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Keywords: Fair Trade

  • INTERNATIONAL

    Buying exemptions: Donald Trump's tariff deal

    • Binoy Kampmark
    • 13 March 2018
    5 Comments

    This affair has done little to encourage Australians keen on pushing a more robustly independent line from Washington. A ceremonial subservience and deference to US power has been exhibited. Such sentiments embrace the inherent inequality of the Australian-US relationship. To be in deficit to the US is seen as a good and necessary thing.

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  • ECONOMICS

    No economy of exclusion and inequality

    • Joe Zabar
    • 27 February 2018

    'Francis' statement is not one merely for theological or academic contemplation. It is in effect Francis' call to establish a new benchmark for our economy, one where exclusion and inequality are no longer a natural and accepted consequence of its operation.' Director of Economic Policy for Catholic Social Services Australia addresses the CSSA annual conference in Melbourne, February 2018.

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  • RELIGION

    Address to future doctors

    • Frank Brennan
    • 31 January 2018

    'The place of religious and comprehensive world views in legislating, ethical decision making, and good medical practice informed by prudential resource allocation' — Remarks by Fr Frank Brennan to first year medical students at the University of Notre Dame Australia, 30 January 2018.

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  • RELIGION

    Same sex marriage and freedom of religion

    • Frank Brennan
    • 10 November 2017
    28 Comments

    Wednesday will be a day of celebration for those wanting a 'Yes' vote. It should also be a day when we Australians recommit ourselves to respect for all citizens, especially those whose beliefs differ from our own. Our politicians led us into this divisive campaign. Now they need to lead us out of it.

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  • RELIGION

    Seeking a true new start for all job seekers and workers

    • Frank Brennan
    • 08 November 2017

    'We need to recommit to work for all those who are able and willing. We need to recommit to social assistance for all those who are not able. We need to ensure that a life of frugal dignity is within the grasp of all citizens.' 2017 Rerum Novarum Oration by Fr Frank Brennan SJ

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  • AUSTRALIA

    The Coalition's special disrespect for unions

    • John Warhurst
    • 06 November 2017
    13 Comments

    The raid on the offices of the Australian Workers Union by the Australian Federal Police demonstrates a disrespect for trade unions contrary to the Catholic tradition. The political theatre indulged in by the Employment Minister Michaelia Cash and the Registered Organisations Commission is especially worrying for the deeper attitudes it reveals.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    Different country, different culture (or how different legal systems view deal-making)

    • Frank Brennan
    • 12 October 2017

    In the 16th century it was the Dominican friars like Vitoria, Las Casas and Montesino in Salamanca who confronted the state and challenged public opinion about the rights of the indigenous peoples in Spain's newly colonised lands. Not even the most nostalgic and forgiving Jesuit would opine that the modern practitioners of Morality with a capital M challenging the powers of the market and the state would be found in a modern monastery.

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  • MEDIA

    The sad history of Australian media reform

    • Andrew Dodd
    • 19 September 2017
    5 Comments

    The big media players eventually get what they want by wearing down the government of the day and latching on to whatever opportunity comes their way. This month the government handed them the reform they've long craved while Xenophon attempted to win some concessions. We can assume Australia's media market will now become more concentrated. What we don't know is whether Xenophon's trade offs will do enough to protect public interest journalism and media diversity.

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  • RELIGION

    Citizenship and the Common Good

    • Frank Brennan
    • 30 August 2017
    6 Comments

    'There was one controversy in which Lionel Bowen was involved that does provide good lessons for the contemporary Catholic considering the desirable law or social policy on a contested issue - lessons for the citizen weighing what is for the common good. Back in 1979 there was debate in the Parliament on a motion which was framed to stop Medicare funding of abortions. Bowen, a strict Catholic, was strongly opposed to the motion. He did not think the motion was about abortion. He thought it was about money.' Frank Brennan's 2017 Lionel Bowen Lecture

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Political donations reform ignores insider politics big picture

    • John Warhurst
    • 20 June 2017
    5 Comments

    The revelations that several billionaires of Chinese origin have sought to influence Australian politics through large political donations have rekindled bipartisan concern to ban such donations. That it took investigative journalism by ABC and Fairfax media to generate such a rush to reform is a reflection on the Australian political class. While it is likely that reform legislation will be introduced and passed before the end of the year that will be only a very partial response to a bigger problem.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Steering SS Australia through the doldrums is serious work

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 08 May 2017
    11 Comments

    In Australian public life we are becalmed in a sea where the trade winds of political will, imagination, ability to agree, trust and firm direction do not blow. We search for portents in the US skies and hope for wind from the budget. The challenge facing the serious person on the ship is to avoid responding to each rumour and proclamation and focus on what matters. What is needed is to sustain the spirits of the crew and to plan the continuation of the journey when the wind again fills the sails.

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  • MEDIA

    Gambling on the fat dollar

    • Rachel Woodlock
    • 23 March 2017
    3 Comments

    Elite athletes wear Nike. Celebrities wear Nike. Beautiful people. People who take their sports seriously. Well, that's what decades of advertising around the little swooshy tick and 'Just Do It' trademark told us. Fat girls don't deserve to wear Nike because they are supposed to feel ashamed of their ample girths. They should exercise, of course, but in sackcloth and ashes, with downcast faces, signalling they understand their moral depravity. Some people, it seems, still feel that's the way it should be.

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