Readers interested in some of the big political ideas and trends of our time may like to listen to a recent talk on the greening of democratic politics. Hosted in Sydney by the newly-foundedInstitute for Democracy and Human Rights, it aimed...
Read MoreDeutsche Bank headquarters, Frankfurt Heike Rehm/flickr The following draft reflection on the subject of banks and democracy has been prepared for presentation at a forthcoming OECD meeting in Paris, in late-May 2013. The text is obviously much too long for any ‘normal’...
Read MoreThe following remarks on truth and democracy were presented at the opening of a brainstorming session entitled Does Truth Really Matter in Australian Politics? Political Accountability in an Era of Agitated Media. The lively, all-day gathering of journalists, academics, students and...
Read MoreWith the Dalai Lama’s visit to Sydney just around the corner, I was naturally drawn to freshreports that during the past year the Chinese authorities have been experimenting in Tibet with a new political ‘grid’ (wangge) system of neighbourhood information-gathering units,...
Read MoreABC 24 talks to Professor John Keane about Julian Assange's bid for Senate. Professor Keane spent a day with Julian Assange at the Ecuadorian embassy in London. 3 April 2013. Original Link here -> Lunch and dinner with Julian Assange, in prison...
Read MoreStrange are the times we’re living through. In matters of democracy, they feature many novel and contradictory global trends, none quite so potentially fractious as the political tension between majority rule government and public struggles to restrain and humble lethal...
Read MoreEverybody warned this would be no ordinary invitation, and they were right. Three hundred metres from Knightsbridge underground station, just a stone’s throw from fashion-conscious Harrods, I suddenly encounter a wall of police. I try to remember my instructions. Look...
Read MoreReaders might like to sample the following birthday toast in honour of the English political writer Thomas Paine (1737 – 1809). It was prepared for a dinner hosted by Graham Allen MP, Chair of the Political and Constitutional Reform Select...
Read MoreLook around, or beyond the borders where you live. You’ll probably have noticed that disquiet and disaffection are spreading through the drought fields of democracy. Political parties and legislatures are not exactly in favour. Public disenchantment with politicians and official...
Read MoreBliss was it in that spring to be alive, and to be young, on the streets, was very heaven. Or so it seemed to millions of women and men in early 2011, shortly after the first protests in Tunisia rocked...
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