Tag: democracy
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Why are our universities undemocratic?
University mismanagement in Australia is capturing the federal government’s attention, with recent headlines exposing wage theft, inflated executive pay, exorbitant expenditure on external consultants, among other issues. It’s hard to defend the status quo. In searching for the root cause of universities’ broken governance, consider democracy, or rather the lack thereof. Australia’s public universities are…
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WA election rerun
It’s not decided yet, but the odds look good for a new WA senate election, to clear things up after the AEC’s recount discovered 1375 missing votes. (I gather from Antony Green that the AEC actually knows what these votes were, or at least how they were originally counted, but they can’t be used in the recount…
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Climate Policy and Democracy in 2013-14
Tim Dunlop argues that Labor, having lost the election, should yield to Tony Abbott’s right “to govern as he sees fit”, and help him repeal the carbon tax. According to Dunlop, the “norms of democratic governance” are at stake. I find his reasoning a bit simplistic, but I’ll get back to this. A range of new Senators…
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Compulsory voting
I have a few things to say about compulsory voting, since scrapping it has been put on the table by Queensland state government. (Oh Queensland, what would we do without you?) I happen to be a fan of compulsory voting, not because it’s the status quo, nor simply because it’s “our duty” (although that is a…
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Gun Freedom Flowchart
One of the major rationales for gun ownership in the US — I’m led to believe, against all reason and common sense — is that the government needs to be kept in check by a bunch of armed militias. Militias, you understand, are the epitome of democratic process. Here are my own thoughts on this…
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Multi-party politics
I’m reminded by the ACT election how much more interesting politics can be when there are more than two choices. If I lived in the US, I think I would despair at the monotony of the eternal struggle between the Democrats and Republicans. However, Australia still hasn’t truly come to terms with multi-party politics. We…
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Political imagination
For the public benefit, I shall elucidate some actual and hypothesized political systems in terms of (a) our ability to imagine them, and (b) their actual likelihood of existence. First, the status quo — a sleazy and mildly corrupt but largely representative democracy. Nobody really believes that this is actually how things are, because we’re all too…
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The price of opinion
Gina Rinehart, for all that she inspires consternation, does not strike me as a particularly deep thinker. The poetry is a giveaway. We laugh, but it does tell us something serious about the person who wrote it. For instance, consider this extract: Is our future threatened with massive debts run up by political hacks Who…
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Glossary of politics
I thought I’d iron out some common appropriations of English words and phrases as used by politicians and journalists. Let me know if you have any more suggestions. accountability. 1. (n.) The state of being duly sniped at while virtuously refraining from voicing any counterargument that would draw attention to the ridiculousness of the snipes. 2. hold to account (v.)…
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Unhinging the Bolt
I’m going to contradict myself on Andrew Bolt. In a previous post, I defended Bolt’s right to free speech, as have so many others, in the face of his court case. At the time, my esteemed nemesis, the Slightly Disgruntled Scientist, came to a different view. Since the judgement, I find myself changing my mind, and…