech, that we the West should not be critical of the CCP and the Chinese governance for their repressive policies and instances of abuses of human rights.

Instead, Solace wants to highlight several points that are important in relation to the discussion of China that increasingly sounds like a new Cold War: 1) ideology is not just a Chinese thing. The West and Garnaut himself are not free from their own ideology; 2) Mao was not Stalin, and Xi is not Mao. China was and is different from Russia and Xi is different from Mao; 3) China under Mao attempted an alternative to Western capitalism but failed and China now is actually not Communist but capitalist; and 4) China should be looked at historically and it has made progress towards liberty and human rights.

October 31, 2017

IAN VERRENDER. Productivity Commission pulls no punches on 'appalling' energy crisis, calls for carbon price

Basil Fawlty couldn’t have done it better.

Treasurer Scott Morrison last week stood at the lectern and delivered a thundering dissertation on the urgent need for cuts to company taxes.

August 1, 2019

STEPHEN S. ROACH. Chinas Long View (Project Syndicate 26.7.2019)

Time and again, the long view in China has stood in sharp contrast to Americas short-term approach. Sun Tzu put it best in his ancient treatise, The Art of War: If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the results of a hundred battles.

December 14, 2016

A transformational foreign policy

Some of Australia’s most experienced former foreign policy and defence bureaucrats have issued an open submission to the Foreign Minister calling on her to rethink the Australian-US alliance now that president-elect Donald Trump is set to lead the US.

January 3, 2018

PATRICK MCEACHERN. What is Kim Jong Un's intention with nuclear weapons?

Unlike his father and grandfather, Kim Jong Un began his reign as the top leader in North Korea with an unambiguous and tested first generation nuclear device. He showed early signs of doubling down on the nuclear program as fundamental to national security. Contrary voices publicly articulating the trade-offs associated with varying approaches to the nuclear issue observable during his fathers term evaporated under Kim Jong Un. His regime would be unified in word and deed at least publicly as it advanced its nuclear weapons capabilities. Though Kim Jong Uns North Korea oscillated between boisterous nuclear threats and relatively quiet nuclear development that included offers for diplomatic engagement on the nuclear issue, the nuclear program has continued to progress. This is not simply a quantitative growth of North Koreas nuclear arsenal, rather Kim Jong Un has articulated and his regime has pursued a more advanced nuclear deterrent.

October 9, 2019

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 trying to work out what went so horribly wrong.

June 29, 2018

TIM BUCKLEY. India is bringing the coal era to an end.

On Tuesday last week, Tony Abbott, Australias ex-prime minister, was photographed in parliament clutching a document entitled, the Coal era is not over.

March 8, 2018

BILL ROWLINGS. Pilgrim passages, tatters returns.

Open and transparent could scarcely be claimed as the style of Australian executive and bureaucratic rule. But even by our poor standards, the saga of the Office of the Information Commissioner has been a disaster of huge proportions.

December 19, 2017

KIM OATES. The Royal Commission, a beginning, not an end.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse is testament to both the evil in our society and to the courage and determination of many of the victims. But we need to be aware that most child sexual abuse occurs in places other than churches and institutions.

January 20, 2019

DUNCAN GRAHAM When sinking looms, jump.

Imagine if almost six per cent of the Coalition reckoned theyd lose their seats at the next election so switch to Labor.

Chances are they wouldnt be piped aboard, as ship jumpers are not favoured in Australian politics, distrusted by the party they betrayed and the one where they seek to stowaway.

December 26, 2017

RICHARD BUTLER. 2018: La Commedia Continua?

Two new basic policy statements by Canberra and Washington offer no hope for a constructive engagement of either in finding multilateral solutions to major political and humanitarian problems.

September 2, 2019

ANDREW GLIKSON. The global significance of the Amazon and Siberian fires

As fires rage across tens of thousands of square kilometers of the Amazon forest, dubbed the Planets lungs as it produces some 20 percent of the oxygen in the atmosphere, some 72,843 fires are burning in Brazil this year. Fires on a large scale including through Siberia, Alaska, Greenland,southern Europe and elsewhere, herald a world where increasing temperatures and droughts overwhelm original habitats, flora and fauna.

December 16, 2018

LOUISA GUNNING. Why we shouldnt blame the students.

In the past year or so, I have been made painfully aware of poor NAPLAN results among high school students as a student who just finished my last NAPLAN exam last year. Many of the articles I have seen seem to have a common thread: Students have stopped trying. And to be frank, I can tell you that we have no reason or time to care, not among our preoccupation with countless other assessments.

March 5, 2018

MUNGO MacCALLUM. Adani.

Bill Shorten has finally taken a firm position on the Adani coal mine: procrastination.

January 3, 2017

RAMESH THAKUR. AHRC President Gillian Triggs: a year of living dangerously. Part 3 of 3.

In hearings before a Senate estimates committee on 18 October, Triggs said her interview had been inaccurately reported, with quotes taken out of context and even fabricated. When the papers editor replied they held an audio recording of the interview, Triggs acknowledged that the article was an accurate excerpt.

December 23, 2019

Politics determines ICC investigation of Israeli war crimes

After five years of procrastination, the International Criminal Court’s prosecutor has announced an investigation into alleged Israeli war crimes in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip. From Palestinians’ perspectives that may sound encouraging, but the rules of international law will be no match for politicians’ fascination with violence as the way to govern.

October 30, 2019

TIM COSTELLO. Crown- a private company masquerading as a public one that is above the law?

The annual Crown Resorts AGM last week should have been a moment for admission to shareholders by the Board that they were in trouble and a moment toreassure investors that they had strategies to address a burning platform. Instead, they blamed everyone but themselves.

October 28, 2018

MUNGO MacCALLUM. Welcome to the hung parliament.

Welcome to the hung parliament. A disaster, according to our PR obsessed prime minister instability and chaos, But for ordinary Australians it might not be so bad.

March 28, 2019

MIKE SCRAFTON. The Golan Heights: Whose rules?

President Trump has recognised the 1981 Israeli annexation of the Golan Heights. Whatever Trumps motivesgenuine concern for Israels security, geostrategic positioning in the struggle against Iran, fulfilling a divine mission, or domestic politicshis act raises important geopolitical issues and questions of international law. Trumps move should force the Australian government to revisit its prioritisation of defence of the rules-based global order in its foreign and defence polices.

November 28, 2017

LYN GILBERT. Healthcare-associated infections are important and often avoidable.

Hospital, where you go to get better, can have the opposite effect and high on the list of hazards is infection acquired while there. Progress has occurred but more needs to be done. IT opens up great possibilities for scaling mountains of data that could improve patient welfare and save wasted money.

November 28, 2015

Joanna Thyer. When we are not sure, we are alive.

What do Pope Francis, Thomas Merton and Graham Greene have in common?

Like Pope Francis, Thomas Merton and Graham Greene were individuals whose sheer complexity equipped them to address the often contradictory world we live in, in order to find God in it.

The writer and Trappist monk Thomas Merton, the famous British writer, Graham Greene, and our current pope, Pope Francis, have a lot in common. Merton died in 1968 from accidental electrocution whilst touring in Thailand, and Greene died peacefully in 1991. Both men were converts to Catholicism. Like Pope Francis, Merton engaged in interfaith dialogue. What these three men have in common, however, is that their works reveal them to be visionaries and mystics with a faith message for the world, a message that does not shy away from naming and engaging with the darkness around us.

October 1, 2018

GERALDINE DOOGUE, AMY DONALDSON. Bill Hayden explains why he decided to be baptised.

Apart from being Australia’s second longest-serving governor-general and introducing the first version of Medicare, Bill Hayden is probably best known for being a vocal and even hostile atheist.

January 30, 2018

ROGER SCOTT. Postscript on Australian universities: 'are we near the Kodak moment'? Part 3

In March 2017, under a headline Digital disruption lowers costs of pricy masters degrees the Australian Financial Review reported:

A round of price-cutting has broken out in the market for high-priced masters degrees with four Australian universities offering students a pathway to complete part of their degree online at a steep discount. [Tim Dodd, AFR 18 March 2017]

Are we near the Kodak moment for Australian universities?

April 8, 2019

JIM STANDFORD. Wages: Oops, They Did It Again! (The Australia Institute)

You would think that after 5 consecutive years of wage forecasts that wildly overestimated actual experience, the government might have learned from its past errors and published a wage forecast more in line with reality. But not this government.

April 12, 2018

TIM SOUTPHOMMASANE. Australian business and other organisations persistently fall short on cultural diversity.

Australia is widely celebrated as a multicultural triumph, but any such success remains incomplete. There remains significant under-representation of cultural diversity in the senior leadership of Australian organisations. Our society does not yet appear to be making the most of its diverse talents.

February 1, 2018

RICHARD BUTLER. The State of the Union: Pantomime, With Menaces

Trumps State of the Union speech was filled with menaces to enemies both foreign and domestic. US policy is now comprehensively militarized and in the hands of Trumps Generals. It was a dangerous pantomime, with much cheering from Republicans who still seem to hope that no one will notice the Faustian bargain they have done with Trump and militarism.

August 9, 2018

Catholic bishops opposition to Donald Trump emboldens church liberals.

They may be disappointed.

November 19, 2018

GEOFF DAVIES. Lest We Also Forget.

The women who tried to stop the slaughter; the vibrant young nation crushed; that a nations soul cannot be sponsored by arms manufacturers; the Australian war.

October 28, 2019

JOHN MENADUE. The National Party has deserted country people on Climate Change, NBN, Health Services and more.

The Nationals have a serious problem. It is not just a problem of Michael McCormack’s beige leadership and being pushed aside by Scott Morrison on key country issues like the drought. It has failed on numerous policy fronts.

October 7, 2018

TIM COSTELLO. The Alan Jones-Opera House row proves Sydney is in thrall to the gambling industry (the Guardian, 07.10.18)

Is this the tipping point? Will we one day look back and thank Alan Jones for drawing attention to the disgrace that is Sydneys capture by the gambling industry with his nasty hectoring of Opera House CEO Louise Herron?

May 11, 2020

CHRIS GERAGHTY. Pell Again

Dear George,

More bad news. When will it cease?

December 10, 2017

RICHARD BUTLER. Jerusalem: US Foreign Policy begins at home.

In fulfilling a campaign promise made to what he discerned to be an important part of his base, Christian evangelicals and Jewish Americans, that is, to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, Trump has: trashed all prior iterations of US policy; taken a position opposed by every other nation, except Israel; and, sunk all existing frameworks for a resolution of the Israel/Palestine problem. He was motivated by domestic political concerns but also by the growing US alignment with Saudi Arabia in the current power struggle in the Middle East.

June 22, 2019

PETER SAINSBURY. Sunday environmental round up, 23 June 2019

Poor planning seems to be endemic in the gas industry. Despite clear evidence that gas is not low in emissions, not needed for grid reliability, not a viable transition fuel and not cheap, governments and gas producers continue to peddle the myths and develop more gas production facilities. Michael Mann argues that system-wide changes, not personal behaviour changes, are required to avoid catastrophic global warming, and graphic evidence that renewables are increasing in parallel with fossil fuels, not replacing them. But first a good news story about eagles.

February 17, 2019

ABUL RIZVI. Questions for Dutton on his record border protection failure.

The mainstream media (other than The Australian, The Daily Telegraph, Herald-Sun, Daily Mail, Sky News After Dark, Alan Jones, Ray Hadley and their ilk who usually obsess about border protection) has at last picked up on Duttons failure to secure our borders. Dutton now holds the record as the Immigration Minister under whom Australia received the largest number of non-genuine asylum applications (see here and here). It is time now to ask Dutton more detailed questions on what he has done about this over the last three years and what he will now do given he has failed to stem the surge?

March 25, 2018

JENNY HOCKING. Archival Manoeuvres in the Dark

This months federal court ruling that the Palace letters, between the Queen and the Governor-General at the time of the Whitlam dismissal, are personal and not subject to the Archives Act means that this historic correspondence will remain under lock and key in the National Archives and embargoed on the instructions of the Queen, potentially indefinitely.

February 12, 2019

SHEILA A. SMITH. US policy in Asia heads from bad to worse.

If the past year is any indication of the year ahead, US policy in Asia will be erratic and self-serving. The beginnings of anIndo-Pacific strategynotwithstanding, the Trump administration continues to work out its issues with countries in the region bilaterally and sporadically.

December 28, 2018

ABUL RIZVI. The Best of 2018: Scott Morrisons Record on Immigration.

While Scott Morrison earlier this year publicly disagreed with Tony Abbott on immigration levels, he eventually gave way to Duttons ruse about greater scrutiny leading to the migration program ceiling not being delivered in 2017-18. Will he continue to compromise with Abbott and Dutton on immigration or has he drawn a line in the sand by appointing a moderate in David Coleman as the new immigration minister?

December 16, 2018

NILE BOWIE. 1MDB dragnet closes in on Najib, Goldman Sachs (Asian Times, 14.12.18)

Legal wheels are turning fast in Malaysia and US to jail the ex-premier and hold the American investment bank responsible for money laundering and fraud worth billions of dollars

May 29, 2020

DANG CAM TU.The Virus and Regional Order: Perspectives from Asia and beyond .

A self-help state is back, and nationalism, populism, xenophobia, trade, and territorial disputes are on the rise.

June 10, 2018

ABHISHEK MOHANTY. Renaming the US Pacific Command: Why Indo-Pacific?

In a pivotal move projecting a new set of national interests, US Defence Secretary Jim Mattis, barely a day before the Shangri La Dialoguebegan, announced that the US Pacific Command will now be called the US Indo-Pacific Command. The name change, seen by observers as a tactical move against Chinese military and economic hegemony in the region, is just symbolic for now, as it wont immediately result in any major alterations to the commands maritime boundaries or assets in the huge area spanning from East Africa to Americas Pacific coast.

April 6, 2019

PETER SAINSBURY. Sunday environmental round up, 7 April 2019

The diverse responses of Australian businesses to climate change and the legal responsibilities of their boards to respond appropriately to climate change are highlighted and lead into a discussion about whether capitalism, as an economic system, has the capacity to deliver a carbon free society. More parochially, the Great Barrier Reef is not doing well after the bleaching events of 2016 and 2017 but better methods of eliminating feral cats and the discovery of several colonies of Night Parrots provide some good news.

August 4, 2016

JOHN MENADUE. Democratic renewal.

Vested interests and the subversion of the public interest.

There are many key public issues that we must address such as climate change, growing inequality, tax avoidance, budget repair, an ageing population, lifting our productivity and our treatment of asylum seekers.

But our capacity to address these and other important issues is becoming very difficult because of the power of vested interests with their lobbying power to influence governments in a quite disproportionate way.

November 26, 2019

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 Actionto certain favoured recipients. Any efforts it might have made on climate change mitigation were completely derailed by Tony Abbott when he became prime minister and his extreme denialist attitude continues to the present day.

November 21, 2019

ALI KAZAK. The UN exposes Australia's shameful votes on the Israeli occupation.

The UN General Assemblys decolonization committee, which includes all 193 member states, on Friday 15th November 2019 adopted eight resolutions condemning Israels occupation and violations against the Palestinians, its repressive measures against Syrian citizens in the Golan Heights, renewed the mandate of the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), and renewed the mandate of a UN special committee to investigate Israeli practices affecting the human rights of the Palestinian people. Australia unlike all European countries, New Zealand and the overwhelming countries around the world, supported only one resolution, opposed two and abstained on five. Below are the votes and the resolutions.

May 15, 2019

ANDREW JAKUBOWICZ. Election 2019: finally, the beginning of the end of White Australia?

Somewhere along the road to May 18, the Australian media discovered multicultural Australia, and began to sense its import and influence. Journalists who could speak Putonghua or track threads through WeChat, or tap away on one of the many desi social media, suddenly found they were in demand. Names never before seen on by-lines suddenly were paired with the old guard Euro-Australian reporters.

February 13, 2018

Nuclear portents mount while Rome burns

The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything save our modes of thinking and thus we drift toward unparalleled catastrophe. (Albert Einstein May 1946).

February 25, 2018

ANDREW FARRAN. Brexit: How to get it done!

According to a leaked Treasury document, which the Remainers claim was fiddled, the UK would be worse off in any alternative trading arrangement to the present - varying from two to eight percent of GDP over the next 15 years; and that none of the possible third country alternatives, including with the US and Australia, taken cumulatively, could be expected to make up for those reductions. What outcome might ameliorate these losses the most?

January 26, 2018

KIM WINGEREI. Book review of "Churchill and Orwell: The Fight for Freedom" by Thomas E. Hicks, Pulitzer Prize winner.

At first glance they may seem like an odd couple, but their influence on the seminal events and the thinking of the 20th century is equally profound. Winston Churchill defined and led the resistance against the tyranny of Adolf Hitler; George Orwell understood and explained the nature of totalitarian regimes. They were both men who were prepared to change themselves in order to change the world.

Pulitzer Prize winner Thomas E. Ricks has written an insightful account of these two men whose paths never crossed and came from opposite ends of society and ideology. The book focuses on their life and deeds from the late thirties until after the Second World War. Ricks does not eulogise either man, he recognises their flaws and earlier failures, yet puts them both in the historic perspective that they deserve.

August 1, 2019

BINOY KAMPMARK. Militarizing Australia: Talisman Sabre and the US Military Build Up (American Herald Tribune)

Deemed the Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations strategy, the military method is a US Marine special, still spanking new, featuring the amphibious landing of troops on islands for seizure and capture as part of a forward projection of sea and air power aimed at the mainland.

Pearls and Irritations

John Menadue's Public Policy Journal