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The Greens challenge the Australian two-party system by promoting an alternative political agenda and by facilitating democratic processes. Their recent successes in federal and state elections suggest that the party itself deserves closer scrutiny. This paper shows how the Greens are organisationally different from other parties currently active in Australian politics due to both their internal processes and their parliamentary practices. Recent theories of parties argue that party organisation has changed significantly for major parties, adopting an electoral-professional or cartel model that centralises power and decision-making in party representatives within parliaments. This paper shows how a smaller party uses identity formation processes to establish a distinctive organisational style. We examine the Greens' party organisation by analysing the interdependent relationships between the party membership, the state and national offices, and Green MPs. The paper is based on original research including in-depth interviews undertaken with state and federal Greens members of parliaments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Trade Practices Act 1965 was widely criticised as being weak and unproductive. It was a significantly watered-down version of the original Bill overseen by Garfield Barwick. Although the final form of the Act was perceived as ineffective at the time, it is now viewed as an important step towards a national competition policy and a precursor to the opening up of the Australian economy. This paper outlines the economic, political and social background to the introduction of the legislation. We specify some of the factors that explain why its creation caused controversy and its importance in initiating change in Australians' attitudes towards collusive behaviour and economic protectionism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article considers the way in which recent commentators have represented Australia's relationship with Antarctica including current and future challenges. While successive Australian governments from the 1950s onwards have sought inter alia to develop and protect the country's southern oceanic and Antarctic interests, concern has persisted about the activities of other parties. The signing of the 1959 Antarctic Treaty helped to ensure that the territorial status quo prevailed with regard to the Australian Antarctic Territory. The entry of the United Nations Law of the Sea Convention (UNCLOS) into force in 1994 created new opportunities for further expressions of sovereign rights in this region. While mindful of the evolving legal geographies affecting Antarctica, our paper asks a series of questions about this relationship with the far south: how has Australian national identity been informed and influenced by Antarctic engagements? Will UNCLOS actually weaken the Antarctic Treaty System? Finally, do contemporary Australian pronouncements on the Antarctic hint at anxieties reminiscent of the 1950s? We conclude with a warning that nationalistic evocations may well unsettle a delicate balance concerning the Southern Ocean and disputed ownership of Antarctica. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the implications of high levels of informal (or invalid) voting in Australian national elections using a social exclusion framework. The rate of the informal vote is an indicator of social and political exclusion with particular groups of Australians experiencing inordinate electoral disadvantage. Poorer voters, voters from non-English speaking backgrounds and those with low education levels are especially disadvantaged by factors peculiar to the Australian voting experience. We begin by exploring the character and pattern of informal voting and then canvass the technical and socio-economic factors which explain it. We conclude by considering proposed options for reducing informality, some of which are: the abandonment of compulsory voting, major structural change to the voting system as well as ballot re-design, electoral education and community information initiatives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the most widely-endorsed norms in Australian politics is the requirement for bipartisanship in the management of defence and security policy. This norm is assumed to lead to good policy creation, foster political unity, and protect those who implement national policy (particularly the military). The paper argues that evidence for all three of these claims is overstated. In addition, the effects of the norm are often counter-productive and even harmful to the conduct and management of Australian policy. The paper concludes by arguing that the norm of bipartisanship for Australian defence and security policy should be abandoned. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2010, Australia finally introduced maternity leave, making it one of the last OECD nations to do so. Yet this policy had been announced by the Keating Government some sixteen years earlier, only to be watered down and then ultimately scuppered by subsequent governments. How, then, do we make sense of the rise and fall of this policy in the 1990s? This paper examines this question, arguing that while effective mobilisation by women in the labour movement was crucial to placing this issue on the Keating Government's policy agenda, the continued dominance of a male breadwinner model ultimately served to provide powerful impediments to policy implementation. The paper draws on interviews with key actors and analysis of policy debate to make this case, employing the concepts of policy windows and path dependency to make sense of the opportunities and impediments to policy change respectively. While an important and neglected story of maternity leave policy in Australia, this analysis has important implications for understanding policy-making, policy trajectory and even gender roles in Australian politics and society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the politics of telecommunications reform between 1967 and 1972, during which time Labor developed a new policy approach that included committing to reconstitute the Postmaster-General's Department as a relatively independent statutory authority. This represented the first serious attempt to reconcile the conflicting objectives of Australian policy: to provide affordable universal services by a government department expected to operate as a 'business-like' enterprise, and ended the political consensus about how national telecommunications should be delivered. The paper contrasts Labor's policy with the Liberal-Country government's more incremental approach; and highlights a significant public policy shift that has received insufficient attention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In contrast to some other jurisdictions, in Australia, governments relying on minor parties and independents to enact policies and especially to hold power, are readily characterised by oppositions and commentators as unstable, even chaotic and an undesirable deviation from the stability of majority parliaments. The almost unremarked exception is the Liberals' long and frequent reliance on the National Party and its predecessors to form government. This paper explores the role of the National Party in minority Coalition governments and considers why this form of minority government attracts so little comment, noting the inter-party and intra-party systems and strategies that give the appearance of stability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Australia's main parties have experienced rapid deterioration in levels of membership but most have been reluctant to follow the lead of many of their counterparts in Western Europe and embrace more radical, inclusive pre-selection formats to arrest declining numbers. This paper offers a partial explanation of why the Liberal and Labor parties have been disinclined to look to reforming candidate selection as a strategy to combat their shrinking rank-and-file membership. It argues that compulsory voting in conjunction with high levels of party identification has reduced the imperative for Australia's major parties to resort to candidate selection reform as a device to stabilise their voter base. This study underscores the important role of the institutional setting in affecting the incentives for parties to use pre-selection reform to combat a shrinking membership base. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Northern Australia Development Committee (NADC) was established in late 1945 to coordinate the efforts of the Commonwealth, Queensland and Western Australian governments in developing the north of the continent. At the outset, defence considerations were uppermost. However, the NADC soon became entangled in disputes among Commonwealth departments and personalities over the relevance of northern development to national defence. Some - notably the Department of Defence - insisted that northern Australia no longer possessed special strategic significance. Others - notably the Department of External Affairs - argued that northern development must be conceived within a broader geo-political context. This paper examines the NADC's entanglement in these disputes, and explains how this entanglement contributed crucially to the committee's ineffectualness and early demise. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Anti-Americanism, sometimes called the 'last acceptable prejudice', is a common phenomenon in the modern era. This paper explores the ebb and flow of anti-Americanism in the Australian Labor Party in the post-Second World War period and argues that while at times it was reasonable or proportionate, at others such criticism became unreasonable, disproportionate and therefore prejudicial. When this occurs the Australia-US alliance can become strained, the Australian electorate tends to become sceptical of the ALP's credentials on national security and the party's electoral prospects also tend to suffer. Nevertheless, following the brief leadership of the stridently anti-American Mark Latham, such sentiment in the ALP has been widely discredited and is unlikely to emerge again in its prejudicial form for some time, marking the end of an era. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The political potency of national history has been understood for generations. Yet there has been an unquestionable surge in history's political influence over the last twenty or thirty years, as the various history wars that have broken out around the world attest. Australia has been no exception: disputes over its national story continue to generate considerable controversy in the media, in politics and in public debate. But how has this politicisation of the past affected Australian political history in the present? This paper examines how history is practised in contemporary Australian politics — and notices an increasingly strategic use of the past by politicians in recent years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies examining opposition transition to government processes and planning usually emphasise the responsibility of oppositions as a legislative institution and the role of party leaders. However, such approaches place too much emphasis on notions of responsible opposition and party leaders. They de-emphasise the importance of partisan considerations that shape transition planning or how party organisations have attempted to assert control over parliamentary parties. Drawing on archival materials, policy documents, and elite interviews, this study examines both public and internal transition to government strategies undertaken by the Liberal Party of Australia during their opposition years (1983-1996). The paper finds that while party leaders became more important over time, the party organisation's involvement remained significant. The Liberal Party transition planning focused primarily on cabinet processes, Australian Public Service (APS) organisation, particularly the senior bureaucratic level, and selecting political staff. In so doing, the Liberal Party anticipated many of the Hawke government's 1987 reforms to the APS. The Liberal Party was motivated by its desire to restructure the machinery and culture of government and to allocate sufficient political staff resources to government. Its aim was to better equip the party to achieve its political and ideological goals when next in government. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How do partisan citizens respond to campaign information and make voting decisions? We theorise that the association between exposure to campaign information and partisan voting is moderated by citizens' political predispositions — strength of partisanship, political sophistication, and election interest. To test our expectations, we used Australian Election Studies data from 2013, 2016, and 2019. We found that partisans who are exposed to campaign information tend to follow their party preference when strength of partisanship is high. For political sophistication, we found that the influence of campaign information on partisan voting is not conditional on sophistication. For election interest, we found a moderating effect of election interest whereby partisan individuals who encountered campaign information were more inclined to choose their own party when interest was low and more inclined to support their opposing party when interest was high. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When Justice James "Diamond Jim" McClelland took to London to "tip [...] buckets" on the British establishment for their role in the nuclear tests in Australia, the judge secured his place in history as the defender of independent Australian nationalism. The Royal Commission into British Nuclear Tests in Australia (1984–85) thus reinforced a narrative of Australian victimhood at the hands of an overzealous British establishment, largely obfuscating Australian colonial complicity. Through its specific terms of reference, the Commission ignored contemporary debates surrounding uranium and land rights policies in an effort to alleviate some of Australia's "colonial cringe", the weight of which was becoming unbearable in the lead‐up to the Bicentenary. This article undertakes a deeper examination of the Royal Commission to tease out some of the historical motives behind the politics of the inquiry, demonstrating that the Commission served a greater political purpose than merely seeking justice for nuclear damages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Arthur Calwell was the major architect of Australia's successful post-war migration program that laid the demographic, economic and cultural foundations of contemporary society. In public memory, however, Calwell is now mostly associated with the White Australia policy, which aimed to preserve Australia as a white, British-Australian society by severely restricting Asian immigration. This article assesses Calwell's leadership of the immigration program, his impact and his legacy. It identifies three distinct, often irreconcilable leadership characteristics, defined in terms of him as 'innovative policy-maker', 'political broker' and 'agitator'. This focus on leadership challenges the one-dimensional view of Calwell that exists in Australian political historiography. It is also intended to extend our engagement with leadership studies and illuminate the role leadership plays in political decision-making, especially sensitive portfolios like immigration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is not widely remembered that on 10 June 1955 two men, Raymond Edward Fitzpatrick and Frank Courtenay Browne, were sentenced to gaol for three months on a vote of the Commonwealth House of Representatives for contempt of parliament. Two parliamentary officials, Frank Green and Harry Evans, have dominated scholarly attempts to explain this unusual event. To the former, the privilege case largely reflected the animus of Prime Minister Menzies towards Browne and his desire for revenge. To the latter the matter was a genuine case of contempt. This article revisits the 1955 Bankstown Observer privilege case with the benefit of recently released archival material. It seeks to understand why two citizens were deprived of their liberty without legal representation or redress and to find some compromise between the divergent interpretations proffered by Green and Evans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the political situation in the Northern Territory during the first half of 2020. Topics covered include the resignation of Speaker Kezia Purick after an Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) finding of corrupt conduct, the measures taken by the state government in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and the Federal Court's decision to overturn the 2011 live cattle export ban imposed by then Agriculture Minister Senator Joe Ludwig.

The article discusses the political situation in Vicrotia during the first half of 2020. Topics covered include the formation of Fire Services Victoria (FSV) authority by Premier Daniel Andrews to deal with the bushfire crisis, the measures taken by the state government in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and the strong community support obtained by the state government for its most repressive policies to contain the coronavirus.

The article discusses the political situation in Australia during the first half of 2020. Topics covered include the government's response to the bushfire crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic, and the creation of a national cabinet that met frequently to coordinate policy options. Also discussed is the resignation of Richard Di Natale as leader of the Greens party.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples have campaigned for reform to the Australian state for generations. Over the last decade, debate over constitutional recognition has assumed mainstream prominence as a series of parliamentary and expert bodies designed to raise awareness of the need for change, propose options for that change, and build a community consensus around those proposals, have been established. This article assesses the five public processes undertaken between 2010 and 2017. It explains that constitutional reform has been hampered by state ambivalence towards the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP). However, it argues that that same state ambivalence created space for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples to eventually take control of the debate, reframe it along their own priorities, and re‐energise the movement for constitutional recognition. Even if prospects for a referendum remain uncertain, the Uluru Statement from the Heart has succeeded in building community consensus for a clear proposal because the UNDRIP informed and influenced its development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The decision to go to war in Australia remains the prerogative of the Executive. The lack of parliamentary authorisation of perhaps the most significant decision a democracy can make has seen sustained, but unsuccessful, efforts to reform legislation. In the wake of the costly invasion and occupation of Iraq in 2003, repeated calls for legislative reform of Australia's war powers have failed to find traction amongst Coalition and Australian Labor Party (ALP) leadership. Lamenting the lack of transparency and accountability in the current system, those favouring legislative reform would see authorisation of combat missions placed in the hands of Parliament. However, given the lack of support from either of the major parties, any legislative reform remains unlikely. Given this impasse, this article argues that a compromise option, in the form of a new war‐powers convention, may be a small step towards democratising the decision of going to war. While not legally binding, this constitutional convention would represent an agreement by the major parties that overseas combat operations will be properly debated in Parliament. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the historical and conceptual framework of race and its role in the development of national identity, migration policy and refugee politics in Australia. Topics discussed include impact of white nationalism on the nation's migration policy or the movement of non-white population in and around Australia, the colonial foundations of Australian whiteness, and the conflict between white politics and the contemporary multicultural and Indigenous policies.

In Australia, two‐and‐a‐half party systems are common with the Liberal and National parties, usually needing to collaborate to form governments. In Queensland, the 2008 merger of two of these state parties to create the Liberal National Party (LNP) created instead a two‐party system. This review examines the forces for the merger and prospects for the continuation of the LNP, the likelihood of change as a result of the Queensland merger in the remaining two‐and‐a‐half party systems, and how the drivers of this merger compare with those observed in studies of other non‐Australian party and electoral systems. Pressures and conditions for a merger similar to those in other, mostly European systems, were evident in the case of the LNP. The particular structure of the pre‐merger party competition and relationships was, however, a likely factor in the merger in that two collaborating parties could avoid a contested switch in party seniority. This aspect, unlikely to occur in other Australian party systems, combined with the very limited success of the LNP in gaining and holding government since the merger, does not suggest an imperative for further mergers in other Australian systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article analyzes the concept of labor in the Australian Labor Party's administration of state governments in Australia. Topics discussed include analysis of the ideological and policy profile of state Labor governments, policy mechanisms of state Labor governments based on a framework adopted from policy experts Armando Barrientos and Martin Powell, and the comparative profile of modern state-level social democracy in Australia.

Is the Australian Labor Party (ALP) one party, or eight? Academic accounts of the ALP throughout its history have emphasised the importance of state‐based policy‐making and organisation as evidence that the "life of the party" occurs within state and territory branches. However, over the last three decades, changes to the national conference and constitution, the increasing prominence of national leaders and the professionalisation of campaigning practices have arguably created the conditions for a far more centralised organisation, raising the question of whether, in 2019, there is anything distinctive about the ALP state and territory branches beyond the jurisdictions in which they operate. In this article, we investigate the distinctiveness of state Labor branches in terms of their formal organisational diversity and the characteristics and attitudes of their supporters. Using data from an original survey of Australian party supporters conducted in 2016, as well as undertaking an analysis of formal party rules, we show that the ALP exhibits a high degree of organisational uniformity across its branches, and supporters of the party in all states and territories very closely resemble each other. We conclude that even though the party maintains a federal structure it is possible to study its supportership and formal structure as a national organisation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines how Australia's successful campaign for a non‐permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) (2008‐12) and its subsequent term on the Council (2013‐14) both encouraged and impacted on the country's engagement with Africa. Drawing on extensive interviews with senior Australian politicians and government officials with intimate knowledge of the country's campaign for the UNSC and its time on the Council, as well as with senior African diplomats, the article contributes new knowledge on how Canberra campaigned to secure African UN votes and how it engaged with the Council's Africa‐dominated agenda. The article concludes by evaluating the legacy of this period of high engagement for both ongoing Australia‐Africa relations and Australia's new campaign for a UNSC seat during the 2029‐30 term. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The announcement in January 2015 that Prince Philip had been chosen to receive an Australian knighthood (an honour which itself had been controversially revived the previous year) sparked a fury of debate about honours, and about the continuance of a British connection in Australia's national life. Such debates were not new, echoing earlier arguments about honours as a national or imperial symbol. Through two related case studies - the Australian honours system and the Australian of the Year award - this article explores the politics of national recognition in 1970s and 1980s Australia. We consider both the politics involved in the creation and alteration of awards by which individual achievement and service are recognised by the nation, and the politics involved in imagining and recognising an Australian nation as expressed in those awards. We argue that these two institutions were more than a means to acknowledge hard work or sacrifice; they were also significant sites for contests over the nature of Australia's post-imperial identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change sceptics are known for their resistance to proactive climate response policies, especially policies aimed at restricting greenhouse gas emissions. It is often assumed that scepticism about the science behind climate change would lead directly to outright rejection of all proactive climate policies aimed at mitigating emissions and adapting to climate-induced changes already under way. This article demonstrates the variability among the climate policy views of seven well-known Australian climate change sceptics in the period 2007-2012. Using the lens of frame-analysis, we unpack some key sceptic rationales and narratives. The analysis shows that sceptics share a master frame that privileges individualist-libertarian-progress-social order values, which are thus likely to conflict with the values implicit in conventional climate policy remedies. The analysis also shows that sceptical pre-occupations diverge at more detailed framing levels, with various practical concerns and fears often at the centre of sceptical argumentation [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the Gorton government's tentative, but significant role in reshaping Australia's approach to overseas investment, focusing on the role of the Prime Minister himself. Prime Minister Gorton and his Cabinet ultimately accepted the need to pursue a more overt form of economic nationalism for political gain. This provided a basis for subsequent governments to offer more direct, national government intervention in foreign investment decision-making to the Australian polity. Historical accounts and more recent assessments are drawn on to make this case and point to the legacy of Gorton and his government in the political management of foreign investment in Australia. The approach to foreign investment that emerged during Gorton's government demonstrated to subsequent governments the worth of developing a calibrated response that appeared to address populist concerns while still enabling substantive and increasing investment inflows. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article highlights political issues in the Commonwealth of Australia from January-June 2016. Topics discussed include forced resignation of Human Services Minister Stuart Robert after report revealed that he had gone to China to secure a trade deal between mining companies, China Minmetals and Nimrod Resources, and ultimatum given by Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull to parliament in reintroducing the industrial relation bills for a second time.

The article discusses several political developments in the Commonwealth of Australia between July 2015 and December 2015. According to the article, Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott was forced to remove politician Bronwyn Bishop from her position as the Speaker of the Australian House of Representatives after Bishop failed to explain or apologize for abusing her travel entitlements. Australian Royal Commissioner Dyson Heydon's report on trade union governance and corruption is examined.

Measuring party support in Australia by constructing a 'two-party preferred' vote has had a profound effect, not only on the way political scientists, journalists, and politicians understand electoral 'swing' and predict electoral outcomes, but also on their understanding of the party system, their thinking about electoral fairness, and their views about which party or parties can legitimately claim government. This article traces the origins - the maternity as well as the paternity - of the 'two-party preferred'. It documents its spread from federal to state elections, even as voting systems in some states have switched from exhaustive preferential to optional preferential. It discusses its wide-ranging impact, and its implications for notions of electoral fairness and the legitimacy of election outcomes. It evaluates various criticisms of the concept - technical, pragmatic, and conceptual. And it notes the implications for marginal seat campaigning of the commonly observed 'uniform swing'- implications completely at odds with the idea that marginal seats matter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Participatory democracy was one of the core tenets of the New Left student movements that emerged in Australia in the 1960s. However, scant attention has been given to the idea within the literature on the New Left. This article examines an experiment in participatory democracy that took place in the Department of Philosophy at Sydney University in the 1970s. Following a series of strikes, the Philosophy department was split in two, with one half, the Department of General Philosophy, operating under a democratic constitution for six years from 1973 to 1979. This case study reveals a great deal about the intellectual history of the student New Left and the centrality of participatory democracy within it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Defence Preparations Act 1951 was conceived as a solution to an ideological as much as the constitutional dilemma the Menzies government faced as a result of the inflationary crisis of 1950-51. Drawing on Cabinet Notebooks, we argue that the government used the Act to facilitate peacetime access to capital issues controls under the defence powers, but also to reassure its supporters and the public that turning to direct economic controls was not a vindication of the 'socialism' it promised on election to stand against. While the Act enabled the government to convince the High Court that imposing anti-inflationary controls was linked to defence preparations, it was also a way for it to maintain ideological coherence as it sought to breach a principal tenet of its political philosophy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In weighing Britain's decision to seek membership of the European Economic Community Australian scholars have focussed attention on its adverse impact on Anglo-Australian and EU-Australian relations, and the emphasis that Australia thereafter placed upon economic relations with Asia. This article identifies a consequence of Britain's decision which has largely escaped attention: the part it played in stimulating Australia's successful 1969 application for membership of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. Although Australia's interest in the increased access to West European decision-makers that the OECD would provide dates to the latter 1940s and 1950s, the British application for membership of the EEC added particular weight to those arguing that Australia should seek OECD membership. It led to an extension of Australian activities in Western Europe which was not extinguished by the growing emphasis on relations with the Asian region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses various aspects of the political conditions in Australia between July and December 2013, focusing on the reported tribalisation of Australian politics and the nation's 44th federal election on September 7, 2013 which featured interim Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd. According to the article, Australia's Labor Party-led government was swept out in 2013 after two parliamentary terms in office. Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott and political campaigns are examined.

The role of advertising in the production of political campaigns deserves more consideration than it has previously received. My study examines advertising agencies associated with election campaigns in the 1970s and 1980s, investigating their decisions to accept or reject political accounts. Focusing on Britain and Australia, and using a range of primary sources including the industry press, interviews and memoirs, I demonstrate that an agency's decision to accept a political account is always complex, contested and highly contingent. Accepting a political account may alienate clients and agency staff who support another party. Campaigns are labour-intensive and may detract from an agency's core business. Involvement in a losing campaign can damage an agency's reputation, just as association with a successful one may attract clients. Agencies are often unsure how to approach political advertising where traditional techniques may not be suitable. Such concerns about accepting a political account will likely be put aside where an agency principal has close personal ties to a party or leader. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Large-scale issue-advertising by third parties appears to be increasing in Australia. This article analyses recent official data on political expenditure, and situates such campaigning in historical perspective with case studies of the bank nationalisation, Medibank, WorkChoices and mining tax campaigns. The success of the latter two campaigns illustrates the potential for well-resourced sectors to employ what has traditionally been seen as an 'outsider' tactic. The various drivers of the phenomenon are discussed, including evolving trends in political engagement and the media, and fluctuations in perceptions of governmental strength or weakness. The most distinctly Australian aspect of the phenomenon is the tendency in recent decades for governments and third parties to engage in a 'call-and-response' cycle of issue-advertising. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In his work on policy development, John Kingdon discusses the role of 'policy entrepreneurs' in advocating particular solutions to policy problems. This article discusses a group of policy entrepreneurs in the US who have been actively seeking to shift drought policy away from a crisis response towards an approach based on risk management. The case is discussed by comparison with the development of Australian drought policy which has taken a risk management approach since 1992. Drought policy in Australia has largely been developed in a top-down fashion while in the US policy advocacy has been more bottom-up. This case highlights a key point that Kingdon and others have made, that policy entrepreneurs cannot succeed alone in achieving policy change, and raises the question as to whether the concept of 'policy entrepreneurs' is useful beyond being an appealing descriptor of influential but not decisive agents in the policy process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses issues in Australian foreign policy between January and June 2012, commenting on the policies of the government of Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard. It examines policy toward China and the U.S., policy toward countries of the Pacific region and South East Asia, and Australia's international commitments, particularly in the Middle East and Afghanistan. The author comments on the relationship between transnational and domestic politics, trade and economic policy, and the policies of Australian Foreign Minister Bob Carr.

The article discusses issues in Australian politics from January to June 2012. It particularly examines the policies of the minority Labor government of Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard. Topics concerning the Australian federal government include Gillard's relationship with former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, the formation of Gillard's Third Ministry, and accusations of fraud and sexual harassment against politician Peter Slipper. The author also comments on politics in the various Australian states and territories, examining topics including elections, budgets, and environmental issues.

Between 1977 and 1982, the Australian Government resettled over 54,000 Vietnamese refugees. It also admitted 2,059 Vietnamese asylum seekers who arrived by boat without state authorisation. Although the number of Vietnamese asylum seekers was significantly smaller than the number of Vietnamese refugees processed offshore in refugee camps, the unexpected arrival of these boat people stimulated debate in Parliament and in the press about an appropriate response. This article examines the language politicians used to describe Vietnamese asylum seekers and the arguments used to justify their inclusion or exclusion. The evidence demonstrates that the political rhetoric used in this period in Australia's immigration history cannot be solely categorised as inclusive or humane. Rather, the overall impression is one of resistance and pragmatism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Country Party leader Jack McEwen said that Australia would join the OECD 'over my dead body' and it did not do so until 1971, the year he retired from politics. Since then Australia has taken part in what is a complex 'network of networks' linking over 40,000 senior public servants from many of the most influential states via some 200 committees spanning a wide range of policy areas. Yet Australian scholars have paid little attention to the OECD and to its effect upon Australia. Our essay is a first step in remedying this gap. Using both archival sources and interviews with public servants, we examine Australia's reasons for taking up OECD membership and assess its impact on policymaking since, the most obvious of which has been upon policy learning. We also ask about Australia's impact on the OECD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The influence of federalism on the organizational arrangements adopted by Australia's parties endures. This study examines the organizational structure of the State and Territory divisions of the Australian Greens through an analysis of their local party constitutions. It shows that there are important areas of difference in the organizations of state and territory Greens, despite their shared ideological commitment to inclusive internal party structures. These variations are a function of institutional and political factors, especially those induced by the Australian federal system. It is argued that differences in the organizational formats of state and territory party divisions reflect the historical circumstances in which they emerged and variations in the institutional (regional) setting in which they are located. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Julia Gillard replaced Kevin Rudd as prime minister and Labor leader in June 2010. She describes her government as being firmly in the 'tradition of Labor'. To locate it in the broad ideological continuum of Labor governments, and to test the suggestion that she is travelling a reform path set largely by the Hawke and Keating governments, I analyse the positions taken by Rudd and Gillard on a range of issues, beginning with economic policy. On social issues Gillard has been even more cautious than Rudd and this reflects her analysis of the electoral impact of Howard's Culture Wars. Her focus on educational opportunity suggests she is the logical successor to Gough Whitlam, Bob Hawke and Paul Keating. As Labor leaders, Rudd and Gillard each embraced market-reliant policy positions. Rudd even claimed to be an 'fiscal conservative'. However, with Rudd venturing a critique of neo-liberalism, it is Gillard whose stance is closer to Hawke and Keating's 'economic rationalism'. Indeed Gillard's insistence upon the centrality of markets leaves Labor with a dilemma: if there are no significant problems with relying on markets then why does Australia need a social democratic party? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines developments in Australian politics and governance between January and June, 2011. The author notes that partisan politics dominated political discourse in Australia during this period, although a slate of natural disasters and subsequent rescue efforts interrupted political bickering. Controversial policies concerning mining taxes, off-shore processing of asylum seekers, and carbon taxes are then assessed. Budget concerns are addressed, as is criticism of the ruling Labor Party and Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard. The article then discusses political developments in specific Australian states.

Recent public debates about family law reform have revealed both support for and criticism of legislative policies that seek to shape social norms. Amidst this debate was a suggestion from some quarters that the Whitlam Government's removal of fault-based divorce is responsible for the gendered tensions that characterise modern reform debates. This article draws on archival records and interviews conducted with family law professionals who worked in the system in the 1970s and experienced the transition to the no-fault system, to explore the principles underlying the introduction of the Family Law Act of 1975 and to identify the sources of continuing dissension about its impact. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Three figures - the student, the expert and the peacekeeper - have provided influential frameworks through which Australians have conceptualised their relations with the world since 1945. Each has defined points of intersection between prevailing values in Australian civil society and understandings of international change as offering opportunities and challenges in articulating national interests. This article places each of these figures in their context, and in a sequence which suggests that each served to resolve uncertainties regarding international engagement while also generating new tensions. Tracing these effects illuminates the cultural transitions that have selectively determined how international issues have been comprehended and the roles Australians have perceived for themselves in relation to them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents an overview of politics in Australia from January to June 2010. The period marked the final months for Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and his Labor Party with a loss of public popularity. Other subjects considered include the Global Financial Crisis which began in 2008; safety issues associated with the Home Insulation Program; cost overruns with the federal Building the Education Revolution program; and the failure to institute a national emissions trading program. It also discusses the politics of Australia's state governments during the period for states including New South Wales, Victoria, and Queensland.