Quarterly Essay 80 The High Road


Book Description

Australia and New Zealand are often considered close cousins. But why, despite being so close, do we know so little about each other? And now, in the wake of COVID-19, is it time to change that? In this wise and illuminating essay, Laura Tingle looks at leadership, character and two nations in transition. In the past half-century, both countries have remade themselves amid shifting economic fortunes. New Zealand has been held up as a model for everything from privatisation to the conduct of politics to the response to COVID. Tingle considers how both countries have been governed, and the different way each has dealt with its colonial legacy. What could Australia learn from New Zealand? And New Zealand from Australia? This is a perceptive, often amusing introduction to two countries alike in some ways, but quite different in others. “Jacinda Ardern is not the first reason we have had to look across the Tasman and wonder whether there is another way of doing things . . . New Zealand – perhaps the only place in the world that has suffered isolation and the tyranny of distance more than Australia – has repeatedly jumped out of its comfort zone and changed direction harder, faster and for longer than Australia has done in the past half-century.” —Laura Tingle, The High Road




Globalisation in Transition


Book Description

This book brings together diverse ideas on selected facets of globalisation and transitions in globalisation. The scholars that have contributed to this book examine the phenomenon of globalisation through varied lenses, focusing specifically on the human and economic perspectives. These analyses originate in many areas and different legal systems but are all connected through the work of Professor John Farrar and the associations of the contributors with him. This book does not attempt to provide answers to the many challenges of globalisation. Instead, this book discusses selected, particular aspects of globalisation that derive from and are connected to the authors’ own research. The thematic diversity of this book is a true strength and should draw a broad range of readers. Whilst this book is primarily written from a legal angle, its content overlaps with broader specialised policy areas, with contributions ranging from taxation to ageing, from insolvency to social licences, and from refugees to the treatment of first nations people. In short, there is something for everyone in this book. As a tribute to the life’s work of an outstanding legal scholar, Professor John Farrar, this book explores legal responses to the social and economic impacts of globalisation. After personal acknowledgments from colleagues highlighting the significance of his scholarship, this book is divided into two parts. The first part addresses the social impact of globalisation, focusing on immigration and the impact on First Nations people. Changes in the regulation of medicine and technologies related to ageing are also addressed in this part. In part two, the book addresses the transitioning corporate law landscape and notions of fairness and good faith in the law. The final part contains the conclusions, reflections and synthesis of the editors.




History Wars


Book Description

‘In 1993, Manning Clark came under severe (posthumous) attack in the pages of Quadrant by none other than Peter Ryan, who had published five of the six volumes of Clark’s epic A History of Australia. In applying what he called “an overdue axe to a tall poppy”, Ryan lambasted the History as “an imposition on Australian credulity” and declared its author a fraud, both as a historian and a person. This unprecedented public assault by a publisher on his best-selling author was a sensation at the time and remains lodged in the public memory. In History Wars, Doug Munro forensically examines the right and wrongs of Ryan’s allegations, concluding that Clark was more sinned against than sinning and that Ryan repeatedly misrepresented the situation. More than just telling a story, Munro places the Ryan-Clark controversy within the context of Australia’s History Wars. This book is an illuminating saga of that ongoing contest.’ — James Curran, University of Sydney ‘The Ryan-Clark controversy … speaks to the place of Manning Clark in Australia’s national imagination. Had Ryan taken his axe to another historian, it’s unlikely that we would be still talking about it 30 years later. But Clark was the author and keeper of Australia’s national story, however imperfect his scholarship and however blinkered that story. Few, if any, historians in the Anglo-American world have occupied the space that Clark occupied by dint of will, force of personality, and felicity of pen.’ — Donald Wright, University of New Brunswick




Giving Future Generations a Voice


Book Description

This important book focuses on how newly emerging institutions for future generations can contribute to tackling large scale global environmental problems, such as threats to biodiversity and climate change. It is especially timely given the new global impetus for decarbonisation, as well as the huge growth of climate litigation and climate protest movements, often led by young people.




Not Waving, Drowning


Book Description

How can we mend Australia’s broken mental health system? Mental illness is the great isolator - and the great unifier. Almost half of us will suffer from it at some point in our lives; it affects everybody in one way or another. Yet today Australia's mental health system is under stress and not fit for purpose, and the pandemic is only making things worse. What is to be done? In this brilliant mix of portraiture and analysis, Sarah Krasnostein tells the stories of three women and their treatment by the state while at their most unwell. What do their experiences tell us about the likelihood of institutional and cultural change? Krasnostein argues that we live in a society that often punishes vulnerability, but shows we have the resources to mend a broken system. But do we have the will to do so, or must the patterns of the past persist into the future? "In our conception of government, and our willingness to fund it, we are closer to the Nordic countries than to America. However, we're trending towards the latter with a new story of Australia. The moral of this new story is freedom over equality, and one freedom above all - the freedom to be unbothered by others' needs. However, as we continue to saw ourselves off our perch, mental health might be the great unifier that climate change and the pandemic aren't." Sarah Krasnostein, Not Waving, Drowning This issue also contains correspondence discussing Quarterly Essay 84, The Reckoning, from Gina Rushton & Hannah Ryan, Amber Schultz, Malcolm Knox, Janet Albrechtsen, Kieran Pender, Sara Dowse, Nareen Young, and Jess Hill




In Search of Good Government


Book Description

Finalist, 2016 Walkley Award for Long Feature Writing With the politics of rage and resentment dominating many Western nations, including Australia, Laura Tingle's calm, perceptive analysis is more relevant than ever. What has happened to good government? Can Malcolm Turnbull apply the lessons of the past to put things right? When leaders surf the wave of discontentment all the way to power, how do they deal with our great expectations? In her crisp, profound and witty essays, Laura Tingle seeks answers to these questions. In Political Amnesia, she ranges from ancient Rome to the demoralised state of the once-great Australian public service, from the jingoism of the past to the tabloid scandals of the internet age. In Great Expectations, Tingle argues that governments can do less since deregulating the economy, but they still talk like they can do more, and we still expect them to do more – leading to anger, frustration and disengagement. In Search of Good Government also contains a major new essay that analyses Turnbull's leadership and brings the story up to date. 'This is precisely the kind of political journalism we don't get to see often enough.' Sydney Morning Herald




Quarterly Essay 60 Political Amnesia


Book Description

Whatever happened to good government? What are the signs of bad government? And can Malcolm Turnbull apply the lessons of the past in a very different world? In this crisp, profound and witty essay, Laura Tingle seeks answers to these questions. She ranges from ancient Rome to the demoralised state of the once-great Australian public service, from the jingoism of the past to the tabloid scandals of the internet age. Drawing on new interviews with key figures, she shows the long-term harm that has come from undermining the public sector as a repository of ideas and experience. She tracks the damage done when responsibility is 'contracted out,' and when politicians shut out or abuse their traditional sources of advice. This essay about the art of government is part defence, part lament. In Political Amnesia, Laura Tingle examines what has gone wrong with our politics, and how we might put things right. ‘There was plenty of speculation about whether Turnbull would repeat his mistakes as Opposition leader in the way he dealt with people. But there has not been quite so much about the more fundamental question of whether the revolving door of the prime ministership has much deeper causes than the personalities in Parliament House. Is the question whether Malcolm Turnbull – and those around him – can learn from history? Or is there a structural reason national politics has become so dysfunctional?’—Laura Tingle, Political Amnesia




Owls Do Cry


Book Description

First published in New Zealand in 1957, Owls Do Cry, was Janet Frame's second book and the first of her thirteen novels. Now approaching its 60th anniversary, it is securely a landmark in Frame's catalog and indeed a landmark of modernist literature. The novel spans twenty years in the Withers family, tracing Daphne's coming of age into a post–war New Zealand too narrow to know what to make of her. She is deemed mad, institutionalized, and made to undergo a risky lobotomy. Margaret Drabble calls Owls Do Cry "a song of survival"—it is Daphne's song of survival but also the author's: Frame was herself misdiagnosed with schizophrenia and scheduled for brain surgery. She was famously saved only when she won New Zealand's premier fiction prize. Frame was among the first major writers of the twentieth century to confront life in mental institutions and Owls Do Cry is important for this perspective. But it is equally valuable for its poetry, its incisive satire, and its acute social observations. A sensitively rendered portrait of childhood and adolescence and a testament to the power of imagination, this early novel is a first–rate example of Frame's powerful, lyric, and original prose.




Quarterly Essay 73 Australia Fair


Book Description

What do Australians want most from their next government? In this vivid, grounded, surprising essay, Rebecca Huntley listens to the people and hears a call for change. Too often we focus on the angry, reactionary minority. But, Huntley shows, there is also a large progressive centre. For some time, a clear majority have been saying they want action – on climate and energy, on housing and inequality, on corporate donations and the corruption of democracy. Would a Shorten Labor government rise to this challenge? What can be learnt from the failures of past governments? Was marriage equality just the beginning? In Australia Fair, Rebecca Huntley reveals the state of the nation and makes the case for democratic renewal – should the next government heed the call. “Often the claim is made that our politics and politicians are poll-driven. This is, on the whole, bunkum. If polls were influential, we would have invested much more in renewable energy, maintained and even increased funding to the ABC, and made child care cheaper. We may already have made changes to negative gearing and moved towards adopting elements of the Uluru Statement from the Heart. We would have taken up the first iteration of the Gonski education reforms. These are some of the issues where a democratic majority comes together, a basic agreement crossing party lines.” —Rebecca Huntley, Australia Fair Rebecca Huntley is one of Australia’s leading social researchers. From 2006 until 2015, she was the director of the Mind & Mood Report, Australia’s longest-running social trends report. She is now head of Vox Populi research. Her most recent book is Still Lucky. She presents The History Listen on ABC Radio National.




Australia Vs. New Zealand; Quarterly Essay 80


Book Description

Despite being so close in distance, why do Australia and New Zealand seem to know so little about each other? And is there such a thing as national character? In this wise and illuminating essay, Laura Tingle looks at leadership, economics, history and more. Competitiveness has marked our relationship from its earliest days. In the past half-century, both countries have been compelled to remake themselves amid shifting economic fortunes. New Zealand has been held up as a model for everything from tax reform to the way we conduct our politics. What have been the outcomes? How do they compare to ours? Tingle considers everything from Morrison and Ardern as national leaders to the different ways each country has dealt with its colonial legacy.




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