The release of figures today showing a dramatic fall in immigration numbers prompts the question of whether certain sections of the media are influencing government policy. Are Australian politicians allowing…
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The Conversation wraps up Clearing up the Climate Debate with a statement from our authors: the debate is over. Let’s get on with it. Over the past two weeks The Conversation has highlighted the consensus…
In the dying days of his own government, Gough Whitlam observed that Labor’s role in opposition was to win public support for the need for change, thereby raising expectations that would inevitably fail…
Christoper Monckton has returned to Australia where his unique brand of climate contrarianism is expected to get another good run in the media. At The Conversation, we’re giving him a run too, but of a…
Sometimes we just get sucked into a story. Reason, caution and scepticism sometimes just get swiftly sidelined for a story that’s captivating. And sometimes, along the gay girl in Syria, Colorado balloon…
The decision by Animals Australia/RSPCA to allow their footage of slaughter of cattle and sheep overseas raises interesting questions about how animal welfare should be managed in this country. Was it…
Western Australian author Kim Scott won the Miles Franklin Literary Award for the second time last night with his fifth novel, That Deadman Dance. Described by one judge as “post-reconciliation” fiction…
Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad made a major speech earlier this week promising major reforms in the way his country is governed in an attempt to end protests rocking the Middle Eastern country. However…
The International Monetary Fund executive board will complete interviews of the two leading candidates to replace Dominique Strauss-Kahn this week, with the aim of picking a new managing director by June…
Conversation is civilized speech. It is more purposeful than chatter; more humane than gossip; more intimate than debate. But it is an elusive ideal. In our verbal exchanges we often flip from one topic…
Even a cursory glance at Australia’s mental health system indicates shortcomings in the provision of a range of services to people with mental impairments. Since 1993, when the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity…
Tonight, during World Refugee Week, SBS One premieres Go Back to Where You Came From. Over three nights the series plunges six Australian participants into the intense fear and desperation of the refugee/asylum…
The most feared exam in the world has been dropped. For over a century those hoping to study at All Souls College in Oxford opened an envelope with trepidation to discover just one word inside. They then…
The suspension of live cattle exports to Indonesia will also have significant implications on Australian cattle farmers, Australian and Indonesian domestic markets, and on the trade relationship between…
Kurt Cobain was the messiah of my generation, the monumental talent who saved rock from the mediocrity of 1980s cock rock and hair metal. But behind his public eminence stalked a personal hell of addiction…
Radical Indonesian Muslim cleric Abu Bakar Bashir was yesterday sentenced to 15 years in jail for supporting and sponsoring terrorism. RMIT Associate Professor Jeff Lewis, an Indonesia expert, tells The…
OPEC Conference president Mohammad Aliabadi recently joined a chorus of international observers to blame speculation as the source of ongoing volatility in the global oil market. Speaking at an OPEC Conference…
Aboriginal Australians living in remote areas have, for the past five decades, experienced at close quarters the ill-effects of large scale mining, while receiving few of the benefits. From Cape York…
The Gillard government’s proposed “Malaysian solution” for dealing with asylum seekers who arrive in Australia by boat has come under considerable scrutiny. Under the agreement Australia will send 800…
To share or not to share – that is the question of moment in the AFL. The AFL Players’ Association (AFLPA) appears determined that player payments should be a percentage of league revenue. The AFL administration…
Those debating Australia’s future, and its immigration policy would do well to consider a lesson from the past. Anybody can establish a successful state, the real difficulty is maintaining its success…
Andrew “Twiggy” Forrest’s visit to Canberra earlier this week didn’t prove particularly effective in swaying the government on its freshly drafted mineral resources rent tax (MRRT) legislation. But the…
Unlike politics, unlike sport, literature doesn’t appear an obvious candidate for scandal. Most literary controversies can’t be easily packaged along the Camillagate, Zippergate, Weinergate lines; can’t…
Standard & Poor’s downgraded Greece’s sovereign debt rating by three notches on Monday, reflecting its view that it would be next to impossible to imagine a scenario where the country could restructure…
CLEARING UP THE CLIMATE DEBATE: CSIRO’s James Risbey explains why it’s not “alarmist” to describe the threat of climate change to the public and how the climate system will respond to half measures. With…