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Australian Politics at a CrossroadsProspects for Change
Edited By Matteo Bonotti, Narelle MiragliottaCopyright 2024
ISBN 9781003394686
312 Pages 12 B/W Illustrations
Published February 28, 2024 by Routledge
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Description
As the 21st century proceeds apace, Australia faces new and old challenges, both domestically and internationally. These include managing complex governance issues, preventing democratic fracture, balancing an ever- shifting geopolitical strategic order, addressing the recognition and identity demands of marginalised groups, and responding to crises and urgent policy challenges, such as climate change.
Bonotti, Miragliotta, and the other contributors to this volume analyse and evaluate the challenges which confront Australia by locating them in their national and comparative context. The various contributions reveal that while these challenges are neither novel nor unique to Australia, the way in which they manifest and Australia’s responses to them are shaped by the country’s distinctive history, culture, geography, location, and size.
The chapters offer a cutting- edge analysis of these pressing challenges faced by Australia and offer reflections on how to address them. The book is a valuable resource for scholars and students of Australian politics, and of comparative politics in a global perspective.
Table of Contents
Introduction
Matteo Bonotti and Narelle Miragliotta
Part One: Australian Governance and its Challenges
1. A Party System in Crisis? Assessing the State of the Australian Party System [Narelle Miragliotta and Finley Watson]
2. The Challenges Facing Australian Federalism [Alan Fenna]
3. Australian Governance in an Era of Leadership Instability [Paul Strangio and James Walter]
Part Two: Making Australian Democracy Work – Trust, Integrity and Civility
4. The Challenge of Political Trust [Josh Holloway and Rob Manwaring]
5. Promise Breakers? Rebuilding Trust in Our Government [Frank Algra-Maschio and Robert Thomson]
6. The Integrity Debate in Australia: Perspectives from the Parliamentary Inquiry into the National Anticorruption Commission (NACC) [Zim Nwokora]
7. Incivility in Australia: Challenges and Opportunities [Matteo Bonotti and Steven T. Zech]
Part Three: Australia’s Policy Issues in a Global Context: Climate Change, Migration and Geopolitical Security
8. Turning the Tide on Australian Climate Action [Nathan Fioritti and Robert Thomson]
9. Building a Fair Future: Transforming Immigration Policy for Refugees and Families [Matthew Lister]
10. Exogenous Crises and Australia’s Development Policy [Eleanor Gordon, Samanthi J. Gunawardana and Lauren Lowe]
11. Global Canberra: Leveraging Australia’s Strategic Partnerships [Remy Davison]
12. Nuclear dangers: Australia’s role in global efforts for non-proliferation and disarmament [Marianne Hanson and Maria Rost Rublee]
Part Four: Australia’s Systemic Social Issues: Inequality, Disadvantage and Discrimination
13. Income Inequality in Australia [Nicholas Barry]
14. The Participation of Young People in Australian Politics [Katrina Lee-Koo, Luke Dean and Zareh Ghazarian]
15. Australia's Woman Problem? The Rise and Fall of Gender Equality [Blair Williams]
16. Speaking with Two Voices: ‘We, the People(s) of Australia’? [Paul Muldoon]
17. Australian Republicanism and the Colonial Fracture: Post-Colonial Nationalist and Decolonial Critiques of Monarchy [Ben Wellings]
Editor(s)
Biography
Matteo Bonotti is a Senior Lecturer in Politics and International Relations at Monash University. His research interests include political liberalism, linguistic justice, free speech, civility, food justice, and democratic theory. His work has appeared in journals such as the American Political Science Review, the Journal of Politics, the British Journal of Political Science, and Political Studies. He is the author of Partisanship and Political Liberalism in Diverse Societies (Oxford University Press, 2017), the co-author of Healthy Eating Politics and Political Philosophy: A Public Reason Approach (Oxford University Press, 2021) and Recovering Civility during COVID- 19 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2021), and the co-editor of A Century of Compulsory Voting in Australia: Genesis, Impact and Future (Palgrave Macmillan, 2021).
Narelle Miragliotta is a Senior Lecturer in Politics and International Relations at Monash University. Narelle’s research spans the study of Australian and liberal democratic political institutions, partcularly constitutions, political parties, parliament, elections and electoral systems. Her work has appeared in journals such as Party Politics, Governance, Electoral Studies, Environmental Politics, Parliamentary Affairs, Government and Opposition, Politics, and the Australian Journal of Political Science.
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Book Series
This book is included in the following book series:Routledge Advances in International Relations and Global Politics
Related Subjects
Comparative Politics Government International Relations Politics & International Relations
Dr Nicholas Barry has examined why income inequality is a policy problem in Australia
The gap between Australia’s rich and poor is growing. The average disposable income of the top-earning 20 percent of households is now almost six times more than the lowest 20 percent.
Dr Nicholas Barry, Senior Lecturer in Politics, has written a book chapter for ‘Australian Politics at a Crossroads’, examining why income inequality is a policy problem in Australia.
“Since the 1970s, there has been greater inequality in wages and salaries, with high-income earners experiencing greater gains than low and middle-income earners,” Dr Barry explains. “Combined with job polarisation across households, the casualisation of work, and a fall in the percentage of full-time middle-income jobs, the result is a higher level of inequality.”
Although the impact of technological change on the nature of work has played an important role in these changes, Dr Barry says public policy has also been crucial in the growth of income inequality, particularly in areas such as industrial relations and tax policy.
“Industrial relations changes over recent decades have contributed to a decline in union membership and also made it more difficult for unions to bargain with employers, while tax cuts and other changes to the tax system mean that it is not reducing income inequality as effectively as it once did.”
“This suggests that the current distribution of income is not inevitable, but is strongly shaped by political decisions,” he says.
And while effective solutions are available, Dr Barry believes they are politically challenging in the current Australian landscape.
“We know from existing research that countries with high levels of union membership, longer periods of centre-left government and welfare states with a higher level of universalism, tend to have lower levels of income inequality,” he says.
“Australia has relatively low levels of union membership, lower rates of tax and a more residual welfare state, which means that the nation’s appetite for egalitarian political reform is limited.”
“This doesn't mean that higher levels of income inequality are inevitable in Australia,” he adds, “but it does mean that egalitarians will need to focus their efforts on political organisation – particularly around organised labour – to build a stronger movement for change.”
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