I have an article in Online Opinion on Labor’s post-election prospects although my comments applicable to the entire left including the Greens. One topic I touch is the implications of slower economic growth for politics. In recent weeks we have seen a revival of the ‘secular stagnation’ thesis that due to a shortage of investment […]
From the Rudd legacy to the Gillard wars
I have an article in The Conversation about Kevin Rudd’s legacy. In the next Overland I will have a longer article on Rudd and Gillard. I don’t find Rudd particularly interesting. Even his parliamentary supporters such as Richard Marles can only tell us he was a nice bloke, at least some of the time. The […]
Superannuation & contraception in the US & Australia
In the 1980s Australian unions pursued a retirement income strategy that centered on the inclusion of superannuation in agreements with employers.
American persistence and the future of social democracy
It has been a popular meme in recent years that American power is in decline. China’s rise is impressive, although some predict a Chinese crash. However a recent report by HSBC on the world economy in 2050 casts doubt on the assumption of American decline and sheds some light on the prospects of social democracy. […]
From Freidrich Hayek to Ron Paul & Rick Santorum
How are we understand divisions in American conservatism? Of the top three candidates in the Iowa caucuses two, Ron Paul & Rick Santorum, have expressed dissent with aspects of contemporary American conservatism. The key to understanding conservative politics is that conservatism is a disposition, conservatives know what they are against rather than what they are […]
Ignoring the unemployed
Much airheadery on British riots. Some historical background provided by Gareth Steadman Jones’ Outcast London on the Victorian specter of the mob. One point. There has been much discussion of ‘social exclusion’ and the beneficial consequences of labour market participation. There is something to this although much popular discussion about social policy suffers from a […]
Obama and Gillard’s prospects compared
2010 was a difficult year for the Australian Labor Party and the American Democrats. Media coverage goes in waves; it was slow to catch up with Labor’s woes and perhaps has overstated Obama’s difficulties. Much was made of the Democrats’ poor performance in the Congressional elections. Little attention was given to the fact that they […]
Populism from Bryan to Obama
Barack Obama’s current political woes are slightly overstated, the current Democrat slump has been worsened by a panic reaction to bad economic news, even although the economic evidence viewed overall points to a continuation of the slow recovery.
The election for Americans
Wrote below for US site The Monkey Cage:
The Afghan war and the American right
Public discontent with the Afghanistan war is growing in the United States, I suggest that this is linked to the sudden upsurge in conservative preoccupation with the imagined internal Islamic threat to the United States, a threat defined not in terms of terrorism but much more unclear goals. So we have Newt Gingrich: