All posts by Frank Bongiorno
The history of referendums in Australia is riddled with failure. Albanese has much at risk – and much to gain
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article here. The Australian summer has not been kind to the proposal for a First Nations Voice to Parliament. A recent Newspoll shows a majority in favour – at 56% – but with half of those only partly in favour…
‘He was woeful’: in Bulldozed, Niki Savva catalogues Scott Morrison’s nasty, duplicitous, nutty behaviour
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article here. Niki Savva doesn’t like Scott Morrison. In the very first chapter of Bulldozed, she describes him as “petty and vindictive.” Savva was just warming up. After the revelations of Morrison having secretly taken multiple ministries, his colleagues presented…
Dreamers and schemers and the election that changed us
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article here. This is an edited extract from Dreamers and Schemers: A Political History of Australia by Frank Bongiorno, La Trobe University Press, 2022. The term “democracy sausage” first appeared in Australia in 2012. It literally referred to the practice…
The Liberal Party is in a dire state across Australia right now. That should worry us all
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article here. “The duty of an Opposition is to oppose” – attributed to Lord Randolph Churchill – is one of those quotations I remember seeing on exam papers in high school politics classes. It is true, but only half-true. Tony…
what was Bob Hawke’s 1983 National Economic Summit about?
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article here. This article is part of The Conversation’s series looking at Labor’s jobs summit. Read the other articles in the series here. The Albanese government’s Jobs and Skills Summit this week owes something to Hawke government precedent and inspiration….
Do we care enough about COVID?
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article here. The COVID-19 pandemic has already generated its own mythology. In Britain, they talk of the “myth of the blitz” – the idea of a society that pulled together in the second world war to withstand the bombs dropped…
Did Australia just make a move to the left?
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article here. Political commentators often use the idea of a political spectrum from left to right as shorthand for understanding political ideologies, parties and programs. Derived from the arrangement of the National Assembly in the French Revolution, it has been…
The story of ‘us’: there’s a great tale Labor could tell about how it would govern
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article here. Election campaigns are exercises in storytelling. Yes, they are about images, but these are usually attached to words. The stories are not normally outright lies, although we’ll certainly see a few of those on the way to May…
Tax cuts? COVID management? On the search for the Morrison government’s legacy (so far)
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article here. It is premature to be discussing the legacy of the Morrison government. While it is well behind in the polls, there is still an election to be fought. Most commentators are understandably wary of prediction, not only because…