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Keywords: Australia Day

There are more than 200 results, only the first 200 are displayed here.

  • ECONOMICS

    Managestocracy

    • David James
    • 28 October 2022

    Who wields the most power in the world? If one follows the money trail, it becomes clear that Western societies have become ruled by a new type of aristocracy: a management aristocracy. 

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  • AUSTRALIA

    When the lobbyist makes the laws: Victoria and the sex industry

    • Juliette Hughes, Kathy Chambers
    • 20 October 2022
    10 Comments

    With very little public debate or consultation, Victoria has repealed almost all laws relating to prostitution. Alone among all recreational activities, sex for payment is now unrestricted, even regarding health and safety. If we really care what happens to people, what place does sex work have in our society?

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  • RELIGION

    Catholics and freedom of religion

    • John Warhurst
    • 13 October 2022
    13 Comments

    Freedom of religion, a matter of national interest still to be resolved successfully in the Federal Parliament, has yet again become a focus for the nation’s football codes. The Essendon controversy has demonstrated how it is issues with a religious-cultural component, not economic issues, which most polarize our society and are the most difficult for politics to resolve harmoniously. 

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Civil disagreement on a hill

    • David Halliday
    • 10 October 2022

    Last week, in a pluralistic and diverse, multi-ethnic, multi-faith society, a person was considered ill-fitting for employment, not because of their track record, but because of their outward association with a mainstream religion.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    The republic and the crown

    • Julian Butler
    • 06 October 2022
    4 Comments

    There is no popular groundswell for constitutional change in the direction of a republic just at this moment. The parliamentary recess, the proclamation by the Governor General of our fealty to the new King, and the public holiday were all a bit embarrassing. The parade being over, we can go back to gawking at the Royal Family much like Americans do. The question of what monarchy means for us feels best left alone for a while.  

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Reassessing assessments in an era of anxiety

    • Sarah Klenbort
    • 03 October 2022
    4 Comments

    Assessments serve a valuable purpose: they give us a way to measure what students are learning. The problem is, they don’t seem to be learning. According to the Australian Council for Educational Research, recent results confirm that Australian 15 year-olds continue to show significant declines in math, reading and science when measured against their international counterparts. Australian students are learning less, and at the same time, never have we seen such an emphasis on assessments in schools. 

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Stray thoughts: Striving for solemnity

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 03 October 2022

    In the last few weeks, we have been drowned, smothered or mired in words that have striven for solemnity. Such occasions as the death of Queen Elizabeth II and the various Grand Finals are held to transcend the everyday and so to demand elegiac or epic words. It is easy to laugh at the manifest failures to reach those heights, whether by Poets Laureate who should have known better, or by excitable journalists. There is, however, something endearingly human in the attempt.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Devaluing freedom

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 29 September 2022
    8 Comments

    Recently many people have expressed disquiet about the trend to authoritarian rule throughout the world. They have good reason for doing so. In the world we are entering, the freedom of citizens in the State depends on the will of Governments that will have no enforceable obstacle to withdrawing such freedoms on suspicion of future misconduct and not just for punishment of past, proven misconduct. 

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    The empty echo chamber: A conversation with Dr Axel Bruns

    • David Halliday, Axel Bruns
    • 22 September 2022

    Despite our differing social and cultural beliefs, we can mostly agree that we live in highly polarised times. But what divides us? ARC Laureate Fellow Prof. Axel Bruns studies social polarisation, and in this discussion we explore the drivers of polarisation, examining the role that digital and social media and broader social and political contexts play in intensifying social conflicts, threatening economic prosperity, undermining public trust, and ultimately destabilising societies.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Venerable shards from Broken Hill

    • Bernard Appassamy
    • 20 September 2022

    The shards are earthenware with geometric or figurative coloured patterns. Their cracked glazes and ragged edges echo the outback raw aesthetic, and allude to the ongoing challenging narratives of Broken Hill. Now they are sitting large on my desk claiming a distinctive extraction value from a mining city, and whispering, like books on a homely shelf, an intimate lasting merit.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    The book corner: Reappropriating stolen memory

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 16 September 2022
    1 Comment

    Joel Birnie’s short and admirable book provokes reflection both on what should have mattered in the relationships between colonial invaders and Indigenous peoples in the nineteenth century and on what matters in the relationships that constitute Australia today. 

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  • RELIGION

    Church reform and the monarchy

    • John Warhurst
    • 13 September 2022
    7 Comments

    Republican sentiments from prominent Australians did not ever preclude great personal admiration for Queen Elizabeth for her devotion and service. Now, following her death, attention has particularly turned to her Christian faith. Following the lead of Pope Francis, the Australian bishops have joined in widespread community admiration. Pope Francis spoke of ‘her steadfast witness of faith in Jesus Christ and her firm hope in her promises’.   

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