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This article analyses the policy discourse of Australian right-wing governments, exploring how such governments have combined neo-liberal economic policies with social conservatism, populism, cultu...

Using Aḥmad Fāris al-Shidyāq’s semi-autobiographical fictional travel narrative from 1855, this article critiques current world literature paradigms that see literary modernity as the entrance into world literary space’s zones of equivalence. Al-Shidyāq’s text, the article argues, encapsulates debates over the origins of Arabic literary modernity, but rejects both the notion that Arabic literary modernity is a European import and that it is product of a national literary past. Rather, in the author’s reading, al-Sāq represents a combative archive of influences and intertexts that is self-consciously multilinguistic and trans-imperial. Analyzing al-Sāq’s engagement with European texts, the article argues for the power of productive misreadings and corrections, as al-Shidyāq places errors at the centre of his comparative methodology. Reading al-Sāq as participating in and theorizing the nahḍah’s own transnational currents, the article argues that al-Shidyāq analyzes literary and linguistic relations...

This review article, written for the fiftieth anniversary of the Australian Journal of Political Science (formerly Politics), analyses articles focusing on women, gender and feminism that were published in the journal. The analysis demonstrates that the study of gender is relevant to a broad range of fields, and methodological approaches used, in political science. It also demonstrates that political science knowledge is itself historically and socially constructed, reflecting both traditional social power relations and the influence of the social movements that challenge them. Consequently, key articles have drawn attention to the ways in which the frameworks of mainstream forms of political science were gender-biased and have sometimes continued to be so, particularly in terms of narrow constructions of the ‘political’. Such narrow constructions may still be contributing to some ongoing gaps in the literature, despite the important contributions made by work published in the journal.

Various Australian politicians have argued for the need to combine ‘hard heads and soft hearts’ in politics. Unfortunately, this article argues that that recognition is not yet fully accepted in Australian political science. While there has been a significant progress, both in terms of the number of senior women in the discipline and the gender content of Australian political science, problems still remain. Unfortunately, some of the issues are still those identified by Carole Pateman in her famous 1981 address as President of the Australian Political Studies Association when she noted both the underrepresentation of women in political science and that there was a tendency to define ‘the political’ in narrow ways that excluded the study of women and issues that were of concern to them. This article will explore why political science has been less open to incorporating feminist insights than some other related disciplines. It will analyse a number of issues regarding the gendering of Australian pol...

This article explores the ways in which politicians use same-sex marriage as a sign that both conveys a wide range of meanings to the electorate and implicates the construction of particular citizen identities. Politicians' views discussed range from those of Tony Abbott and Julia Gillard to George W. Bush and Barack Obama. By analysing the ways in which heteronormative signs are contested, the article questions whether measures such as same-sex marriage are as unambiguously normalizing as critics like Butler suggest. For, despite some normalizing aspects, same-sex marriage can also challenge the way in which heteronormative citizen identities have been constructed. That is precisely why some conservative (and not so conservative) politicians see it as a threat while others see same-sex marriage as an important sign of progress. Meanwhile, what had been intended as a reassuring sign for the religious right contributed to Australian Labor losing votes on the left.

This article analyses how politicians' use of emotion is gendered. Key Australian, US and UK politicians studied include Obama, George W. Bush, Hillary Clinton, Cameron, Rudd, Abbott and Gillard. Emotions analysed range from fear to compassion. A particular focus is placed on issues of masculinity; however, the implications for constructions of both femininity and masculinity will be considered, including arguments that female politicians face particular problems in utilising emotion, for example, in projecting an image of being both tough and compassionate. It will be argued that it is not just that politicians' use of emotion intersects with issues of gender but that particular gendered identities are a key vehicle via which emotion is deployed. Consequently, the analysis contributes new insights to both the literature on the politics of emotion and the literature on masculinity and gender.

Labor's broadband policy influenced key regional independents to support the formation of the minority Gillard government. However, analysing information technology policy doesn't only demonstrate continuing differences between Labor and the Coalition. It also demonstrates changing Labor attitudes on issues ranging from neoliberalism, globalisation and social inclusion to conceptions of market failure and the rising power of Asia. In particular, this article compares and contrasts the attitudes of the Rudd government to those of the Hawke and Keating governments, arguing that the Rudd government placed much more emphasis on the role that market failure had played in contributing to Australia's poor broadband provision. The resulting policy involved an increased role for government in rolling out broadband not only to the cities but also to regional Australia. That approach benefitted Gillard. It also reflected ideological differences between not just Labor and the Liberals, but also between Rudd and his L...

Politicians have long mobilised emotion in order to gain voters' support. However, this article argues that the politics of affect is also implicated in how citizens' identities, rights and entitlements are constructed. Examples are drawn from the positions of UK, US, Canadian and Australian politicians, including Tony Blair, David Cameron, Kevin Rudd and Barack Obama. Emotions analysed include love, fear, anxiety, empathy and hope. The article argues for the importance of a concept of ‘affective citizenship’ which explores (a) which intimate emotional relationships between citizens are endorsed and recognised by governments in personal life and (b) how citizens are also encouraged to feel about others and themselves in broader, more public domains. It focuses on issues of sexuality, gender, race and religion, and argues that the politics of affect has major implications for determining who has full citizenship rights. The Global Financial Crisis has also seen the development of an ‘emotional regime’ in w...

Despite claims that Kevin Rudd's campaign against John Howard was based around ‘me-tooism’, there was an ideological contest underlying both the Labor and Liberal electoral strategy. Indeed, Howard's ideological hubris helps to explain why the Liberals' previous election strategies no longer worked. WorkChoices reflected Howard's neoliberal ideological influences and undermined his previously electoral strategy of wedging conservative workers and ‘battlers’ away from Labor. Rudd presented as a safe, economically conservative, ‘small target’ candidate. Nonetheless, his own policies were influenced by social democratic ideology, particularly in regard to his critique of extreme neoliberalism. That critique underlay Rudd's policies on working families, climate change and broadband. Furthermore, while being cautious in his statements on contentious social issues, Rudd cleverly used the politics of signs to indicate that he had more progressive policies than Howard on issues ranging from race to gender.

This collection of papers focuses on the domestic and international politics of Australia's recent engagement with Asia. The theme of Asian engagement appears to be of particular pertinence to the current study of Australian politics given numerous pronouncements that we are entering an ‘Asian century’ during which key Asian economies will gain greater ascendancy and certain Asian states will come to play a more prominent role in global politics. We employ the idea of ‘re-engagement’ in order to show how engagement with Asia has been turned to again and again by Australian governments, albeit in different political and strategic contexts. This collection aims to consider the politics of re-engagement from a number of different theoretical positions, as well as from a number of different perspectives (be it international relations/foreign policy, domestic politics, identity politics, or from the perspective of bilateral Asian partners). Emphasis is placed not simply on the foreign policy prerogatives behin...

This article analyses John Howard's arguments on the relationship between ‘values’ and ‘national identity’. Some key arguments were prefigured before he became Prime Minister, when he promised not to politicise national identity. More recent arguments influenced debates over foreign policy, counter terrorism measures, industrial relations policy and the banning of same-sex marriage. In particular, the article explores the relationship between Howard's ‘values’ and Anglo-Celtic identity, social conservatism, the Christian Right and a neo-liberal ‘entrepreneurial culture’. It suggests that Howard is using his emphasis on the relationship between values and national identity to endorse and encourage particular forms of citizen identity (which also have policy and electoral implications). This is despite Howard's earlier critique of Keating for using debates over national identity to engage in social engineering.

This article focuses on Mark Latham's views on equality. Latham's emphasis on education and on overcoming suburban, spatial inequality draws on the Whitlamite tradition. However, his work also draws on neoliberal influences and on arguments regarding the impact of the information economy. Both these influences have contributed to a move away from more traditional Labor and social‐democratic views on class, racial and gender inequality. This article considers Latham's relationship with traditional Labor ideology as well as with Third Way politics. Latham's arguments regarding the role of elites and the implications that this has for his understandings of the city, capitalism and diverse forms of inequality are also addressed. Latham's earlier views still influence his speeches and electoral strategy as Labor Leader.

Since the 1980s, a growing number of radical right‐wing populist parties have managed to establish themselves permanently in the party systems of advanced liberal capitalist democracies. Initially dismissed as ephemeral reflections of a general debasement of politics in recent years, they represent today one of the most serious challenges to liberal democracy in Western Europe and elsewhere. Unlike the traditional postwar radical right, the contemporary populist right has developed an ideology that, albeit fundamentally anti‐liberal, is compatible with the basic formal principles of democracy. Radical right‐wing populist ideology is anti‐elitist, appealing instead to the common sense of ordinary people; exclusionary, appealing to the right to cultural diversity and identity; and openly discriminatory, appealing to the right to ‘national preference’. The larger goal behind the radical right‐wing populist political project is to halt and reverse the erosion of the established patterns of ethnic political an...

This is a very impressive collection that throws new light on both Australian leadership and the nature of ‘leadership’ itself. The feminist insights driving the project have resulted in the uncove...

This article analyses recent federal debates regarding gay and lesbian issues, focusing on the Howard government, and drawing attention to the arguably heteronormative nature of many politicians' views. Policy issues analysed include assisted reproductive technology, superannuation rights and censorship. Reference is also made to the Justice Kirby controversy. The article explores the way in which heteronormative arguments not only construct heterosexual citizens as the norm but are also used to discount arguments that discrimination against gay and lesbian citizens is taking place.

In 1871 four panoramas of Duluth, Minnesota, were submitted to the Library of Congress in Washington as part of the registration requirement for copyright. These photographs are the earliest vintage panoramas of Duluth in the Library's collections. They were taken a few months after the completion of the Lake Superior and Mississippi Railroad, which was responsible for the growth and development of Duluth and which probably influenced Caswell & Davy, the photographers of these views, to establish their photographic business in the burgeoning town. These panoramas mark an important point in the history of Duluth and an interesting early chapter in the development and commercial use of photography.

This article seeks to explore some problems in Jurgen Habermas's account of political norms and values in Western society. Using examples from Australian political discourse, it is argued that Habermas has neglected to analyse some of the ways in which political consensus can be generated in Western society. In particular, he has failed to acknowledge adequately the role played by liberal norms and values in attempts to reconcile conflicts between the individual and general interest While Habermas has made important contributions to social theory, such deficiencies limit his usefulness for Australian political scientists who wish to analyse some crucial aspects of Australian political culture.

(1988). Is it worth salvaging the socialism in socialist feminism? Australian Feminist Studies: Vol. 3, No. 7-8, pp. 187-191.

(1986). Comment on ‘A comparative analysis of equal pay in the U.S., Britain and Australia’. Australian Feminist Studies: Vol. 1, No. 3, pp. 91-95.

(1963). A Modification of the Embedded-Figures Test for Use with Young Children. The Journal of Genetic Psychology: Vol. 103, No. 1, pp. 67-74.