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The political status of the Cocos-Keeling Islands, a group of twenty-seven small atoll islands in the Indian Ocean about 1,700 miles west of Australia, remained unresolved from the time of the islands' settlement in 1827 until their effective incorporation into Australia in 1984. For a century and a half, protection shopping helped to create and sustain the islands' condition of suspended sovereignty. During the nineteenth century, the ruling family actively cultivated the protection of Dutch and British imperial agents and played one empire against the other. Imperial agents veered between intervention and restraint, and Cocos-Keeling islanders invoked protection to blunt rulers' power over them. The politics of protection continued into the twentieth century. Despite international attention to self-determination, the Cocos-Keeling Islands were not positioned for statehood, and full and effective integration into the British empire or Australia was perennially delayed. The territory's history as a place of seemingly permanent semi-autonomy illuminates a global pattern in which protection politics worked to suspend sovereignty and in some cases perpetuate social and racial inequalities, both inside political communities and across the international order. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While Federation in 1901 failed to lodge in the popular imagination, Australians widely embraced the idea that their nation was born at Gallipoli during World War I. Despite its subsequent ubiquity, the form of nationalism that spawned the legend of martial birth was not the only kind that had currency during World War I. This article traces the ideal of Australian nationhood held by imperialist liberals, such as Alfred Deakin and members of the Round Table group, through the campaign for imperial federation. It argues that the distance between Australian and British interests that became apparent during the war and the peace process put paid to Australian interest in imperial federation, and to the quasi-mystical ideal of nationalism that went with it. Australians were left with a martial nationalism that was more strident, parochial and anxious than the imperial liberalism that propelled the Federation movement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Established in 1944, the North Queensland Local Government Association made an impact on post‐war reconstruction and northern development in Australia. The association modernised infrastructure and improved social conditions in Queensland's north, as well as launching an influential publicity campaign to promote a massive northern development scheme. In an era when federal proposals for developing Australia's northern regions often struggled to make a convincing case for Commonwealth investment, these were significant contributions to nation‐building. Putting substance before parochialism, the association fostered cooperation among municipal authorities and patiently lobbied the Queensland government. But some members complained that their region was part of a "neglected north" and called for a more assertive campaign. By the late 1950s, having developed regional infrastructure, grown in confidence, and looking for new challenges, the association shifted its lobbying to target the Commonwealth government. The change led to the "People the North" publicity campaign, which influenced federal northern development policy. This article analyses the campaigns led by the North Queensland Local Government Association in the twenty years after 1944. It illuminates a neglected part of Australia's political history: the contribution of regional political voices from Australia's north to nation‐building projects such as post‐war reconstruction and northern development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Much has been written about the nature of Australian nationalism during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. While post‐Second World War historiography analysed the role of class in nationalist sentiment, more recent work has examined the racialised and martial aspects of Australian nationalism and imperialism. There has been less consideration of how the nature of turn‐of‐the‐century Australian nationalism affected the Federation that was established on 1 January 1901. This article examines early debates about commemoration of the anniversary of Federation, revealing an indifference to the occasion that was common to the public and most political and civic leaders, including Prime Minister Edmund Barton. It finds that popular enthusiasm at the inauguration of the Commonwealth in January 1901 and the opening of the first parliament in May was a response to imperial pageantry and celebrity, rather than the creation of the Australian federation. The article suggests that Australians' longstanding resistance to reform of the Federation is a legacy of their historic failure to attach to it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While declining political trust has been given much attention, the behavioural implications of declining political trust have not yet been investigated extensively and the literature also shows the varying effects of political trust on support for extreme and populist parties across contexts. This article focuses on the decline of political trust in Australia from 1998 to 2016 and its effect on Australian voting behaviour. Multinomial logit estimations are performed using individual-level survey data from seven Australian federal elections. Our study provides evidence that political distrust can unite all successful right-wing populist parties and act as a moderating source to raise votes for right-wing populist parties in the elections. The study further demonstrates that right-wing populist parties can experience electoral success beyond mobilising anti-immigration sentiments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Uluru Statement from the Heart offers an opportunity to reorder the Australian constitutional hierarchy as it relates to First Nations. The proposal for a First Nations Voice provides a tailored, structural response to the experiences of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people under the Australian state. For the First Nations Voice to meet this potential, it will require more than careful design of the Voice as a new constitutional institution; it will require existing constitutional institutions within the legislature and executive to learn to 'listen'. This article draws on the political and democratic listening literature to examine how political listening might be practised at the interface between the First Nations Voice and existing constitutional institutions. We suggest five principles to guide this cross-institutional relationship together with ways these principles might be incorporated into governance structures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The overwhelming majority of jihadists identified in Australia across the last two decades form an interconnected network which transcends time and geographic locations. Close peer relationships appear key to understanding how Australian jihadists recruit and how the network evolves. More recently the Australian network has grown significantly, and with this increase in size has come a concurrent escalation in the level of threat posed. This article analyses the factors that have coalesced together to drive this increase. In doing so, it challenges some underlying assumptions regarding radicalisation in Australia that may not be backed by empirical research, or are based on anomalous case studies not representative of the larger network. It also highlights the recent emergence of a new cohort of Australian jihadists: teenagers. An analysis of the emergence of these teenage jihadists is then conducted, along with a discussion of the implications for policing strategies and the future of countering violent extremism programs in Australia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines how the Australian government began to formulate its approach to space research, exploring the way it approached the establishment of American tracking stations from 1956, proposals for a civilian space research program in 1959, involvement with British space research and, from 1960, the negotiations for the European Launcher Development Organisation use of rocket testing facilities at Woomera. It argues that financial and strategic considerations were foremost in the minds of the Menzies government in shaping its approach to space policy, in particular in the context of rocket testing at Woomera. Ultimately, while the decisions taken between 1956 and 1962 laid the foundations for significant and often celebrated Australian involvement in space during the 1960s, the way in which these decisions were made reflected a reluctance to be involved at all. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent scholarship posits that ambiguous ('polysemic') ideas are effective for coalition building between diverse stakeholders: their capacity to be interpreted differently attracts different interests. Hence, in search of political solutions to 'wicked' and similarly complex problems, deploying polysemic ideas would be critical to effective policy-making. This paper scopes the policy-making potential of polysemic ideas by examining the impact of an ambiguous concept known as 'One Health' on responses to antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in Australia and the UK. It offers two primary arguments. Firstly, polysemic ideas can help mobilise broad attention to complex problems: since One Health became associated with AMR, political and administrative attention has grown more intense and coordinated than previously. Secondly, however, a polysemic idea alone may be insufficient to generate effective action: the contrast between Australian and UK AMR policies illustrates that polysemic ideas do not suspend interests, institutions, or ideas that can be readily deployed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gerard Henderson: Well Robert thanks for that. Robert Tickner: Yes Gerard Henderson: So that's not the only driver, is it? Robert Tickner: Well I did Gerard Henderson: You did? Robert Tickner: Thank you Gerard. [Extracted from the article]

Satisfaction with democracy has declined rapidly in Australia, reaching the lowest level recorded since the 1970s in 2019. Whereas Australian citizens used to be among the most satisfied democrats in the world, there is now evidence of widespread dissatisfaction. What explains this rapid decline in political support? Comparative studies emphasise the role of government performance, both political and economic, in shaping citizens' attitudes towards the political system. This paper examines the role of government performance in shaping satisfaction with democracy in Australia, using Australian Election Study data from 1996 to 2019. The results demonstrate that frequent changes of prime minister, which a majority of voters disapproved of, and rising economic pessimism contributed to the decline of democratic satisfaction in Australia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper establishes a multi theory framework to help explain factors and conditions promoting a political priority for policy change. The framework's analytical utility is illustrated through its application to a case study of waste management in Australia. A lack of political momentum to prioritise regulatory interventions has contributed to uncoordinated responses by the Australian federal and state governments resulting in unsustainable approaches to waste management. Lessons are derived from the analysis that provide insights into the potential for establishing political priority for policy change from uncoordinated voluntary schemes to more coordinated regulatory approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyzes the impacts of the Australian Federal Government's food labeling reforms on the formation of food practices and the market for local food products. It considers how the inclusion of product and ingredient origin information blurs the distinction between 'domestic' and 'foreign' food products, and foregrounds different 'support local' behaviors. Findings from the study highlight the influence of structural and cultural factors, complemented by the strategic use of media tools, in shaping how food labels function as mechanisms to mediate domestic and transnational food practices. Retail concentration, support for the 'buy local' discourse, and the mediating influence of supermarket food media are presented as key factors that underpin the diffusion of and the demand for branded products and local food products in Australia. The impacts of the food origin labeling regulations on Australia's highly concentrated grocery retail sector and export markets for Australian food products are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The decline in the smuggling of people from Indonesia to Australia since late 2013 is primarily attributable to unilateral deterrence policies under Australia's Operation Sovereign Borders. When seeking to prevent asylum seekers from coming to Australia to enjoy the right to asylum there, the Australian government has tested a number of deterrent mechanisms that sometimes border on illegality and even state crime. In May 2015, for example, Australian authorities intercepted an Indonesian boat carrying 65 asylum seekers and allegedly paid the six smugglers to return their passengers to Indonesia. In this article, we reconstruct what happened at sea, and put forward a number of arguments that categorise this 'turnback' as explicitly-commissioned people smuggling against Indonesia. Our article also points to further implications about looming risks if the policy was to be employed more widely by states in other areas of the world where people cross the sea to seek asylum. Not only would the practice severely undermine international collaborations that have developed to prevent and combat people smuggling, but it would also create additional safety risks for those who are turned back. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reconsiders the validity and relevance of the initiative-resistance thesis particularly in the context of the political party system in Australia. Topics discussed include the role of the Australian Labor Party as the driving force in the nation's politics and policy, separate identity of the National Party and its role in understanding the two-party system, and the critical analysis of Australian political scientist Henry Mayer on the subject.

The article assesses the relevance of governments administered by the Australian Labor Party and its role in the implementation of urban transport policy in Australia. Topics discussed include the partisan politics of public transport, the economic importance of urban rail transport and its construction, and the policy implemented by the Labor government for the railway system in January 1989.

The article explores various approaches to the study of governments administered by the Australian Labor Party (Labor) and the Labor policy at the state level in Australia. Topics discussed include the significance of state Labor in the nation's political system, performance of Labor governments at the state level and its impact on political parties, and the implications for the country's federal system of governance.

Participatory governance practices are enjoying popularity, not least in local government. This is driven by legislation that requires councils to undertake some of these processes; also by communities and practitioners – parties that derive income from participatory governance. An industry is emerging: one characterised by demand and supply, with frameworks, strategies and processes, training and conferences. This industry warrants investigation so that its impacts upon local democracy can be understood. Following a theorisation of local democracy and community engagement, the paper describes the community engagement industry, presenting evidence about council activities, providers and professional associations to establish that the commercialisation of engagement is a significant phenomenon in Australian local government. Possible risks to local governance and local democracy are explored. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Turnbull government presented Australia's fifth national multicultural policy statement in March 2017. This article analyses the policy statement and argues that it represents the most significant change to Australian multicultural policy in four decades. Among other things, it abandons the language of government responsiveness to cultural diversity that previously defined Australian multiculturalism. The 2017 policy amounts to a new form of post-multiculturalism—different from earlier conservative, neoliberal and centre-left versions—in that it seeks to 'mainstream' multicultural policy on the grounds that Australian multiculturalism has succeeded in its intended task. While a mainstreaming strategy of this sort is, I argue, theoretically consistent with Australia's liberal nationalist approach to cultural diversity, the institutional and attitudinal conditions that it presupposes are yet to be fully realised in Australia. More multicultural work needs to be done before this kind of post-multiculturalist approach is practicable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2012, Australia reintroduced arrangements for 'offshore processing' in the Pacific, which forcibly transferred asylum seekers arriving by boat to the Republic of Nauru and Papua New Guinea (PNG), purportedly for refugee status determination (RSD). Previous studies have focused on the detention of asylum seekers transferred to these States in 'regional processing centres' (RPCs). This article instead provides a factual foundation for more current inquiries into the content and scope of each State's protection obligations under international law, which have increased in importance since the end of closed detention in the RPCs in 2015 and 2017. The formal legal and diplomatic arrangements established in and between the three States for the transfer of asylum seekers; processing of their claims; and provision of durable solutions will be examined, with reference to the minimum standards required. The article identifies a protection deficit in the legal architecture and bilateral arrangements underpinning offshore processing. Since their inception, the arrangements have lacked clarity regarding the respective obligations of the three States; involved transfers even in the absence of fair and efficient procedures for RSD in Nauru and PNG; and failed to ensure timely access to appropriate outcomes for all transferees (whether determined to be in need of international protection or not). The article therefore concludes that Australia should facilitate readmission to its territory for all people in Nauru and PNG who do not have access to an appropriate alternative outcome. It also suggests that any future attempts to establish third country transfer procedures will require radically different legal and diplomatic arrangements to enhance responsibility sharing and cooperation on refugee protection, and to comply with international law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Conventional wisdom has long held that class is declining as an influence on voting. More recently, new conceptions of class, focusing on the ownership of economic assets and the possession of social and cultural capital, have challenged this view. This article evaluates these arguments in two ways. First, we examine trends in the impact of traditional measures of class on the vote in Australia from the 1960s to the present day. Second, using a 2015 national survey that measures different aspects of class voting, we assess for the first time the relative effects on the vote of occupation, assets, and social and cultural capital. The results show that while occupation has declined and is now unimportant, the ownership of both assets and cultural capital are major influences on the vote. We argue that the impact of class on the vote has not declined, but rather transformed itself in new and different ways, which has important long-term implications for party support. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people navigate the social and political order of the Australian settler state in ways that seek to increase their personal freedoms and political autonomy. For some groups this means seeking a firmer place within the social, political and economic life of Australia, and for others it means navigating away, towards a more distant relationship based in the resurgence of Indigenous nationhood. This navigation is composed of multifaceted and multidirectional relations between Indigenous Australians, settler Australians, and the settler state. As a discipline, political science must move beyond the study of settler institutions and begin to engage more comprehensively in research that considers the dynamics and structures of Indigenous-settler relations as a matter of priority. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Australian political science is broadly derivative of British-European liberal ideas and prescriptions. It supports Settler governance by following dominant political dynamics, and struggles to engage with Indigenous political ordering other than through British-European settler-colonial logics. In response, this article experiments with a dialogical approach to studying political science that is responsive to Indigenous frames of reference and attentive to the colonial political relationship that Indigenous and non-Indigenous people share. We first document and attempt to break with the structural politics of knowledge that conditions Australian political science. We then deploy an idiom for advancing macro-level and informal insights for knowing liberalism on the Australian continent. The final section outlines a selection of key challenging questions that Australian political science needs to address if it is to enter into more appropriate relations with Indigenous political ontology and peoples of the continent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While Australian political studies often appears to have neglected engagements with Indigenous peoples and politics, we argue this is not a simple question of omission. In fact, the discipline is deeply implicated in imperial knowledge production and the authorisation of racialised colonial governance. As non-Indigenous scholars working within Australian political studies, in this paper we reflect on our own discipline in light of several decades of critical scholarship, identifying the production of disciplinary innocence through a theoretical and institutional analysis of Australian political studies knowledge practices. We explore this production via canonical knowledges, institutional processes that contain Indigenous people and knowledge to subjects of policy, and the operation of disciplinary divisions which neutralise scholarship on policy and political institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Contemporary public policy increasingly emphasises a focus on outcomes, the difference that occurs in the lives of citizens from policy and activity of government. Other contemporary imperatives for effective planning include: recognition of the values of the community whom plans serve, direction towards goals and objectives, utilisation of evidence, articulation of theories of change that underpin planning and responsiveness to evaluation. This article reports a desk‐based research project to assess how local government planning documents meet these imperatives. Two documents are examined for 67 councils across Australia: the major strategic document, council plan or other‐named document and the cultural development plan (CDP) or other‐named document that directs staff and investment aimed at cultural enrichment of the LGA. Findings indicate that the majority of councils' documents appeared only concordant with one or two of these planning imperatives. No plan addressed more than three. Overall, council plans and cultural development plans did not clearly indicate their responsiveness to values of their communities, nor include objectives that formed measurable steps towards goals or formally refer to the use of evidence in decision‐making. No plans included theories of change to underpin decision‐making. This analysis indicates clear areas of improvement for planning for local governance. This article reports an examination of Australian local government plans (council plans and cultural development plans) against principles for effective planning, including attention to community values, outcome‐focus, utilisation of evidence and theories of change and responsiveness to evaluation. Findings indicate little concordance of planning documents with these principles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]